Good Stewards in Trying Times: Benchmarking Peer Collections of Sociology Reference Sources Using LibGuides

Abstract

This article describes a method for using LibGuides as a tool for collection development by benchmarking peer (Carnegie or other classification) institutions’ reference resource recommendations. The results of this benchmarking can be used to build strong, compact collections. Although the focuses of this study are on building and maintaining of a sociology reference collection, the method transfers directly to other subject areas.

Keywords:

• reference collections
• peer collection assessment
• LibGuides
• sociology

Notes

© Susan Metcalf