Western University
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Collaborative Approaches to the Management of
Geospatial Data Collections in Canadian Academic
Libraries: A Historical Case Study
Leanne Trimble
University of Toronto
Cheryl Woods
Western University#!5..$135.#!
Francine Berish
Queens University
Daniel Jakubek
Ryerson University
Sarah Simpkin
University of Oawa
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Publications
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Collaborative Approaches to the Management of Geospatial Data
Collections in Canadian Academic Libraries: A Historical Case Study
Leanne Trimble University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Cheryl Woods Western University, London, Ontario, Canada
Francine Berish Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada
Daniel Jakubek Ryerson University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Sarah Simpkin University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Abstract
The Ontario Council of University Libraries (OCUL) is a consortium of the twenty-one university
libraries in Ontario, Canada. Since 1967, OCUL member institutions have worked together to
share costs and workload through collective purchasing/licensing of information resources, and
more recently through the establishment of a shared digital infrastructure known as Scholars
Portal. Under the auspices of OCUL, Ontario’s university map librarians formed the OCUL Map
Group in 1973 to seek opportunities to communicate and collaborate to improve the collections
and services they could offer to their users. The opportunities provided by collaboration have
ensured a greater capacity to manage evolving collections of geospatial data. The group has
served as a community of practice, which has provided educational opportunities and facilitated
collaborative problem-solving through a listserv, conference calls and face-to-face meetings.
This collegial environment has also led to the completion of a number of projects, which have
resulted in the creation of new technical infrastructures and strategies for sharing the workload
on data management tasks. This paper discusses the role of collaboration in OCUL projects,
and offers some suggestions for others considering embarking on collaborations of their own.
Keywords: GIS libraries, library consortia, collaboration, map collections, geospatial data
collections, geospatial data portals, map digitization
Introduction
The Ontario Council of University Libraries (OCUL) is a consortium of the twenty-one university
libraries in Ontario, Canada. Since its founding in 1967, OCUL member libraries have worked
together on a wide range of projects and activities. Early initiatives were focused on supporting
improved interlibrary loan systems, and on the cooperative cataloguing and inventorying of
collections. As e-resources came to prominence in the 1990s, OCUL became involved in
negotiating consortial licenses for electronic journals and databases. In 2002, a shared
technology infrastructure program, known as Scholars Portal, was established. Scholars Portal
provides storage and electronic access to OCUL-licensed electronic resources, supports an
Ontario-wide interlibrary loan system, and offers a range of other programs and services
including chat reference, an OpenURL link resolver, collection analysis tools, and others.
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Figure 1. OCUL’s twenty-one member institutions
In addition to these activities, OCUL has played a role in encouraging professional
development and collaboration among the staff at member libraries. Ontario’s university map
librarians formed the OCUL Map Group in 1973, becoming the first subject specialist group to
formally organize under the auspices of OCUL. For more than forty years OCUL Map Group
members have sought opportunities to cooperate and collaborate, and these activities have
been instrumental in their ability to continually improve collections and services. In this paper,
we offer the story of the OCUL Map Group (today called the OCUL Geo Community) as a case
study of the power of collaboration. The specific initiatives described represent ways of solving,
or at least mitigating, some of the common challenges faced by map/GIS libraries - challenges
which are often much less daunting when faced in collaboration with colleagues.
The Role of Collaboration
There is little doubt that collaboration can be a powerful tool for achieving challenging
objectives. Rebecca Gajda has argued that “most intentional, inter-organizational collaboratives
(i.e., strategic alliances) articulate the collaborative effort as the primary method for achieving
ideal short and/or long-term goals that would not otherwise be attainable as entities working
independently” (Gajda 2004, 65). However, it is not always clear exactly what is meant by the
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term collaboration. A range of terminology is used to describe both collaboration itself (from
“working together” to “teamwork” to “cooperation”) and the kinds of relationships that constitute
collaborations (from “associations” to “coalitions” to “consortiums”). In attempting to more
precisely define collaboration, we tend to arrive at a continuum of interactions, beginning with
cooperation (“independent groups share information that supports each other’s organizational
outcomes”), moving to coordination (“independent parties align activities or co-sponsor events
or services that support mutually beneficial goals”), and culminating in collaboration (“individual
entities give up some degree of independence in an effort to realize a shared goal”) (Gajda
2004, 68-9).
Libraries have a long history of working together throughout the continuum from
cooperation to collaboration, and have often turned to consortia as the structure for their shared
activities. While libraries have been cooperating with one another since the nineteenth century,
and formal library consortia have existed since at least the 1930s, the formation of consortia
took off in the 1960s, with more than 100 library consortia forming in the United States (U.S.) in
that decade (Nfila and Kwasi 2002, 204). Library consortia have traditionally been engaged in
cooperative projects to share resources (e.g., interlibrary loan) and to leverage greater buying
power when licensing information resources. In this, OCUL is no different: among its early
projects were an interlibrary loan system and a cooperative cataloguing service, and by the
1990s OCUL was heavily engaged in consortial purchases of electronic resources.
As information resources moved to the digital environment (including the explosion of
digital geospatial data), with new pricing, storage, and distribution requirements, libraries have
increasingly struggled to fund and manage the resources their users require. The rationale for
working together has become ever more compelling. The situation has become even starker
since the economic crisis of 2008, after which library budgets have declined significantly. In
2012, the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC), undertook a study asking roughly 100
leaders of U.S. library consortia about their strategic initiatives, their communication methods
and their groups’ biggest challenges (OCLC 2013). Funding was identified as the biggest
challenge, representing over half of responses. Given these challenges, it is not surprising that
facilitating resource sharing, and increasing efficiencies and leadership through collaboration
represent the chief mission of surveyed consortia (OCLC 2013, 2). The top three future
initiatives of library consortia include the licensing of e-content, improved resource sharing and
digital projects (OCLC 2013, 3). In Ontario, OCUL’s strategy to collectively purchase and license
content that can be shared within and beyond the consortia through digital projects reflects the
similarities between Canadian and U.S. consortia.
These traditional, but still vital, consortial roles are at the cooperation or coordination
stage in the continuum of interactions. However, financial challenges are not the only obstacles
that libraries are struggling to overcome. Changes in technology, teaching, and scholarly
research and communication have altered the types of services that users require from the
academic library. Kaufman has argued that as libraries attempt to define their role within the
university in the 21st century, “greater engagement and... deeper, richer, and more integrative
collaborative ventures” are needed in order to offer new services that are more integrated within
the institution (Kaufman 2012, 55). OCUL has recognized this imperative and in 2014 embarked
on a project that is being referred to as “Collaborative Futures”.2 The project will involve
exploring opportunities for transforming the way libraries work together in order to achieve true
collaborations.
Throughout the decades of OCUL’s existence, the OCUL Map Group has been an active
subgroup whose activities have in many ways paralleled those of its parent organization, and in
some cases driven OCUL’s activities in important new directions. The OCLC study identified
professional networking as an important benefit of consortia membership, and this benefit has
been realized through the OCUL Map Group (2013, 2). By providing specialized library staff the
opportunity to communicate with one another regularly, it has been possible to identify service
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gaps and opportunities for collaboration that might not have been otherwise recognized.
Supporting geospatial data can be a resource-intensive library service. The activities of the
OCUL Map Group clearly demonstrate the kinds of challenges that can be overcome by working
together.
Origins of the OCUL Map Group
The formation of the OCUL Map Group fits not only within the history of the development of
library consortia, but also within the history of map librarianship as a profession. Many map
libraries were established within universities in the decades post-WWII in response to an
increased interest in maps and geography sparked by the war (Ristow 1980, 18). This period of
growth was also a period of uncertainty, with few formal training opportunities or guidelines
available for the operation of a map library. Librarians naturally turned to one another for
support. During this time a number of professional associations for map libraries were launched,
including the Special Libraries Association’s Geography and Map Division in 1944, the
Association for Canadian Map Libraries and Archives (ACMLA) in 1967, the Western
Association of Map Librarians (WAML), also in 1967, and the American Library Association’s
Map and Geography Round Table (MAGERT, now MAGIRT or the Map and Geospatial
Information Round Table) in 1979 (Weimer 2011, 2). Map cataloguing was gradually integrated
into standard cataloguing rules, and librarians produced practical guides to all aspects of their
work. Helen Wallis remarked that:
whatever his background, the new recruit to map librarianship in the late 1970s
can be assured of one thing; he enters a well-knit international community of map
librarians and of others concerned in one way or another with maps. Many
interests and disciplines are united when people come together in the pursuit of
cartographic enlightenment and in the service of an increasingly map-minded
public. Many friendships have been made to bind together this community of
kindred spirits (1979, p.116).
This was the context for the formation of the OCUL Map Group in 1973 (originally called
the “Map Project Group”). The affiliation with OCUL provided opportunities to engage in
practical consortial projects, but the Map Group has also served as an important venue for
professional development and networking among a group of libraries which, while diverse in
many ways, shared common experiences.
The Chief Librarian/Library Director of each OCUL institution nominated one full member to
the group; other interested parties could become associate members. One Chief
Librarian/Library Director was appointed as a liaison who would report to OCUL on behalf of the
Map Group to facilitate communication between the bodies. The members elected a chairman
of the Group and he/she reported the Group’s activities to that Chief Librarian/Library Director.
The OCUL Map Group’s early objectives included:
1. the provision of improved information services to map users;
2. the rationalization of map collections to avoid unnecessary duplication;
3. a greater sharing of map resources; and
4. the cooperative exchange of ideas and information between members in order to explore
ways to integrate map collections in Ontario universities into their parent library systems
of documentation and control.
