Maximize buying power by developing partnerships with other academic, research, and/or public libraries to form consortial relationships at the state, national, and regional levels.

Members:

Michael Bland; Steve Chism; Sarah Santos (group leader); Kristine Shrauger

1. Briefly describe the background, present setting/structure which applies to the initiative:

Group Purchase and Pricing of Electronic Resources

The University of Arkansas Libraries hold memberships in a number of consortia that enable us to provide resources for our patrons at the best prices available. Agreements with Amigos, ArkLink, and the Big Twelve Plus Library Consortium currently allow the University Libraries to purchase electronic databases at reduced prices by forcing the hand of publishers and suppliers who must choose between making a number of sales of their product at a reduced price to the consortia members, or selling their product at full price and losing many potential customers. Most often the publishers see reason.

Cooperative Collection Development

Another benefit of consortial membership, especially among libraries within the same region (such as the Big Twelve Plus Consortium) is cooperative collection development. Since the late 1980s, the price of maintaining academic serial subscriptions has almost tripled. The cost of monographs has risen as well. Libraries within a region often find it cost-effective not to duplicate holdings, but rather to cooperate with one another to build complementary collections that are shared reciprocally, either free, or at a reduced price through interlibrary loan. University of Arkansas Libraries participate in regional cooperative collection development with the Big Twelve Plus Consortium. Locally, Northwest Resource Arkansas, unique because of its multi-type library partnership, produces a regional union list of holdings. This union list is distributed to member libraries to encourage visits to nearby libraries and to facilitate interlibrary loans. Arkansas libraries have also developed a state network called ArkLink, which provides an infrastructure for further cooperation among academic libraries in the state.

Interlibrary Loan

Interlibrary loan agreements are formed to accomplish more than cooperative collection development. Reciprocal agreements are also formed to reduce costs and improve speed of interlibrary loan service for the participating libraries. Such agreements may be based on geographic proximity or other commonalities. We participate in a number of such agreements through membership in OCLC, our regional OCLC user group Amigos, and in state through Resource Arkansas. Additionally, we participate in CARLA, a reciprocal agreement between Research Libraries of America members. Most large libraries loan far more than they borrow from their surrounding smaller libraries. The price for filling interlibrary loans for CARLA members are reduced because large libraries like ours benefit more equally from like libraries' collections. Another aspect of these agreements is the priority filling of requests coming from consortium members. This greatly reduces turnaround time for patrons of participating institutions and insures the fastest service possible for these interlibrary loan requests. In the case of Northwest Resource Arkansas, a courier service was originally planned for libraries in this region to further speed delivery of materials that would otherwise travel by land mail. But Resource Arkansas, while still active, lacks state emphasis or state funding. Their work continues mainly through the cooperative goodwill of the remaining librarians involved. Neither Northwest Resource Arkansas, the most active chapter in the state, nor any other Resource Arkansas group has yet developed into a strong network.

Law interlibrary loan and resource purchases

MAALL, a special libraries agreement handled through Mullins' interlibrary loan department, allows our law library to cooperate with other law school libraries throughout the United States to receive priority service in filling interlibrary loan requests. Membership in MAALL also reduces costs in consortial purchases of legal resources.

Other Benefits of Consortial Membership

An important benefit of belonging to the OCLC consortium is access to its union list, Worldcat, which during the past thirty years has essentially replaced the National Union Catalog and has become a vital part of scholarly research both nationally and internationally. Another benefit is access to the shared cataloging of other academic and large public libraries. The use of original cataloging from other member institutions within OCLC greatly reduces the workload of University of Arkansas Libraries' technical services librarians. Under OCLC's arrangement, only unique items in our collection, or items which we were the first to catalog, require the attention of our professional staff.

2. Develop an inclusive list (in ranked order of importance) of issues that must be addressed/considered for that initiative, consulting non-group personnel as appropriate:

Create a courier system on campus for document/material delivery

Revive cost-sharing ventures (i.e., collection development agreements) among all libraries on campus

University Libraries' gain membership in LVIS (Libraries Very Interested in Sharing)

Seek grant funding to support initiatives, and involvement in or development of consortia

Establish an agreement with Washington County public schools and Washington County Library System via Resource Arkansas to investigate easier methods for processing interlibrary loan requests

Interlibrary loan service direct to homes: part of the University's distance education program would include services to remote patrons

Work with state agencies to collect state government documents and to provide a place of record for them to be preserved

Universal library card for the state of Arkansas

Revival of the Arkansas Union List of Serials

Establish a "last copy in the state" program

4. Briefly describe how the initiative fits into the long-term goals and/or fulfills the mission of the University Libraries:

As per the University Libraries' Mission Statement: "The University Libraries also serve as a statewide resource for other academic libraries, public libraries in the state, and the general public."

Additionally, from the five major areas of responsibility affected by the University Libraries' goals and objectives, "Goal IV" states explicitly: "The University Libraries participate in state, regional, and national library networks in order to benefit our patrons and to contribute to efforts in resource sharing. Examples of programs in this area include the interlibrary loan program (through which requests are received from the OCLC computerized interlibrary loan subsystem and directly from local libraries by mail, telephone, and fax) as well as membership in such groups as ARKnet Confederation, the Big Twelve Plus Libraries Consortium, CARL, Internet, OCLC, and Resource Arkansas."

5. Indicate other of the initiatives that should be considered in connection to, coordinated with, or that may overlap the initiative:

User Needs; Realignment of Resources; Preservation/Conservation; Collection Development; Full Text Resources; both digitization groups; and Fund Raising.

6. Note any initiatives or considerations that are lacking from those delineated thus far which may be essential to the planning and redefining process:

Consider a "grant writer" position on the Library staff. Grants applications processes and the subsequent receipt and management of grant funds may be better handled centrally in the Library.

7. Recommend names of individuals who are essential to the Initiative Planning Team that works on developing and implementing the initiative in the subsequent phase:

Alberta Bailey (in her role as University Libraries' Distance Education Coordinator); Janet Parsch (in her role as the University Libraries' ArkLink representative; Beth Juhl (electronic resources); Ki Peppers (delivery systems); Necia Parker-Gibson (as University Libraries' Bibliographic Instruction Coordinator); Kristine Shrauger (for the many ILL issues affected by activity in consortia); Ann Waligorski (acquisitions issues); Marilyn Rogers (serials issues); and our future Collection Development Librarian.

8. Recommend, based on best educated guess, the amount of time that will be required to effectively develop the plan for implementing the initiative:

Six months to a year.

9. Recommend the priority level to be assigned to this initiative in the three-to-five-year planning phase:

Priority 2: a very important initiative. Deserves attention as soon as possible.

Report submitted June 29, 2001, by Initiative Review Group #13:

NOTE: Paper copies distributed to IRG 13 members, and to Admin Group via Dean Allen.

Electronic copies sent to Janet Parsch (IRG 13 liaison) and Dean Allen.