An Assessment of the Issues in Collection Security Management in College Libraries

Abstract

Libraries are the soul of educational institutions and play a dynamic role by providing resources and services. Traditional libraries are still a reality in the college libraries of Karnataka where the students are more dependent on the print library collection for their academic activities. In order to satisfy the needs of the users college libraries have to acquire and maintain large print collection. With available library staff managing the large print collection and the enormous users is a difficult task. The problem of library collection security is universal. The problem of how to ensure the security of library materials is the concern of librarians throughout library history. This research article aims to examine the library collection safety and security spanning various range of issues like nature and causes of security threats, types of collection security threats, methods adopted, measures to control and solutions for collection security mismanagement. This article will serve as means of awakening and strengthening the attention of library managers about collection security. The scope of this article is limited to 53 colleges affiliated to University of Mysore, Karnataka, India. 455 Post Graduate (PG) students from the sample population. Survey method is used to gather the opinion, attitudes and behavior of the respondents towards collection security using a structured questionnaire. Likert’s scale is adopted to collect rated responses from the users of colleges under the study.