THE IMPACT OF ONLINE GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS ON GEOSCIENCE LIBRARY COLLECTIONS

Government documents are an important part of an academic research library collection in the geosciences. Many libraries expect to receive these materials through the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP). For a number of reasons, however, online publications have so far not been "distributed" in a consistent manner via the FDLP. With the advent of online publishing and a lack of "active" distribution strategies, it is becoming more difficult to ensure that users will discover federal government publications via traditional library tools like the online catalog.

Given the discovery that hundreds of U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) online publications were missing from the collection at the Fletcher L. Byrom Earth & Mineral Sciences Library at the Pennsylvania State University, an investigation was undertaken to determine how widespread the problem of the "hidden" document really is. In the end a list of more than 1300 online documents was compiled, including over 760 items to be added to our library catalog. A subset of this list included 240 items not found in our catalog or on the USGS list of online publications. Further investigation was undertaken in order to determine whether or not these 240 "missing" USGS documents could be located utilizing other library research and collection management tools. For example, each item was searched for in GeoRef, several other academic library catalogs, WorldCat, and the Catalog of U.S. Publications.

Background information about online government documents and the FDLP, as well as the investigation process and results mentioned above, and suggestions for dealing with online government documents will be discussed in this presentation. In addition links to a downloadable file, compiled by the presenter, containing more detailed information about these "hidden" documents will also be provided.