Shared Print on the Move: Collocating Collections

As university libraries devote increasing portions of staff time and budget dollars to electronic resources, many are looking for cost- and labor-efficient ways of storing and ensuring access to legacy print collections. Shared print repositories have emerged as one possible solution, but setting up a shared storage system is never easy. Issues of selection, preservation, access and use, and interoperability must be resolved, but first comes one pivotal question: Where are we going to put all these books?

Collocating shared print storage is one answer. Rather than securing holdings in place, The Committee on Institutional Cooperation’s Shared Print Repository selects volumes for preservation from multiple universities, relocating materials as necessary to create a comprehensive print collection. Collocating the collection means more secure conditions can be maintained and better user services supported by holding some bodies of print content in common thus relieving each individual school of the obligation to commit the necessary resources to manage these resources on its own. Nonetheless, physically transferring items, but not ownership, to other locations creates specific challenges. This paper will explore the opportunities and issues associated with collocating shared print storage using the CIC Shared Print Repository as an example.