"The New Dynamics & Economics of Cooperative Collection Development"

The Center for Research Libraries hosted its second Conference on Cooperative Collection Development, in November 2002 near Atlanta, Georgia. The Conference will build upon the agenda and discussions initiated at the first Aberdeen Woods Conference, held in 1999 to mark the Center’s fiftieth anniversary. The Association of Research Libraries served as a co-sponsor of the event.

Purpose of the Conference:

The Aberdeen Woods Conference provided a forum for a select group of library and other academic professionals to explore the new dynamics and economics of cooperative collection development. Limited resources for acquisitions and the myriad challenges posed by e-journals, databases, and other digital materials for scholarly research are eliciting innovative new approaches to building collections in both electronic and hard copy. Speakers at the Conference discussed emerging and prospective models of interaction; presented the results of studies stemming from the previous Aberdeen Woods Conference; and developed an action agenda for future CRL collection development activity. Papers from the Conference will be published in mid-2003 by the Haworth Press as part of Collection Management journal series.

Conference Program:

The program included talks by individuals with special perspectives on cooperative collecting, presentations on current projects and practices, working group reports, and small group “break-out” sessions related to topics of special interest. In addition, the Conference format provided opportunities for meaningful, informal discussions among attendees.