PARS Forum: Collections Security

Undergraduate students wearing white glovesgather around tables where photographic materials are laid out.
Undergraduate students encounter primary sources at Ohio University’s Mahn Center for Archives and Special Collections. Like many reading rooms, the Mahn Center is grappling with how to provide access while minimizing risk to rare materials.

The ALCTS Preservation & Reformatting Section hosted a forum on collections security during the 2019 ALA Annual Conference in Washington, DC. Presenters from two institutions, Ohio University and Yale University, described how they balance their responsibility to provide access to special collections, simultaneously providing a welcoming and inclusive environment to researchers while minimizing security risks to rare and unique materials.

What Do We Mean by Security? Questioning Assumptions at Ohio University

Miriam Nelson, Stacey Lavender, and Miriam Intrator presented on how Ohio University (OU) reexamined security issues and implemented significant changes using the Association of College & Research Libraries Rare Book & Manuscript Section (ACRL RBMS) Security Audit to refocus staff on security issues. The library wanted to initiate a frank and open conversation to approach the topic of security and was not looking for specific answer as much as a process and a way to ultimately challenge OU staff assumptions about security and other threats to the collections.

Like many institutions, the Mahn Center for Archives and Special Collections was continuing to enact legacy system for collections security. Good aspects of the system included a designated reading room, separate reception area, and lockers for researchers. Not-so-good aspects included poor sight lines, leaving the reading room unsupervised during paging, and inconsistent implementation of policies and procedures.

Mahn Center staff approached the issue of collection security by examining assumptions, asking: Are we secure? Are staff following procedures? Are procedures aligned with best practices?

Using the ACRL RBMS Security Audit, they developed a simple 9-question anonymous survey for staff to fill out. Results of the audit revealed a lack of shared expectation:

  • All respondents ranked accidental damage as a top threat to collections.
  • 75% thought security very important.
  • 50% answered they were not confident in their ability to handle theft.
  • 50% were slightly uncomfortable with implementing security measures.

Next steps were to have staff “get on same page” about the results of the survey. This included a need to shift focus from theft prevention to preservation, improve reference training, design thorough handling instructions for all patrons, have regular check-ins with patrons, and finally encourage patrons to ask questions.

Picture Yourself Here: Increased Access & Security at the Beinecke Library

Moira Fitzgerald, head of access services at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, presented on behalf of Yale University. The presentation began with a picture of the reading room at Beinecke Library that had been posted to social media with the caption “Picture yourself here!” As Fitzgerald explained, posting this picture would not have been possible five years ago, and many factors led to the significant change.

A building renovation gave the university and the library the opportunity to rethink how things were going in terms of security. After two high-profile thefts, security had to be examined. At the same time, staff wanted to encourage more undergraduate use and open up the library to the larger community at Yale and beyond into New Haven.

Along with the building renovation, the library hired a director of communications (the publisher of the “Picture yourself here” post). The first thing the director did was to conduct a staff and user survey to gauge the welcome that users felt. The survey results showed that users rated Yale well compared with other special collections libraries they had used, but that undergraduates did not feel welcome and found security off-putting.

Recognizing the different experiences of experienced researchers and inexperienced researchers, library staff developed a customer service workshop whose purpose was to help the library change the focus from “you can’t do this or that” to “what you can do at the library.” The workshop included scenarios demonstrating how library staff, including security staff, can provide instruction on handling materials, using lockers, and following security procedures using positive language.

A Monitoring Task Force was set up to look at handling guidelines using positive wording, things to watch out for when monitoring users, and how to spot unusual behavior in terms of theft. These guidelines became important as more courses and events were happening at the library, including large open houses for the larger community. These kinds of events, where there is more exposure to risk, provided a good test for the new monitoring protocols.

The director of communications has moved to make access to the collections more open, while also explaining increased security and why it’s important to the public. Security is an ongoing process, and communication with patrons is critical in that process. Preservation does not have to be a barrier to access, and the balance between security and access is not an exact science.

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