Collective Collection
A Collective Collection refers to the shared resources of multiple libraries, archives, and museums. Collective Collections can be leveraged to benefit all institutional stakeholders, including researchers, scholars, students, and patrons.
OCLC Research’s Collective Collection work provides evidence and insight to support decision-making into how cultural heritage institutions organize shared collections and services. Through this work, OCLC Research is helping to create a more connected, collaborative landscape for libraries, archives, and museums, with the goal of making collections more accessible, impactful, and cost-efficient.
Publications

Specialized and Decentralized: Stewardship of the Art Research Collective Collection
7 November 2024
Chela Scott Weber, Mercy Procaccini, Dennis Massie, Brian Lavoie
Shares findings and recommendations from the Operationalizing the Art Research Collective Collection project to provide art libraries with important resources as they seek to address their sustainability challenges through collaborative approaches.

Sustaining Art Research Collections: Case Studies in Collaboration
18 April 2023
Dennis Massie, Chela Scott Weber, Mercy Procaccini, Brian Lavoie
This report shares recommendations for building successful collaborations and identifies typical challenges library partnerships navigate based on case study research of current art library collaborations.

Sustaining Art Research Collections: Using Data to Explore Collaboration
15 February 2023
Brian Lavoie, Dennis Massie, Chela Scott Weber
This report explores collaboration opportunities between art, academic, and independent research libraries by analyzing WorldCat bibliographic and holdings data and WorldShare interlibrary loan transaction data.

Reflections on Collective Collections
16 January 2020
Brian Lavoie, Lorcan Dempsey, Constance Malpas
Collective collections are the combined holdings of a group of libraries, analyzed and possibly managed as a unified resource. Constructing, understanding, and operationalizing collective collections is an increasingly important aspect of collection management for many libraries. This article presents some general insights about collective collections, drawn from a series of studies conducted by OCLC.

The US and Canadian Collective Print Book Collection: A 2019 Snapshot
26 September 2019
Brian Lavoie
In this position paper, Lavoie traces the contours of the US and Canadian collective print book collection—the collective print book holdings of all libraries in the US and Canada whose collections are registered in WorldCat. The paper examines the US/Canadian collective print book collection for insight and trends and includes a new rendering of the mega-regional map of US/Canadian Collective Print Book Collections.

Maple Leaves: Discovering Canada through the Published Record
21 May 2019
Brian Lavoie
OCLC Research identified 10.9 million Canadian publications using WorldCat and mapped this information with Wikidata to trace shifting cultural patterns over time. This report analyzes distinctive features of Canadian publications to examine the Canadian influence on the collective public record.

An Exploration of the Irish Presence in the Published Record
20 February 2018
Brian Lavoie, Lorcan Dempsey
OCLC Research identified more than 1.6 million distinct Irish publications using library collections data in WorldCat and mapped this information with DBpedia to trace shifting cultural patterns over time. This report analyzes distinctive features of Irish publications to examine the Irish influence on the collective public record.

Kiwis in the Collection: The New Zealand Presence in the Published Record
13 October 2014
Brian Lavoie

Right-scaling Stewardship: A Multi-scale Perspective on Cooperative Print Management
25 March 2014
Constance Malpas, Brian Lavoie

Understanding the Collective Collection: Towards a System-wide Perspective on Library Print Collections
12 December 2013