92 REFERENCE SERVICES
statement can be particularly useful when there is a large reference staff or
when a library has multiple locations at which reference service is provided.
Having guidelines ensures that everyone involved in the reference process
(patrons as well as staff) is on the same page. Notice, too, that this statement
incorporates an institutional goal—to offer
the best possible reference service using the
resources at hand.
In 1991 the board of ALA’s Reference
and Adult Services Division, now known
as the Reference and User Services Associa-
tion, asked the Management of Reference
Services Committee (now the Management
of Reference Committee) of the Manage-
ment and Operation of Public Services Sec-
tion, now the Reference Services Section
(RSS), to draft an outline for use by ref-
erence librarians and others in academic,
public, and special libraries who want to
develop reference or information service
policy manuals. The author was a member
of that committee, which designed this outline to supplement, not supplant,
existing reference guidelines and standards (many of these are listed in the
appendix).
“Information Services Policy Manual: An Outline” was published in the
Winter 1994 issue of the Reference Quarterly (no. 2, pp. 165–72). It consists
of five main sections: mission statement; organizational structure for reference
services; services and service philosophy; personnel; reference collection(s)
policy.mission statement
Here, as in the example previously cited, is a recommendation for beginning
a reference policy with a statement of basic service goals. These should also
include a statement of professional ethics, a description of the library’s clien-
tele, and a statement affirming that reference services are “nondiscriminatory
on the basis of age, race, sexual preference, or disability” (A.4).In “Reference Service Policies,”
Reference Services Review 13,
no. 2 (Summer 1985): 79–82,
Janet Easley lists five reasons for
a reference policy: “A reference
service policy establishes
standards of service; assists in
training new staff members;
establishes levels of service
to users, including limits of
service; establishes priorities of
service; and describes practical
procedures that answer practical
questions” (80).http://www.ebook3000.com