PALNI partnerships are defined as those collaborations with other non-profits to achieve a project, product, or service more effectively (higher quality and/or cost-saving) by sharing expertise, infrastructure, and funding equally.
PALNI does work with other groups, be it outside non-profits or vendors, to accomplish our mission via pay-for-service or product contacts. Those working relationships are listed below under ‘Other groups and vendors with which we work closely.’
- Institutional Repository Development & Implementations
- Partnership for Shared Book Collections
- Academic Libraries of Indiana (ALI)
- OhioNet
- Other groups and vendors with which we work closely
Institutional Repository Development and Implementations:
Pennsylvania Academic Library Consortium, Inc. (PALCI)
PALCI (legally named the Pennsylvania Academic Library Consortium, Inc.) was formed in 1996 as a grassroots federation of 35 academic libraries in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Today, the PALCI membership consists of nearly 70 academic and research libraries, private and public, in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, West Virginia, and New York. PALCI’s mission is to build access to our shared collections through collaboration among academic libraries in Pennsylvania and the neighboring states. PALCI Members serve over 800,000 students, faculty, and staff, through a variety of programs including the highly-regarded E-ZBorrow service. PALCI also serves as the home for PA Digital, the Pennsylvania hub of the Digital Public Library of America, and the new Affordable Learning PA program, creating a community of practice for open textbooks and related educational resources. http://palci.org
Washington Research Library Consortium (WRLC)
The Washington Research Library Consortium (WRLC) is a collaborative partnership providing proactive, responsive, innovative, and cost-effective access to shared information resources, services, and expertise. Through strategic priorities such as the creation of coordinated collections and a robust infrastructure for discovery and access, the WRLC is contributing to the success of learning and scholarship. The combined collections of the Washington Research Library Consortium total more than 17 million items. For more information, visit the WRLC website at http://www.wrlc.org.
Institutional Repositories (IRs) perform a valuable function by creating open access to campus scholarship, and by doing so demonstrating library value and the value of the institution as a whole. This project supports PALNI’s collaborative and community approach on four levels:
- Sharing scholarship and digital content from our institutions with the world
- Developing open-source, community-owned tools
- Collaborating to host and maintain tools in shared server space
- Sharing expertise in metadata, mapping, user experience design, workflow design, and collections across consortia participants
Currently, only 15% of PALNI’s supported institutions currently have an IR systems due to operating at max capacity for other library services. Collaborating with WRLC and PALCI allows both consortia to share resources, expertise, and develop a product meeting multiple priorities for IR and digital collection management.
Partnership for Shared Book Collections:
The following shared print programs have participated in planning for the Partnership for Shared Book Collections:
- Academic Libraries of Indiana (ALI)
- Big Ten Academic Alliance (BTAA)
- California Digital Library (CDL)
- Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries
- ConnectNY
- Council of Prairie and Pacific University Libraries (COPPUL)
- Eastern Academic Scholars’ Trust (EAST)
- Five Colleges
- Florida Academic Repository (FLARE)
- HathiTrust Digital Library
- Keep @ Downsview
- Maine Shared Collections Cooperative
- Michigan Shared Print Initiative (MI-SPI)
- Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI)
- Research Collections and Preservation Consortium (ReCAP)
- Statewide California Electronic Library Consortium (SCELC)
- Virtual Libraries of Virginia (VIVA)
- Washington Research Library Consortium (WRLC)
Academic and research libraries have been collaborating for some time to preserve and protect the print scholarly record as space and budgetary constraints threaten libraries’ ability to provide access locally. The Partnership was formed as an outcome of two Shared Print Monograph Summit meetings sponsored by EAST and funded through a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
The Partnership, which is a federation of the existing shared print monograph programs in North America, looks to coordinate collaboration across these programs to support cost-effective retention of and access to print book collections with the goal of ensuring the long-term preservation, accessibility, and integrity of these scholarly print resources. The Partnership is an agreement between shared print program members, rather than individual
institutions. The member programs have already committed to retain over 40 million books (and growing!) primarily in academic and research libraries across the United States and Canada and make these materials available for scholarship, research, and teaching through inter-library loan and other forms of resource sharing.
By having multiple shared print programs partnering together, even more print resources are available and preserved than ever before. Each print program contributes a Program Coordinator to collectively manage the initiative. Other financial commitments may include support for shared print open retention data registry and supporting participation in at least one face-to-face meeting per year of shared print program member representatives.
Through the power of many, come benefits for all as we work together to connect shared print programs in North America.
Academic Libraries of Indiana (ALI):
ALI represents all academic libraries in accredited non-profit institutions of higher education in Indiana. Its 72 members include major research libraries, law and medical libraries, theological school libraries, and undergraduate libraries.
Full list of members can be found here: http://academiclibrariesofindiana.org/home/members
The mission of Academic Libraries of Indiana (ALI) is to build and foster community and collaboration among academic libraries in Indiana. All PALNI libraries are part of ALI but the two organizations are separate. We work with ALI for licensing resources for our institutions, and also collaborate on projects such as Scholarly Communication, Information Literacy, Resource Sharing, and the Shared Print project.
While similar in nature, ALI and PALNI are two separate organizations. ALI consists of private and public academic libraries, including large research institutions in Indiana. While the inclusion of all types of academic libraries is beneficial when negotiating vendor deals and licensing, the needs of PALNI’s smaller schools tend to get lost in the mix. Because PALNI is solely focused on private academic institutions, we’re better able to meet their needs outside of licensing. Both organizations work together to best support their membership.
OhioNet:
A membership-driven organization, OhioNet provides innovative technology solutions, products, training and consulting. OhioNET assists members in acquiring, implementing and using technology solutions to manage operations and resources to meet end user needs.
Through a partnership with PALNI, OhioNet provides Ezproxy server hosting and complete support. They handle the upgrades, security certificates, configuration files, etc. Their responsiveness is unmatched and PALNI schools rarely have to wait more than a day or two to see changes made to their custom configurations.
Most PALNI schools are run by a small staff who already wear many hats and roles. Having OhioNet take care of configuring and maintaining the Ezproxy server outside of the local library not only frees up their time and expertise to higher priorities but it saves the library space and hardware maintenance. OhioNet helps to keep open the digital doors to resources while the libraries focus on keeping open the physical access to library resources. A win-win partnership.
Other groups and vendors with which we work closely:
"MCLS was formed to facilitate sharing of resources among libraries, to enhance the availability of information resources to patrons, and to encourage libraries to institute cost-effective procedures that are made possible through interlibrary cooperation. MCLS is fully funded by its libraries and receives no direct federal or state support.
In these times of rapid change, increased automation, and technological innovation, Indiana and Michigan libraries need a partner they can trust for reliable information on new products and services and for top-notch support. Libraries need a partner to turn to when negotiating with vendors, a partner who will advocate for the good of Indiana and Michigan libraries. MCLS is that partner." - MCLS website
All PALNI libraries benefit from the partnership with MCLS for group purchasing, affordable professional development training opportunities, strategic planning consultants, and much more.
More about MCLS: https://www.mcls.org/
PALNI benefits greatly from connecting with the Indiana State Library (ISL). ISL provides state-wide access to INSPIRE resources, offers many professional development opportunities, and partially subsidizes the state-wide lending courier InfoExpress. A number of the PALNI libraries are also participating in the SRCS (Statewide Remote Circulation Service), a resource sharing tool linking over 200 library catalogs in a single interface.
The Open Textbook Network (OTN) promotes access, affordability, and student success through the use of open textbooks. The Open Textbook Network consists of a growing network of higher education institutions and systems which are supporting the library and the adoption of open textbooks as members. The Open Textbook Library provides a growing catalog of free, peer-reviewed, and openly-licensed textbooks to be used by anyone and everyone.
PALNI benefits as a member of OTN through the community efforts to pool expertise, promote best practices, and share resources. Having this community of support has enabled the PALSave Affordable Learning initiative to take off and grow within the PALNI libraries.
More about OTN: https://research.cehd.umn.edu/otn/
PALNI contracts for all supported libraries to have a state-of-the art web-based library management system through OCLC. The group discount reflects a savings of nearly a million dollars! Using the system, librarians are able to manage collections while users can easily find resources within their own library, within PALNI, and worldwide.
PALNI also benefits from an active OCLC community of libraries and other consortia using OCLC products and development.
Read more about OCLC: https://www.oclc.org/en/home.html