Collection Development Policy

The Library facilitates equitable access to resources that support deep research and serendipitous discovery. To ensure our decisions are consistent, transparent, and aligned with our mission, we employ the following guiding principles for the selection and retention of library materials:

Promote the College’s Mission

The Davidson College Library provides collections and resources that foster student learning and advance campus teaching and research. In doing so, the Library directly contributes to the college’s broader goal of “assist[ing] students in developing humane instincts and disciplined and creative minds for lives of leadership and service.” The Library’s collections provide materials for course-integrated or course-related student research, joint faculty/student research projects, independent studies, and other college-sponsored student research activities. The Library also curates and maintains a broad collection of resources that deepen the liberal arts experience and “cultivate curiosity, empathy, and intellectual bravery.” 

Actionable guidance: we prioritize curricular needs, but also seek resources that promote academic rigor -- complex scholarly works, alternative viewpoints, and the like.

Increase Educational Impact and Learner Engagement

The Library builds and curates collections to ensure maximum educational impact. Rapid changes in higher education, information technology, and publishing, along with ever-increasing costs and budgetary constraints, demand that the Library align its information resources with the college’s vision and institutional goals. In this way, the Library assists the college in reimagining the liberal arts as it evolves, responds to, meets, and anticipates student and faculty needs and interests.

Actionable guidance: we prioritize relevant, high-use material for current and evolving needs. While we prioritize curricular needs and demonstrated use over specialized research, "Learner Engagement" acknowledges the value of the "inner lives" of the community, and a portion of the budget goes to general interest reading.

Benefit from Shared Responsibility

Working together, faculty, librarians, and students create a library collection that meets the academic needs of the Davidson community. Per the college’s Constitution, faculty are vested with responsibility of guiding the collection and provide the disciplinary expertise to help select materials that support specific learning outcomes. Librarians contribute their professional expertise on the information landscape and a broad perspective on cross-campus needs. Students serve as active contributors to this process, shaping the collection’s evolution through their research, independent scholarship, and demonstrated interests.

Actionable guidance: we actively involve our stakeholders in the selection and retention process.

Highlight Distinctiveness and Diversity 

The Library intentionally curates collections that reflect the Davidson community and the global world, with a specific commitment to amplifying historically marginalized and underrepresented voices. Grounded in the ALA Library Bill of Rights, the Library strives to maintain a balanced collection that encompasses a broad range of viewpoints and embrace strategies that reflect the ALA/ARL Cultural Proficiencies for Racial Equity framework to address inequities in collection representation. 

Actionable guidance: We employ frameworks examining DEIA principles in our acquisitions and collection management practices.

Balance Access and Sustainable Stewardship 

The Library provides a vibrant research environment by balancing local ownership with integrated access to global information. The modern library is defined not by its physical holdings but by its ability to procure resources equitably and at the point of need. Through sustainable stewardship of our physical, digital and financial resources, we facilitate discovery and access across all formats while advocating for open and equitable systems of scholarly communication. 

Actionable guidance: we balance ownership (purchases, perpetual access) with broader subscription access when considering benefits to the community. We prioritize alternate access mechanisms (ILL, demand delivery) to extend the library budget and collections breadth.

Evolve Over Time

The Library maintains a dynamic collection that proactively anticipates and responds to the evolving intellectual landscape of the College. The Library is committed to strategic growth, ensuring that new academic departments, programs, and majors are supported by high-quality resources from their inception. By aligning our acquisitions with the College’s evolving vision, we ensure the collection remains a relevant reflection of Davidson’s scholarly and pedagogical priorities.

Actionable guidance: we review new and upcoming courses, majors, and concentrations  and identify existing and potential resources, working with faculty and seeking additional funding sources as needed to augment collection offerings.

The Library’s collection plays a vital role in the Library’s ability to achieve its mission to serve as the crossroads for intellectual engagement and scholarship at Davidson. The Library fulfills its mission not only by collecting new materials but also by being a good steward of its current resources and spaces. In balancing access and ownership, the Library considers the most efficient and effective options to procure resources, including robust discovery of accessible resources, Interlibrary Loan, automated document delivery, and redirecting to Open content. Davidson also relies on partnerships and consortial memberships to supplement its own collection holdings and achieve cost savings.

Monographs: The Library acquires books in print and digital formats to support the current and emerging curricular needs and research interests of the Davidson community. The Library utilizes Evidence-Based Acquisition (EBA) plans to support a wide range of eBook discovery while ensuring funds are spent on demonstrated use. Individual titles are acquired selectively based on need and to balance the collection: Faculty and students are encouraged to suggest purchases to fill specific research gaps and for course-related material. Davidson learners may also request popular reading (“Browsing Collection”) for acquisition through our partnership with Main Street Books.  

Journals/Serials: The Library maintains a balanced collection of scholarly journals to support departmental research and instructional needs. Strong preference is given to electronic format to provide the broadest access. Davidson relies on its consortial partnerships to leverage cost savings for large journal packages, increasingly focusing on opportunities for Open Access publishing by Davidson scholars. The Library privileges subscriptions that include perpetual access to subscribed content, though alternate access models are considered. Subscriptions are reviewed on a recurring cycle based on usage, cost-per-use, and curricular alignment (see “Evaluation” below).

Databases & Electronic Resources: Databases are selected to provide rich access to full-text resources, primary source material, and/or abstract & indexing services across all disciplines. Davidson prioritizes resources that directly relate to curricular focus and/or meet the research needs of multiple departments or disciplines. Electronic resources must be accessible at the institutional level (IP authentication or SSO-enabled) to be considered. 

Requests for new subscriptions (journals, databases) may be submitted to the Library at any time. Where feasible, the Library will request a trial for a specified time period for evaluation and feedback. New requests are reviewed on a periodic basis, assessed by their content, quality, relevance to curriculum, potential use by the community, cost considerations, and feasible access alternatives. Final decision on new acquisitions is made by the Assistant Director of Collections & Discovery in consultation with the Collections Strategist, Library Director and relevant department chair.

Newspapers & News Resources: The Library provides access to local, national, international, and topical news resources. The Library preferences news databases and digital backfiles to provide research access and robust searching capabilities. The Library selectively considers institutional access to media sites that serve a broad institutional need, such as The New York Times and the Chronicle of Higher Education. 

Audiovisual / Streaming Media: The Library supports streaming media for films and audio to fulfill instructional and research needs in compliance with U.S. Copyright laws. DVDs and CDs are acquired when streaming options are unavailable or unsuitable for the pedagogical need. 

Music Scores and Recordings: The Library acquires music resources to support interdisciplinary needs in music performance, theory and composition, history and literature, and digital music studies. The Library maintains a strong preference for physical scores, while CD and DVD are preferred formats for audiovisual resources. We generally do not collect analog recording formats (e.g. vinyl records, cassette tapes, VHS cassettes, etc.).

Other Resources

• Course Material: to support institutional goals for affordable educational resources, the Library collects required texts for courses upon instructor notification or as otherwise identified. The Library does not automatically collect textbooks due to high costs, publisher restrictions/limited licenses, and rapid obsolescence; but will review faculty course requests on a per-case basis.
• Open Access: The Library supports the "evolving scholarly publishing ecosystem" by funding Open Access publishing initiatives, supporting diverse and accessible open access initiatives, and aiding the community in identifying open-access alternatives to traditional paywalled resources for research, teaching, and publication.
• College Scholarship & “Davidsoniana”: The Library celebrates the legacy and impact of the College by collecting publications by Davidson faculty, staff, and alumni. Faculty publications and published works by alumni and emeriti are acquired as part of the Library’s distinctive Davidsoniana collection. See also Archives and Special Collections’ policies relating to collections of record from and about the College and its affiliates.
• Digital Media Equipment: The Library supports (using non-collection funds) the acquisition and provision of digital media equipment for student and faculty research and learning outputs. Items in Davidson’s burgeoning “library of things” are available to the Davidson learning community subject to specific circulation policies. For more details, see Digital Learning & Scholarship's guide.
• Government Documents: As a selective depository for U.S. Government Documents since 1893, the Library provides access to federal publications in digital and print formats to support research in government and social sciences.
• Gifts: The Library accepts limited items for the general collection that meet current and anticipated curricular and research needs or that contribute to the historical record of the college. We reserve the right to decline gifts of materials that do not meet current collection goals and policies. See Davidson’s Gift-In-Kind Donation policy for further information.
• Replacement: Lost, missing, or damaged physical items are selectively reviewed for re-acquisition based on current selection criteria and demonstrated curricular or research need. Items for which the Library has a standing print retention commitment will be repaired or replaced to best extent possible.

The Library engages in the continuous and systematic evaluation of collections to ensure its resources remain robust, relevant, and responsive to the evolving needs of the academic community. This consultative process, led by librarians in collaboration with faculty, balances the acquisition of new materials with the strategic reappraisal of existing holdings. 

Digital subscriptions, including journals and databases, represent a significant and ongoing financial commitment that is reviewed annually to ensure sustainable budget allocation. This evaluation involves gathering detailed usage data and cost-per-use analysis to identify low-impact resources, with specific attention given to content relevancy, cross-platform discovery, compliance with accessibility standards (WCAG 2.1 AA), and the availability of cost-effective access alternatives. Because subscription price increases outpace budget growth, this review process is essential for supporting emerging curricular needs and making space for new scholarly resources. 

For the physical collection, the Library undertakes periodic and phased reviews designed to maintain a vibrant and relevant research environment. With the addition of the Library Annex to securely store and effectively manage physical collections, the Library is able to optimize space in the main library while stewarding resources deemed to have enduring value to the college. However, constraints in both budget and space necessitate ongoing evaluation of the existing collection to ensure that the collection as a whole remains relevant, current, and true to the Library’s mission.

Deselection decisions are informed by objective criteria including physical condition, circulation history, and the availability of stable digital surrogates or consortial copies. The Library generally prioritizes the retention of materials that are unique, historically significant to the College, representative of a diversity of perspectives through time and subject matter, or are part of long-term preservation commitments through shared retention programs like the Eastern Academic Scholars’ Trust (EAST). Materials may be candidates for withdrawal if they are superseded by revised editions, are duplicative without high-demand justification, or contain obsolete information that no longer supports current scholarship. 

To safeguard long-term access, the Library coordinates these maintenance efforts with digital stewardship initiatives such as HathiTrust and shared print retention programs like EAST, ensuring that locally deselected titles remain available to the Davidson community through trusted consortial partners.

• Archives & Special Collections Collection Development Policy
• College Scholarship : Guiding Principles  (2024)
• Format Duplication Policy   (2021 - scheduled for review fall 2026)
• Media Digitization Policy  (rev. 2026)
• Gift-in-Kind Donation Policy  (rev. 2023)
• Reconsideration Policy  (2025)
• Collection Management & Deselection Procedures - (forthcoming Summer 2026)

To ensure that the Library’s collections and policies continue to serve the curricular and research needs of Davidson students, faculty, and staff, this policy is reviewed biennially by Davidson College Library’s Research Collections Strategies team. Revisions to policy are reviewed by library staff as well as the library faculty committee prior to implementation.