College and Research Libraries Letters To the Editor: In his C&RL, (Mar. 1985) article "Book Selection Policies in the College Library: A Reap- praisal,'' Charles Gardner makes at least two important claims, one of which is true and the other false . Neither is well documented. The first is that faculty dominate book selection in small undergraduate institutions. I found this to be true in 1979, when I did a study, "Collection Development in Ten Small Academic Libraries: A Report to the Council on Library Resources" (ERIC ED 190 074). Further, I expect it is still true, though less so than it used to be and not for the same reasons reported by Gardner. A second claim made by Gardner is that the first claim is the prevailing opinion of college librarians and that there have been few dissenters. Please count me, and a host of other college collection developers, as dissenters. Many of us have argued that material's bud- gets should be allocated by subject rather than by department precisely in order to make it clear to everyone just who has responsibility for and control of the book budget. I might point out that this has been argued ad nauseam in print and out. Mr. Gardner may think he is alone in his reappraisal. He is not. Rather he joins a large, established, and distinguished group of college librarians interested in collection develop- ment. WILLIAM E. HANNAFORD, JR., College Librarian, Castleton State College, Castleton, Vermont To the Editor: The paper of Kohl and Davis, "Ratings of Journals by ARL Library Directors and Deans of Library and Information Science Schools" [C&RL Jan. 1985], is clear with respect to di- rectors, deans and truly general journals. However, its treatment of specialty journals (e.g., excluding Notes and BMLA but including Law Library Journal and School Library Media Quarterly) is confusing. And the claim that it represents a dialogue between educators and practitioners may require an important qualification. There must be-in studies like this and in tenure and promotion decisions-a better distinction made between truly general journals (e.g., Library Quarterly, Library Trends, Library Journal), which deans and directors can judge as well as anyone else, and those journals specialized by librarian function (e.g., RQ, Reference Seroices Review, and Reference Librarian) or subject area (e.g., Notes, BMLA, Sci- ence and Technology Libraries) best judged by instructors and practitioners in those special- ties. The authors acknowledge limitations in the scope and nature of this study, but sug- gest that it might well be extended to school or public librarians. May I suggest that any extension be in a way of perhaps greater interest to readers of C&RL: the consensus of pro- fessors and practitioners of public and technical services, and humanities, social science, and scientific literatures, about the journals (both general and within their specialty) that they regard as prestigious. TONY STANKUS Science Librarian, Holy Cross 359 Compare. MORE SAVINGS • MORE FREQUENT DELIVERIES • MORE TECHNICAL TITLES To give you an even better picture of the savings you get with our Periodicals in Microform, send us your current subscription list and we'll perform a complete price comparison for you. Or just give us a call. Either way, we let our low prices do the talking! Contact: Deb Phillips, Bell & Howell Company, Pub- lication Products, Old Mansfield Road, Wooster, Ohio 44691-9050. Call1-800-321-9881. In Ohio call 1-216-264-6666. 111~ tJ)k4 ~di:JL­ Ivw ~~~r Popular/Generallnterest B&H Brand X U.S. News & World Report $42 .00 $44.54 Sports Illustrated 34.50 37.57 Law Uniform Commercial Code Law Journal 7.50 7.99 Journal of Real Estate Taxation 7.50 7.99 Business & Finance Fortune 24 .00 25.41 Forbes 18.00 21 .25 Medical/Biology Disease Markers 7.00 8 .33 New England Journal of Medicine 44.00 47 .35 Education Death Education 7.50 7.99 Journal of Education 7.50 7.99 Engineering/Technology Iron Age 55.00 57 .97 Consulting Engineer 21 .00 24.39 Chemistry /Science Science Digest 11 .00 11 .90 Science News 8.50 9.18 Ask about our special BEI!-HIOWEU Budget Bounty promotion - designed to give you items that you can 't squeeze out of your budget - absolutely FREE with your new Bell & Howell purchases. Publication Products