What qualities would you look for in preferred school library suppliers?

In our library we use follett for our main catalogue and borrowbox for our ebooks and audiobooks. We used to use Wheelers, but we have found it too expensive to keepo both borrowbox and wheelers for eresources. The follett library management system can be accessed 24/7 from anywhere, for print and ebooks, it links more than one campus K-12 which suits our school context and there is also a build in program that encourages independent reading and can be used with bookclubs and reading classes. The access is convenient and considering our school is BYOD, it can be easily accessed by all at the school on an indvidual device.

ebook/audiobook suppliers

Ease of access for patrons is a good place to start if looking at a supplier of ebooks and audiobooks. At our library we use Borrowbox which we favour for a number of reasons. It has some very useful features such as when you hover on the book image, a summary of relevant information pops up. You can also preview listening to the audiobooks which is important, as they need to be attractive and user- friendly. Audiobooks are expensive so it is an important decision. You can also check how many times expiring titles have been used in the borrowbox administration eplatform, which is a useful output measure when considering budget expenditure. Considering the collection within the catalogue of the supplier is also quite important. For example, we favour borrowbox as many titles included in their catalogue are from Australian authors.

As Borrowbox is for ebooks and audiobooks another important consideration is whether this can be accessed easily through a mobile app. The mobile app is easy to download and use, and is visually attractive and has a simple layout and function. We have also found that Borrowbox is easily linked to our main library follett catalogue.

The e-books supplied by our main follett supplier do have an electronic shut off period but they have to email the TL to give them due notice that the title will effectively disappear from the library collection on a specific date. The TL should always check that they are not purchasing an e-book that is readily available in the public domain. (Gregory, 2019). Additionally, the Teacher librarian would need to be aware of the restriction and communicate this to the student and teacher users.

Purchase Orders

Purchase orders can be useful to provide some security for a regular purchase of new resources, even when the budget dries up.  In our library we use Scholastic Standing Orders which involves a yearly subscription and a fixed amount that comes out every month. This ensures we have books coming in every year and it is easy to use.

Licensing Agreements

It would be important for the TL to also read the Licensing agreement and any other terms and conditions before making any deal or signing a contract with any supplier. Before signing any contract it is important that the TL fully understands these and has evaluated it in relation to their own school context and collection development policy.