|
MALLCO
The History of the Mid-America Law Library Consortium
The organization was formed as the Mid-America Law School Library Consortium (MALSLC) and from the outset had very close ties to MAALL. More than twenty-five years ago, law school deans and librarians from Mid-America were invited to a meeting held during the 1979 AALS annual meeting. The original impetus for the Consortium came from Dean Allen Smith at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Dean Smith was concerned about the problems facing law school libraries, especially increasing costs and diminishing space.
The interest that developed at AALS in sharing resources and cooperating in interlibrary loans resulted in the creation of a formal organization during the 1980 AALL meeting in St. Louis . The Consortium -- consisting of the four law school libraries of Missouri, two in Kansas, three in Illinois, two in Iowa, two in Nebraska, three in Oklahoma, two in Arkansas and more recently one in South Dakota and North Dakota -- was incorporated as a non-profit Missouri corporation. Eileen Searls of St. Louis University was elected as the group's first chair. Later chairs were elected for two-year periods. They were: John Christensen of Washburn University (1984-86), John Edwards from Drake (1986-88), Frank Houdek from Southern Illinois (1988-90), Susan Csaky from the University of Missouri-Columbia (1990-92), Richard Ducey from the University of Tulsa (1992-94), Sally Wise of the University of Nebraska (1994-96), Kay Andrus of Creighton University (1996-98), Patricia O'Connor of the University of Missouri-Kansas City (1998-2000), John Christensen of Washburn University (2000-01), Glen-Peter Ahlers of the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville (2002), Mary Ann Nelson of the University of Iowa (2003-04), Gary Gott of the University of North Dakota (2004-05). John Edwards of Drake University became president in 2006.
Several significant changes took place in 2005 when the Consortium decided to hire an Executive Director, revised its bylaws, and changed its name to the Mid-America Law Library Consortium (MALLCO). Nina Miley was hired in fall 2005 as MALLCO's first Executive Director and began serving on a half-time basis.
Bob Rowell replaced her as Executive Director in fall 2006.
One aspect of the Consortium's structure which has greatly facilitated and enhanced its operation is the frequency of meetings. Formal meetings of the library directors are normally scheduled in conjunction with the annual meetings of AALS, SWALL, AALL, and MAALL. By meeting four times each year the member schools are better able to maintain contact with each other to further interlibrary cooperation.
The activities of the Consortium have grown over the years. Grant funding from various sources has enabled member libraries to undertake a number of projects. Consortium members are also assessed dues to permit the pursuit of additional endeavors. These projects have benefited not only the Consortium members, but libraries throughout MAALL and AALL as well. Among the many completed and continuing projects of the Consortium, the following are especially noteworthy:
ILL AND PHOTOCOPY RECIPROCITY: Interlibrary loans and photocopies have been exchanged among consortium members without fee assessments since 1980. Thanks to an AALL grant (see below) this was later expanded to include telefax requests.
COOPERATIVE ACQUISITIONS: Member libraries exchanged information concerning specific subjects and titles for cooperative collection development. Lists of expensive microform titles in particular have been distributed regularly to aid in the process. Midwest Library Service was selected as the vendor for the cooperative purchase of monographs project begun in February 1993 . In 2001, Yankee Book Peddler was chosen to replace Midwest as the vendor for cooperative purchasing.
ONLINE: Consortium pricing has been negotiated for online products including LegalTrac, Current Index to Legal Periodicals, CIS Congressional Universe and HeinOnLine. This is an area of active interest.
TELEFACSIMILE OUTREACH: In 1985, with the help of an AALL grant, the consortium libraries installed telefax equipment, permitting the rapid delivery of documents. As a condition of the grant, the Consortium studied the impact of telefacsimile equipment on interlibrary cooperation.
SERIALS UNION LIST: A union list of legal periodicals was assembled on a regular basis beginning in 1982, using OCLC. The union list included law review holdings and related periodicals, noting the specific volumes held from the academic law libraries in Mid-America. Resource sharing among all law libraries was facilitated because of the Mid-America Union List. Now available through OCLC FirstSearch, MAUL is the Union List group symbol.
OTHER UNION LISTS: A union list of looseleaf services was maintained for several years based on the entries in Legal Looseleafs in Print . The Consortium also prepared a union list of major microform holdings. Hard copies of this list were available to help facilitate interlibrary loan and cooperative collection development. Other earlier union lists and surveys covered Canadian primary materials, computer labs, microcomputer software, automation plans and fiche duplicators.
ABA/AALL STATISTICS: Library statistics reported to the American Bar Association and the Association of American Law Schools are submitted to the Consortium's Statistics Coordinator at the same time that they are submitted to ABA/AALS. This permits consortium libraries to have very timely access to comparative information that can be invaluable in the budgeting processes.
CD-ROM UNION CATALOG ("THE INTELLIGENT CATALOG"): In 1990, prior to the adoption of online catalogs in all MALSLC libraries, the Consortium prepared a CD-ROM based public access union catalog containing the records of every member library. The Consortium utilized a 3-year College Library Technology & Cooperative Grant with Library Corporation as vendor.
TRAINING FOR NON-PROFESSIONAL STAFF: The Consortium periodically sponsors workshops for non-professional staff members during the annual meeting of MAALL. Travel grants are available from the Consortium to facilitate attendance of interested MAALL members.
TELECOMPUTING TECHNOLOGY GRANT: In 1992, the Consortium received a major grant to foster telecomputing and resource sharing utilizing scanning and imaging technology. One product of this grant was the Nation's first law library Web-based catalog.
FUTURE PLANS: As the Consortium moves forward with new endeavors the most significant change occurred with the hiring of an Executive Director in 2005. The filling of that position should enable member libraries to pursue even more cooperative activities that should have benefits for everyone in MAALL.
|
