[OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] Evergreen and book groups

[Kate Sheehan]

Hi everyone, 

I'm looking for best practices for getting materials together for book
groups. Our libraries seem to have book groups of two flavors. 

 

The more traditional book groups have a set list of members and are either
run by the library or in some way connected to the library. The book group
members can simply place holds on the title for the month and Evergreen does
the rest. Sometimes, the library staff will place multiple holds for a title
using a book group card, and when the items arrive, they check them out to
the various members and cancel  the book group card's hold. That seems to be
working relatively well. 

 

The book groups that are more like open book discussions are a little
trickier. For these groups, the library will pick a title and hold a book
discussion or lecture on a particular date. For about a month before that
day, they want to have a bunch of extra copies of the book on display. They
can do this with more traditional ILL methods, but we've been looking for
ways to make it work in Evergreen. One library tried manually giving all the
copies they requested a status of "On Hold Shelf" which worked until an
owning library wondered where their book was (since it wasn't actually on
that library's hold shelf, Evergreen didn't say which hold shelf it was on).


 

It's possible to check all of the copies out to a fake book group card, then
check copies out to individuals and override the error message. Some of our
libraries have said they dislike that method because it's too easy to leave
it checked out to the fake card and not know who has the book. Checking it
back in from the fake card before checking it out runs the risk of
triggering transits and holds. 

 

So, how does your consortium handle book groups, especially those without
set membership? 

 

We're appreciative of any insight you can provide - who knew book groups
would be so complicated?

Thanks, 

Kate

 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Kate Sheehan

Open Source Implementation Coordinator

Bibliomation, Inc. 

32 Crest Rd. 

Middlebury, CT 06762

biblio.org

 

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