academic library consortia in lebanon

Academic Library Consortia

in Lebanon

By

Houeida Kammourié-Charara

LALC Coordinator

©2012

http://www.haigazian.edu.lb/default.aspx

http://www.amicalnet.org/


Agenda

• Consortia: Definition, History, etc.

• Library Consortia: – National:

• LALC, LIDS

– International: • AMICAL

– Global: • ICOLC.

© Houeida Kammourié-Charara 2 3/29/2012

Definition Of Consortium

• Consortia OR Consortiums.

• “Formal association of a number of organizations, usually in a specific geographical area, with agreed goals and objectives.

• Services covered can include collection development, cataloguing, computer alliances, systems support, education and training, interlibrary loans, library automation, purchasing, etc.”.


Consortia History

• 1960s: Creation of union catalogs – Library Consortia flourish.

• 1970s: Interlibrary loans, joint storage, etc.

• 1980s: Automation – Stagnation period.

• 1990s: Re-flourishing of Consortia for electronic resources. • 2000s: Consortium of Consortia.

• 2010s: Emergence of mobile devices and applications such as: Smart phones,

e-book readers, iPads, and other handheld devices; it will definitely be part of the consortia work.


National Level

• LALC: Lebanese Academic Library Consortium

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• LIDS: Lebanese ILL/DD Services

LALC story

• The vision began in 2001. The University of Balamand was the leader by inviting and encouraging all major academic institutions in Lebanon to develop a library consortium of electronic resources.

• Three private institutions replied to the UOB invitation (Board members). Jointly they formed LALC, the first Arab and Lebanese formal Academic Library Consortium.


LALC members The Board: • American University of Beirut (AUB)

– JAFET and SML represented by Ms. Hilda Nassar (SML) and Mrs. Olga Ayoub-Mansour (Jafet)

• Lebanese American University (LAU) – RNL and Byblos represented by Mrs. Houeida Kammourié-Charara

• Notre Dame University (NDU) – represented by Mrs. Samar kai-Kiwan

• University of Balamand (UOB) – represented by Ms. Randa Al-Chidiac

In 2006 two new members joined: • Université Saint Joseph (Medical Library) (USJ) • Université Saint Esprit de Kaslik (USEK) And in 2011 two new members joined: • Beirut Arab University (BAU) • Haigazian University (HU)


LALC “raison d’être”

• To cope with changes that took place in the university environment in Lebanon.

• To keep pace with users requests and expectations in

academic libraries, mainly in the e-resources field.

• “To cooperate in the selection, pricing negotiations and access methods of electronic resources in the best interest of the library users in an economical way for the library”.


• In 2002 a draft was prepared for LALC By-Laws which stated:

– “LALC Mission Statement is to improve and expand the library services and resources of its institutional members. This is achieved through building a cooperative yet comprehensive collection of electronic resources and e-journals that will enable LALC member institutions to share resources and provide information to their users more efficiently and cost-effectively.”

• This draft had never been approved and was replaced by a Letter of

Agreement (LOA).

• In May 3rd 2004, a formal LOA was signed between LALC members in which the parties agreed to establish a consortium under the name of "Lebanese Academic Library Consortium – LALC”. After 2 years of active work, LALC status was officially announced. The LOA governs all LALC activities, and it is re-signed when new members join LALC.

• The 2008 LOA included USJ and USEK in addition to the board members.

• A new LOA needs to be signed that includes the additional members, however it is not yet done due to merging issue (LALC with another consortium).


Letter of Agreement

Administrative Structure • Each member library is represented by one librarian designated by the

institution.

• The Consortium Coordinator is elected among LALC members for a period of three (3) years with the possibility of renewal.

• Meetings are held on a rotation basis at the location of the member institutions and are agreed on at the end of each meeting.

• Budget planning, payments and agreements are done on individual basis; each

institution has its own payment methods and applies its own policies and procedures in this regard.

• No membership fees.

• Set procedures and guidelines for trialing, acquiring e-resources, & project proposals.

• In 2010 the Lebanese American University launched LALC website: http:lalc.lau.edu.lb

LALC is a “buying club” for e-resources


© Houeida Kammourié-Charara

LALC Medical Consortium

• LALC member institutions providing medical programs formed a specialized mini consortium:

• AUB-SML

• UOB

• USJ-Medical Library

• USEK

• This consortium acts as a sub-division of LALC and follows all LALC policies & procedures.

N.B. With the creation of the School of Medicine at LAU and the membership of BAU this mini consortium is not needed anymore.

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Lebanese ILL/DD Services:LIDS • The idea of having an ILL/DDS

service was first conceived by LALC in 2004, but didn’t succeed due to internal private reasons.

• In October 1, 2007 The Lebanese ILL/DD Services (LIDS) was born and ILL/DDS policies and procedures were drafted.

• The main goal of LIDS is to initiate

processes & services to expand resource sharing, and to produce a union list of journal holdings of member institutions

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LIDS Prerequisites

• Online OPAC

• Subscribe to LIDS e-journals portal (cancelled in 2011 due to budget constraints).

• Accept the terms and conditions of LIDS and adopt the procedures and processes.


LIDS members are all LALC members too, in addition to ESCWA and Middle East University.

International Level

• AMICAL Consortium


AMICAL Consortium

• “AMICAL is an international consortium of American-model, liberal arts institutions of higher learning located outside the United States”.

• AMICAL was formed in 2004, via the leadership of the American University of Paris, and the support of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

• “AMICAL is committed to sharing information and technologies across national and linguistic borders, using English as the primary language for consortial work”.

• Lebanon hosted two AMICAL conferences: 2005 and 2011 (at LAU).


International Coalition of Library Consortia (ICOLC)

• The International Coalition of Library Consortia (ICOLC) first met informally as the Consortium of Consortia (COC) in 1997. It is a self-organized group with over 200 library consortia from around the world.

• “All library consortia anywhere in the world that are in general agreement with the ICOLC Statements issued over the years are welcome to participate in the activities of ICOLC and identify themselves as participating consortia”.

• LALC is the first Lebanese and Arab Library Consortium that joined ICOLC.


Together we are stronger!!!


Future Challenge

• To review and evaluate the consortium work in order to create an

example that would set standards for consortia in Lebanon.

• To attempt to add more functions to LALC by exploring new ways of improving LALC, such as cooperative cataloguing, online union catalogue, providing common training sessions and preparing manuals for e-resources that all members can share.

• LALC members are actively promoting it by presenting papers on the Lebanese experience in establishing a consortium in different conferences and workshops.

• To widen membership to possibly include regional institutions.


Thank you

Q&A

Houeida Kammourié-Charara

LALC Coordinator

E-mail [email protected]


mailto:[email protected]

References Al-Chidiac, Randa.” The challenging & daring experiment: LALC.” eIFL Workshop, LAU, Beirut, March 2006. Habre, Cendrella. "Lebanese Academic Library Consortium.“ AFLI 13th Conference, Beirut. Oct.-Nov. 2002. Kammourié-Charara, Houeida. "Academic library consortia with examples from the Arab World.“ MELCOM 25th

Conference, Beirut. May 2003. Kammourié-Charara, Houeida. “LALC: A Successful Challenge.” eIFL Collaborative Management Of Electronic Resources

Workshop, Cairo, April 2005.

Kammourié-Charara, Houeida. “ LALC: One more time. Special Library Association, Arabian Gulf Chapter: Pre-conference workshop, Doha. 2008.

Kammourié-Charara, Houeida. "The Role of Consortia in Academic Libraries: A Case Study of the Lebanese Academic Library

Consortium (LALC)." Diss. U of Wales, 2003.

Lebanese Academic Library Consortium (2004). Annual Report, 2003-2004.

Lebanese Academic Library Consortium (2008). Annual Report, 2005-2006 & 2006-2007. Websites: AMICAL http://www.amicalnet.org/ LALC http://lalc.lau.edu.lb/ International Coalition of Library Consortia (ICOLC) http://www.library.yale.edu/consortia/ OCLC http://www.oclc.org/default.htm





http://lalc.lau.edu.lb/

http://lalc.lau.edu.lb/

http://www.library.yale.edu/consortia/

http://www.library.yale.edu/consortia/

http://www.oclc.org/default.htm

http://www.oclc.org/default.htm

academic library consortia in lebanon

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