University Of Southern Maine

The University of Maine and partners Bates College, Bowdoin College, Colby College, Maine InfoNet, Maine State Library, Portland Public Library, Bangor Public Library, and the University of Southern Maine will participate in a statewide Maine Shared Collections Strategy (MSCS) project. The project will define a strategy for shared management of legacy print collections and explore new ways of delivering content to library users by designing and testing a print on demand and e-book on demand service for available digital collections from the Open Content Alliance and Google Books. The MSCS will demonstrate a new model for others to consider as the idea of shared legacy print collections management gains popularity nationally. It will significantly advance the understanding of how to manage relationships among large-scale digital collections and established print collections. It also will provide a concrete example of statewide collaboration among multiple types of libraries.