By Barbara Coopey, assistant head, Access Services

Spring 2013 was the first semester with floating collection in production at 19 campus libraries.  965,046 monographs were converted from BOOK to the BOOKFLOAT item type during the transition to a floating collection. This number will continue to increase as new books added to the general stacks areas of the campus libraries are assigned the BOOKFLOAT item type during the acquisition process.

Approximately 5,000 BOOKFLOAT items have the potential to float because they are currently checked out to users where the user’s campus library doesn’t match the item’s library. For example, Mont Alto users have 11 Hazleton books. As books are checked out and returned among the 19 libraries, the number of floating books on the shelf at a particular library is constantly changing.

The chart below shows a comparison of June and July, 2013 for the increase or decrease in the net number of floating books at a particular library. For example, Behrend had eight extra floating books on its shelf in June, but July shows a net loss of 26 floating books.

Net Loss/Gain of Floating Books

The Penn State floating collection is a group of books that are not housed permanently at a specific library, but instead are shelved at the library that most recently discharged them.