What grade does your media collection get?

How many times has a patron handed in an audiobook and informed circulation that one out of the 30 discs didn’t play – but, sorry, they don’t recall which disc was the problem? Or have you taken items out of the library yourself, only to be disappointed by the frequent skipping and freezing… or worse, total silence?

A visual solution, like a library media report card, can significantly improve patron library experience by:

• giving patrons an outlet to report any problems they’ve encountered
• increasing chances of reporting by placing “report cards” with the media (at the point of need)
• saving library staff & volunteers time identifying problem items at check in
• improving collection quality by repairing, replacing, or withdrawing items (thanks to patron review and reporting)

The idea for a media report card came to me one dark and frustrating night. My mother, sister, and I had planned a lady’s night in and I had checked out a period piece – that, miraculously, none of us had already seen – for the occasion.
 

It was a bumpy start.

The film froze several times in the first fifteen minutes, so we changed rooms and DVD players and eventually managed to skip past the bumpy beginnings. Soon my mother, sister, and I found ourselves lost in the story. We were enthralled and eagerly anticipating our sugar coated ending when, in the final ten minutes, the DVD froze. Noooo!!!

Desperately, we tried all the tricks:  fast forwarding over it, skipping ahead a chapter then rewinding, turning the DVD player off and on again, switching DVD players, gently cleaning the DVD, etc. Nothing helped. After an hour of trying we called it quits.
 

Having talked up the library to my family sometime beforehand (because none of my family are library users) I was incredibly embarrassed and disappointed. How many times had our library patron’s “relaxing” evenings come to a similarly scratchy halt? How could I keep recommending library media if this was the quality of the items going out? This wasn’t the first scratched DVD / CD I had checked out, but this was the first time it happened in company.

I wished we had some system to report problem DVDs the moment patrons encountered problems, so that the library and patrons could pro-actively improve our media collection and the user experience. The media report card was born.

My first report card asked:

“How do I play?

• great
• skips / freezes
• wouldn't play

Which disc?  ___

After some trial and error, we removed the “great” option (as it was starting to waste paper), but we were thrilled with the positive patron feedback to our new DVD cleaning program. I was even more pleased to see other neighboring libraries pick up the system for their media collections.

Manheim Township Public Library of Lancaster Pennsylvania is the latest to adopt the system – putting their own stamp on it - and I am thrilled!

DVDs awaiting resurfacing thanks to the new media report cards

My only suggestions for visual improvement would be to increase the point size of the font and check boxes to report scratched or frozen discs and cut some words below – so that the patron’s eye can identify the paper’s purpose and use quickly.

What do you think? How has your library improved the quality of their media user experience? What grade would your library media collections receive?   

~Jessica Gutacker 
Franklin & Marshall College Library
Manheim Township Public Library