Lowest or Highest Common Denominator
Posted by: Sara Rofofsky Marcus
When performing collection development, or teaching a lesson, or anything in-between, do you aim for the highest performing patron, the lowest performing patron, or somewhere in between? For example, do you only purchase those items that suit the needs of the lowest reading level, forcing others to go ‘down’ or do you purchase only those for the highest (and often most scholarly) forcing others to stretch – sometimes far beyond their means? Is there a happy ratio? If so, what is that ratio? Especially in today’s budget crisis, how do you get the materials that suit all?
May 6th, 2010 at 9:41 am
Since our users have a wide range of literacy skills, we need to provide all of the above. Most materials will fall in the middle, but we also need to support the high-end and low-end users. The larger the collection budget, the easier this is to do. However, with small budgets, the majority of what we purchase will be at the reading level of the average user, with only a few at the high-end scholary level.
Low end users are actually easier to deal with, because materials purchased for the average reader in the K-12 spectrum are also appropriate for adults with low reading levels. It is the high-end, very scholarly user who presents the biggest problem, since materials purchased for those users will probably not be read by very many others — and those materials also tend to be more expensive.
Like all collection development, it is a balancing act.