Competency G

Core Competency G: demonstrate understanding of basic principles and standards involved in organizing information such as classification and controlled vocabulary systems, cataloging systems, metadata schemas or other systems for making information accessible to a particular clientele.

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Introduction:

It is the responsibility of information professionals to be able to retrieve information for users. However, information professionals must also need to understand how to organize information. This is because informational materials are organized to be easily retrieved later (Haycock & Sheldon, 2008). There are two main factors involved in the organization of informational materials: standards and “aboutness.”

Informational materials are usually organized using some kind of standard, which are essentially a set of rules. Standards are vital in organizational work, because they help to keep the organization of materials consistent and allow for greater collaboration among different institutions. When organizing informational materials, it is also important to capture the item’s “aboutness.” This term is used as a catch-all term to describe what an informational material is about—what information it contains, what topics/subjects it covers, and so on.

Many methods of organization exist in the LIS field, and different methods of organization are used depending on the type of material being organized.

Organization of Items in a Physical Environment:

In libraries, books are organized on shelves using classification schemes. The two main classification schemes used in most libraries are Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) and Library of Congress Classification (LC). DDC was developed by a man named Melvil Dewey in the 19th Century and is commonly used by public and school libraries; while LC was developed by the Library of Congress in the early 20th Century and is mainly used by academic libraries (Bolin, 2016; Hirsh, 2015). Both classification schemes are hierarchal: books are assigned a classification number which determines their place in a given hierarchy (Hirsh, 2015).

Both DDC and LC attempt to describe the “aboutness” of a book in one single expression. DDC only uses numbers to classify books. DDC has ten main classes of subjects, which are further divided into ten divisions, which are then divided into ten sections; creating a classification number that is three digits long (OCLC, 2018). If needed, more numbers (representing subdivisions of a topic) can be added on following a decimal to better describe the “aboutness” of a book (Bolin, 2016). The LC classification scheme on the other hand, uses a combination of letters and numbers to classify books. Letters are used to express the main subject of a book, followed by numbers to express subtopics, followed by “Cutter numbers” to represent authors (Bolin, 2016). As to be expected, these classification numbers can grow to become extremely long in some cases. However, this type of organization is necessary in a physical environment. Although DDC and LC have different categories of classes and subclasses, they still organize books in a similar logical fashion: books covering similar topics will be grouped nearer together on the shelves. This allows librarians and library users to locate additional books on a given subject easily.

Organization of Items in a Virtual Environment:

After the invention of computers and the Internet, libraries began to use online public access catalogs (OPACs) to organize the bibliographic records for their informational materials. Bibliographic records are representations of informational materials. They help to make information sorting and retrieval easier. Digital bibliographic records are created using the MAchine Readable Cataloging (MARC) standard so that they can be interpreted by computers (Hirsh, 2015). These MARC bibliographic records are then catalogued using cataloging standards such as the Anglo-American Cataloging Rules, second edition (AACR2); and more recently RDA: Resource Description and Access (usually just referred to as RDA) (Hirsh, 2015).

MARC bibliographic records contain a large number of numerical fields. The contents of these fields are governed by the cataloging rules put in place by AACR2 and RDA. MARC bibliographic records have fields that describe the physical dimensions of an item; the authors/creator/publisher of an item; and many other aspects of an item. There are even fields which list the LC and DDC classification numbers for an item (fields 050 and 082 respectively). One of the more significant parts of a MARC bibliographic record are the subject headings generally seen in the 6xx fields. The subject headings that get assigned to informational materials are usually taken from the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) list—a controlled vocabulary standard created by the Library of Congress (Bolin, 2016). The purpose of these subject headings is to describe the “aboutness” of an item. Multiple subject headings can be assigned to a MARC bibliographic record for a single item. The large number of fields that MARC bibliographic record sets contain allow librarians and library users to search for and retrieve specific types of information easily through OPACs.

Coursework/Experience that Prepared Me for this Competency:

I learned the most about the various different classification and cataloging methods in my Info 248 (Beginning Cataloging and Classification) class. It was also in this class that I learned about MARC bibliographic records, the AACR2 and RDA standards, and how to create MARC record sets. Additionally, I gained further experience with the Dewey Decimal Classification system in my public library volunteer work, as I was usually asked to locate books for library users or the librarians.

References:

Bolin, M. K. (2016). Beginning cataloging and classification. Retrieved from https://sjsu.instructure.com.

Haycock, K., & Sheldon, B. E. (Eds.) (2008). The portable MLIS: Insights from the experts. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited.

Hirsh, S. (Ed.). (2015). Information services today: An introduction. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

Online Computer Library Center. (2018). Dewey Decimal Classification Summaries. Retrieved from https://www.oclc.org/en/dewey/features/summaries.html

Evidence:

1. Info 248 Cataloging and Classification Exercises

The first piece of evidence that I am submitting for competency G is a series of exercises that I completed in Info 248 (Beginning Cataloging and Classification).

The first two exercises included in the document were ones in which I had to provide field explanations for a name authority record and a subject authority record. Name authority records and subject authority records are additional types of MARC records which provide standardized forms for names and subject headings. These standardized names and subject headings are what gets inputted into MARC bibliographic record sets. These two exercises required me to look up the official rules for the MARC record fields. These two exercises establish my understanding of the various MARC record fields and what pieces of information they describe. Having knowledge of the various authority records and MARC fields is important in understanding how to assemble a MARC bibliographic record set.

My third exercise included in the evidence document is one where I had to determine the DDC and LC classification numbers for three books. To determine DDC and LC classification numbers, I had to first identify the “aboutness” of the book. This required me to determine what subject(s) the books covered, which I then used to look up classification numbers created by DDC and LC through various reference sources. This exercise establishes my understanding of how DDC and LC classification numbers are put together to describe the “aboutness” of a book. All three of these exercises demonstrate my knowledge of the official standards used to organize materials in a virtual or physical environment.

All three exercises can be found in the document I have included below.

2. Info 248 LCC and DCC MARC Record Set

The second piece of evidence that I am submitting towards competency G is the final assignment from Info 248 (Beginning Cataloging and Classification) that is titled "LCC-DCC MARC Record Set".

For this final assignment I was tasked with creating MARC bibliographic records for a collection of 18 books. I was also asked to include an explanation of the DCC and LC classification numbers for all 18 books. This final assignment required me to use OCLC Connexion to create a MARC bibliographic record for each book. To create this 18-item MARC record set, I closely followed the official cataloging standards established by AACR2 and RDA. My completion of this assignment demonstrates my knowledge of cataloging standards and how they are used to organize information in a virtual environment. This assignment also demonstrates my ability to apply official standards to MARC records to make them accessible through OPACs—thus making the information they contain accessible to librarians and library users.

The entire MARC record set document can be found below.

3. Info 202 Bibliographic Database (Group Project)

My final piece of evidence is a group assignment from Info 202 (Information Retrieval System Design). For this assignment, my teammates and I were responsible for creating a controlled vocabulary list of subject terms for 20 scholarly articles. We were then tasked with creating a bibliographic database for this collection of articles, and were further tasked with querying and evaluating the database. In this group project, I was responsible for devising subject terms for 7 out of the 20 articles, although we later refined the entire set of subject terms as a group. I was also responsible for the creation of the database itself in WebData Pro; writing up topics 3 and 4 under the query and evaluation section; and writing part of the reflection section (listed under my name).

Although we did not reference any official standards or use any official subject terms for this assignment, completing this group project gave my teammates and I practice in creating a list of controlled vocabulary. This assignment also revealed to us the difficulty in creating subject terms to accurately describe the “aboutness” of informational materials. Despite the challenges, this assignment showed us the importance in having a shared set of standards to make information accessible to clientele. I submit this assignment towards competency G to demonstrate my understanding of the basic organizational principles and how they can be used to make information more easily accessible.

I have removed access to the group report to due to privacy reasons. However, I am able to include a link to screenshots of the database itself.

Conclusion:

Having knowledge of how informational materials are organized is an important skill for any information professional in any environment. As an aspiring public librarian, having knowledge of the Dewey Decimal Classification system alone will not be enough. I will also need to know how to use OPACs, which requires an understanding of how MARC record sets are structured. However, it is inevitable that new forms of organization will be created over the years in an attempt to streamline access to information. Perhaps in the future, MARC record sets will be replaced with an entirely different organizational system. I will have to keep an eye out for these new methods of organization in my future career.