Hi All.

Here's the information I got from Pauline from the Music Library in the Ilac today:

Budget: She was unable to give me budget information as these issues are coordinated centrally in their Pearse Street head office. To be honest she seemed a little reluctant to even give me a ball park figure so I didn't press her.

Policy on Donations: They do not take any donations at the moment regardless of quality or condition because of lack of space.

Government Donations: this doesn't apply to their particular organisation.

Find/review resources for the reference collection: they actually take recommendations from the public on quite a regular basis. What is actually bought is again decided centrally in "Reader Services". If a staff member wishes to order a particular item they fill out details on a "request form" and send it into Pearse Street. It is there that the decision to buy or not is ultimately made. They buy their stock either from Hodges/Figgis or McCullough/Picketts.

Weeding Policy: They have to constantly weed their collection. The criteria for getting rid of an item is a) length of time since it was last borrowed b) general condition and c) value. Their reference collection is quite limited and is only weeded if it is particularly outdated.

Thats about it folks. I hope this can help us a bit even though the information I got wasn't very detailed. I am going to try and get in touch with Pearse Street headquarters to get some budget information. I also got a MusicPal card which lets us use any Music Library collection in Ireland. Might come in handy.