The Agricultural Book Collection of Ladislao N. Diwa Memorial Library and Museum: An Evaluation Through Collection Mapping

Costa, Leonita C (2004). The Agricultural Book Collection of Ladislao N. Diwa Memorial Library and Museum: An Evaluation Through Collection Mapping. Unpublished Master’s Thesis. University of the Philippines, Diliman, Q.C.

The Problem and Methodology

The collection of an academic library is largely based on the degree programs offered by its institution. To determine if the agricultural book collection of Ladislao N. Diwa Memorial Library and Museum collection adequately support the degree programs offered at the University, the researcher evaluated the book collection. By assigning call numbers to agriculture courses of the degree programs using the Library of Congress Classification system (LCC), the researcher mapped the collection to the courses to determine the total number of titles and volumes per subject area.

Findings and Conclusions

The researcher found out that ninety six percent of the collection is relevant to Bachelor of Science in Agriculture and only four percent, for other courses offered under College of Agriculture. The decade of 1991 to 2000 had the highest number of collection was acquired during this decade (474 titles or 49.63 %). The reason for this is that the majority of the major course offerings of the College of Agriculture were offered during this decade. The decade 1981 to 1990 had the highest number of collection with 275 and 605 volumes, followed by the decade 1971 to 1980 with 134 titles and 451 volumes. A very small number of collection was acquired in the decade of 1961 to 1970 with 26 titles, and 16 titles from 1951 to 1960. The collection showed strong support for the subject areas of: Marketing of Agricultural Products, Agriculture, Finance, Development, Mechanics and Utilization and Operation of Credit Institution, Fundamentals of Agronomic crop Production; and Farm Management. The collection in these areas, though, need to be continuously developed, most especially for required courses to serve the increasing student population more efficiently. More books should be acquired in areas where collection is deemed weak. To evaluate the collection quantitatively, the researcher utilized the Guidelines on the Establishment of new Libraries. Data showed that library holdings for College of Agriculture only had 955 titles which are very much lower than the required number of book collection in the guidelines. It further indicated that the library of Cavite State University does not have enough resources in terms of book collection to support the curricular offerings of the College of Agriculture.

Recommendations

After evaluating the library, researcher offered the following recommendations:

1. Faculty must be encouraged to look into the areas of their own expertise and recommend book titles or suggest ways to further develop the specific collection;

2. Study the pattern of enrollment statistics and take into consideration the course with high enrollees and courses that are not taken by the students. Thus, book collection must be developed in the subject areas actually needed by the students;

3. The decline in collection building in the year 2001 and onwards can be attributed to the high prices of books and lack of adequate budget. It is recommended that financial resources be tapped for collection development. These include friends of the library, agriculture alumni and other similar organizations. In this regard, the librarian will know what collection needs to be developed so that the library budget for book acquisitions maybe better allotted.

4. Standards or formulas to measure the library’s collection and services be required as one of the criteria that agricultural schools must meet before they are given accreditation. Standards should be realistic, taking into consideration the Philippine setting for collection development.

Computerization and Modernization in Government Agricultural Libraries within Metro Manila: A Survey

Cañezal, Jennifer Cabangan (2004). Computerization and Modernization in Government Agricultural Libraries within Metro Manila: A Survey. Unpublished Master’s Thesis. University of the Philippines, Diliman, Q.C.

The Problem

The objectives of the study are: 1) To identify government agricultural libraries in Metro Manila that are computerized, not-computerized and/or planning to computerize their operations; 2) To identify the predominant computer configurations as well as software employed and/or planning to be installed by these libraries; 3) To determine the conditions of access to the computerized systems; 4) To determine the extent of computerization in the government agricultural libraries in Metro Manila; 5) To identify the specific library functions/services/areas that are currently being computerized and/or planning to be computerized; 6) To determine from among the non-computerized libraries, the primary services that should be given priority in computerization; 7) To determine from among the computerized libraries the benefits derived from computerization; 8) To identify the major factors that influence and/or hinder the computerization of the government agricultural libraries in Metro Manila; and 9) To recommend innovations to further improve the computerized libraries.

Methodology

The head librarians of the 21 government agricultural libraries in metro Manila comprised the respondents of this study. The descriptive research method was used with the survey questionnaire as a data gathering instrument. The questionnaire was composed of two types: Questionnaire A was intended for computerized libraries and Questionnaire B for non-computerized libraries. All of these questionnaires were personally distributed to 21 libraries in metro manila for one week and were personally collected the week after. These were supplemented by interviews and observations during the actual library visits. The data gathered were organized, tabulated, analyzed, and interpreted using frequencies, percentages and ranking to carry out the objectives of the study.

Findings

A total of 18 head librarians responded out of the targeted respondents. Three out of the 18 reported that they were already computerized while the remaining 15 are still in the process of planning computerization. Two of the computerized libraries implemented their system in the late 1990s while the other one started only in January 2002. Although they are partially automated, the process of implementation had been proceeding smoothly. Cataloging and indexing were mostly the processes that are computerized in these libraries. The main factor influencing the decision for computerization was the goals and objectives of the library/organization whereas, financial resources seemed to be the common factor influencing the non-implementation of the non-computerized libraries computerization plan.

Development of an SDI Service for Agricultural Scientists in the PCARR Network

Researcher: LILIA S. GALANG

Course: Master of Library Science

School: University of the Philippines, Quezon City

Subject Area: Library Services

Year of Graduation: 1980

Attitudes and Perceptions of Information Specialists and Users towards various Aspects of the Agricultural Information Bank for Asia: A Survey

Researcher: BENEFA M. DAYAO

Course: Master of Library Science

School: University of the Philippines, Quezon City

Subject Area: Agricultural Libraries

Year of Graduation: 1978

A Study of the Information Needs and Uses of Agricultural Scientists in the University of the Philippines at Los Banos

Researcher: JOSEPHINE C. SISON

Course: Master of Library Science

School: University of the Philippines, Philippines

Subject Area: Information Needs Assessment

Year of Graduation: 1978