New @ CLA: The Resource Sharing Section

CLA has a new section dedicated to Resource Sharing. The section was created in response to a need for more professional development opportunities in Connecticut concerning resource sharing issues. Born from discussions at CLC’s Interlibrary Loan Roundtable meetings, we collected the required 15 signatures and petitioned the CLA Executive Board who voted the section into being at their meeting in June 2009.

What is resource sharing?

The section’s bylaws define resource sharing as “the library service that seeks to make the collections of one library available to the patrons of another library efficiently and effectively. Resource sharing incorporates activities related to interlibrary loan, including automated discovery tools, such as shared online catalogs, physical and electronic delivery, and reciprocal borrowing.” In addition to those services, the section will keep an eye on related issues, such as:

●    cooperative purchasing and shared collections

●    shared storage facilities

●    use of interlibrary loan statistics for collection development and management

●    copyright and permission issues with respect to interlibrary loan

●    aspects of quality assurance, efficiency studies, best practices

●    library 2.0 and the impact of services such as Open WorldCat and Google Scholar

We are pleased to sponsor three sessions at the CLA Annual Conference this spring: one will be physical delivery of library material, one will be on calculating the cost of ILL, and the third will be on interoperability between circulation and interlibrary loan systems. At one of the sessions, the section will hold its first annual meeting and we will be voting for a our first Chair and Chair-Elect.

Join us!

If you are interested in Resource Sharing issues (and if you’ve read this far, my guess is that you are interested!) consider this an invitation to join your CLA colleagues and become one of the 'founding members' of this new section. As a section member, you can attend session meetings and discussions and help us plan section events. You will be  eligible to be on the Resource Sharing Executive Committee. If you prefer a smaller role in the section, we will be kept up-to-date on our activities through our communications to section members. To see a list of past and upcoming section activities, visit our wiki at http://clarss.pbworks.com

To join the Resource Sharing Section, you can send your name to me (Steve Cauffman, scauffman@cslib.org, acting Chair until July 2010) or you can simply check off “Resource Sharing” on your CLA membership renewal form. We look forward to hearing from you!  

[Note: this article appeared in the Winter 2010 issue of Connecticut Libraries available on the CLA Website ] at: http://www.ctlibraryassociation.org/newsletter.htm]