Should I Barcode 7000 books?

[Pamela Weinrieb <psw@BUFFNET.NET>]

Hi,
   Our school has a partnership with M & T bank.  The bank has purchased
about 500 books for each classroom library over an 8 year period.
Needless to say they were never barcoded and a manual inventory last
year proved that thousands of books were missing.  The reading
specialists, who ordered the books (no vendor disk) did keep the paper
invoices but there does not appear to be a database with title, author,
etc.  The bank would like to keep track of the books - location and
circulation.

The bank would like me to come up with a solution so every classroom
library book has some identification (barcode?) and a circulation
procedure for the books within the classroom so we know who checked out
the book.  I use Alexandria for my automated catalog program in the
library media center.

Is a retrospective conversion possible without a shelf list? Could I
submit an invoice to a company for retrospective conversion?
The bank is really only interested in title, author, copyright,
annotation as a record.  Could I just make a database of all the
titles?  The bank wants accountability!
Our scheduled meeting is next Wednesday - they are hoping I will have
an answer so I am turning to the experts!
Thanks,
Pam Weinrieb
Westminster Community School #68
Buffalo, NY
psw@buffnet.net

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