CREW
For more than 30 years, The CREW Method from the Texas State Library and Archives Commission has provided guidance to librarians and staff in small and medium sized public libraries about how to cull outdated and no longer useful materials from their collections. Since its inception in 1976, The CREW Method has become the benchmark tool for weeding library collections.
CREW stands for Continuous Review, Evaluation, and Weeding. This method has been time tested and is considered so valuable that many libraries simply refer to the CREW method as their criteria for weeding in their collection development policies. Please notice, however, that these criteria are for smaller libraries that normally do not have a heavy research emphasis.
Consider this:
Criteria for Weeding
Several factors must be considered during the weeding process. These factors include:
- The library's selected service responses and resultant goals
- The needs and demands of the library's community of users
- The availability of more suitable material
- The ability of the budget to provide funds to purchase more satisfactory items
- The relationship of a particular item to others on that subject
- Cooperative agreements with other libraries and the ability for patrons to use other libraries in the area
- The degree to which the library serves as an archive or local history center
- The possible future usefulness of a particular item
- The availability of more current information on the Internet
- The ability of the library to borrow the item through interlibrary loan
MUSTIE
MUSTIE is an easily remembered acronym for six negative factors that frequently ruin a book's usefulness and make it a prime candidate for weeding:
M = Misleading (and/or factually inaccurate)
U = Ugly (worn and beyond mending or rebinding)
S = Superseded (by a truly new edition or by a much better book on the subject)
T = Trivial (of no discernible literary or scientific merit; usually of ephemeral interest at some time in the past)
I = Irrelevant to the needs and interests of your community
E = The material or information may be obtained expeditiously Elsewhere through interlibrary loan, reciprocal borrowing, or in electronic format.
CREW: A Weeding Manual for Modern Libraries. http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/ld/pubs/crew Texas State Library and Archives Commission Page 47 of 93 It is helpful to understand the MUSTIE elements, as these can be the most difficult for library staff to base weeding decisions on.
