User:Gchilton-lib/sandbox/Collective Shared Print Collections

Collective Shared Print Collections

Introduction

In a collective shared print collection, librarians collaborate to manage tangible library collections (e.g., books, journals, scores, etc.) so as to ensure the efficient and effective care of physical library holdings while making sure that users have access to these materials.

These shared print collections are created for various reasons. For example, libraries in a particular geographic area or consortium can make an explicit agreement for the purpose of retaining certain holdings and sharing collections with each other, often through interlibrary loan. Such libraries may also partner to analyze their holdings and to divide responsibility for retaining these holdings, with the goal being shared access. These libraries sign agreements that typically outline the retention, ownership, and shelving environment criteria (for preservation) of collections, as well as outline the methods for finding and providing access to titles across a network of libraries, such as a library consortium.

History

Libraries’ efforts to collectively manage and provide access to their holdings date back to antiquity and extend through twentieth century projects such as the Farmington Plan. Librarians in the 2000s began to show more interest in these partnerships, as libraries increasingly faced funding reductions along with escalating costs to store and manage collections. Bernard F. Reilly (the President of the Center for Research Libraries) discussed the importance of shared print collections during this period, writing that it resulted in a “drawing together the major independent regional and national repository initiatives into a coordinated, community-wide print preservation effort.” In ensuing years, Lorcan Dempsey popularized the term “collective collections” as a way to describe how libraries were changing their approaches to collection management and access in an environment of increased connectivity.

Models

To date, librarians have focused on books (e.g. monographs) published as “a non serial publication complete in one volume or a definite number of volumes” or serials (e.g., magazines, journals, and newspapers). When libraries participate, their catalogs are updated to include notes identifying which items are part of the collective collection.

Various types of collective collection models exist. A distributed (or decentralized) collective shared print collection is one in which items in the collection remain at their original library but are made accessible to all partnering libraries.

Centralized collective shared print collections are those in which libraries move books and journals that are part of the collective collection to a shared shelving facility. In many cases this shared shelving facility is a high-density preservation facility built according to the Harvard model. The building is designed to provide a secure, environmentally controlled space that is optimal for long term preservation.

Each of these models has advantages. The benefits of a distributed model could include patron ability to quickly access titles in the local library, librarian incurring lower cost of implementation (as no separate shelving facility is required), library staff practicing more equitable responsibility for shelving volumes, and libraries having less vulnerability to disaster at any given site. The benefits of a centralized model could include libraries having greater control over materials and offering a greater variety of books and journals to library users because multiple collections are combined, and library administrators incurring lower associated storage costs per item.  

Some examples of these two models include the following:

●     CARM Centre

●     COPPUL Shared Print Archive Network

●     EAST: Eastern Academic Scholars' Trust

●     Finland’s National Repository Library

●     HathiTrust Shared Print

●     Keep@Downsview

●     ReCAP

●     WEST

Goals

Libraries create collective shared print collection agreements as a strategic way to both protect access to library collections and support thoughtful deaccessioning, with the knowledge that a certain number of copies will be kept and made available. Collective collection agreements guarantee -- at least for the period specified in the agreement -- that library materials are preserved and made accessible. Organizations that manage most collaborative shared print collections retain multiple copies of each unique edition of any given title -- the number of editions retained depends on consortium size and other factors (e.g. worldwide availability of the item outside of the partnership).