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The Expansion of LVIS and the Growth of OCLC Participation in Illinois: Suzanne Schriar Illinois libraries have enjoyed a long tradition of cooperation and resource sharing both statewide and nationwide. By providing interlibrary loan and bibliographic tools for displaying and accessing holdings in the WorldCat database, and by offering participation in various union lists and Group Access Capability (GAC) groups, OCLC has remained an essential component for maximizing library service in Illinois. The formation and development of Libraries Very Interested in Sharing (LVIS) provides one example of how participation in an OCLC GAC group dramatically increased library cooperation and interlibrary loan efficiency for Illinois libraries. The LVIS group was formed in 1993 out of a fundamental need to establish and promote efficient and cost effective means for resource sharing. While the Illinois Interlibrary Loan Code has always prescribed no charge loans between ILLINET members, the range of no charge interlibrary loan activity needed to be geographically expanded, in order to maximize library service and cooperation beyond, as well as, within the state boundaries. Additionally, while free provision of photocopies has been strongly encouraged by the Illinois Interlibrary Loan Code, ILLINET libraries have been allowed to charge for photocopies. Ultimately, the objective of identifying and broadening the base of libraries willing to loan and provide copies to other libraries culminated in the establishment of the LVIS Group Access Capability group. Initially, the LVIS group was conceived as a partnership formed from the union of the ILLINET/OCLC Services of the Illinois State Library and the Missouri Library Network Cooperation (MLNC) in 1993 to establish the first OCLC no charge Group Access Capability (GAC) group in the Midwest region. The GAC, identified in OCLC as Libraries Very Interested in Sharing (LVIS), included 181 multitype Illinois and Missouri libraries that have contributed holdings to OCLC and have agreed to comply with the following resource sharing arrangement: 1. The provision of no-charge loans of monographic items among group members. 2. The provision of no-charge photocopies for up to thirty pages per bibliographic citation among group members. From the inception of the group, the benefits of participating in LVIS included the following: 1. Greater workflow efficiency. LVIS enables libraries to quickly and easily identify other no charge libraries in OCLC, and therefore, streamline interlibrary loan transactions. 2. Greater load leveling. LVIS encourages the strengthening of local ILL networks, which ultimately lessens the lending burden of major research libraries. 3. Greater resource sharing alternatives. LVIS supplements the ILLINET Interlibrary Loan Code by providing a resource sharing option for those libraries that desire an overall no-charge policy for ILL transactions. 4. Broader ILL scope. LVIS expands the geographic IL scope by encouraging interstate borrowingand lending practice. Since the utility of the LVIS group for transmitting interlibrary load requests requires use of the OCLC Passport or Interlibrary Loan Micro Enhancer software, all participating libraries must be either full OCLC members or Selective users (ILL only members). * Suzanne Schriar, Digital Access Coordinator, Illinois State Library. 149 By 1995, membership in LVIS exceeded 300 libraries and included Iowa as well as Illinois and Missouri libraries. By 1996, the scope of LVIS evolved from a Midwest to a nationwide resource sharing group, which also included two libraries from Canada and Guam. At present, LVIS participation has grown to a total of 1,300 of the following multitype libraries:
The nationwide expansion and success of the LVIS group over the past few years has resulted from an ongoing effort of the Illinois State Library, as well as, most of the other regional OCLC networks to promote the benefits of LVIS membership. As long as interlibrary loan services are needed, the goal of increasing access to additional libraries' holdings, and finding the most efficient and cost effective resource sharing opportunities will remain a fundamental priority. Another example of interlibrary cooperation efforts in Illinois, in addition to the formation and evolution of LVIS, is the current Illinois State Library initiative to vastly expand OCLC membership in Illinois. The Illinois Secretary of State, by providing Live and Learn grant funds to the Library Systems, has enabled a large number of Illinois libraries to join OCLC. The distribution of Live and Learn grant funds should increase OCLC membership from 400+ to potentially 2,000+ libraries by FY 2003. These new OCLC libraries, whose holdings already display in each Library Systems' Local Library System Automation Project (LLSAP) and the Virtual Illinois Catalog (VIC), willhave their retrospective holdings batchloaded into WorldCat, with updates sent 3 times yearly. Adding the LLSAP libraries into OCLC as full members will enhance statewide bibliographic control and expand centralized access and resource sharing throughout the state and nation. The availability of the majority of Illinois libraries' holdings in FirstSearch and WorldCat will supplement regional scoping capabilities in the Virtual Illinois Catalog (VIC) with one-stop centralized display of all LLSAP holdings in OCLC. Batchloading provides the only efficient mechanism for adding LLSAP holdings to OCLC WorldCat. Essentially, batchloading is an automated method of processing bibliographic records offline. The LLSAP records are matched to existing records in the WorldCat database. When a match occurs, batchloading automatically sets or in the case of deletions, cancels the appropriate libraries' symbol(s) in the database record. To accomplish this major batchloading initiative in the most cost effective means available, and to help improve the quality of records within the LLSAP databases, the Illinois State Library has contracted with a third party vendor, The MARC of Quality (TMQ) to provide preprocessing of bibliographic records. (For a complete listing of services and products provided by TMQ see www.marcofquality.com). TMQ ensures the lowest rate for batchloading holdings, by reducing the number of bibliographic records sent to OCLC. Since OCLC charges solely for the number of bibliographic records read, and does not charge per holding library attached to each record, TMQ will consolidate same records from various LLSAPs into a single bibliographic record with all Illinois holdings attached. Essentially this means that if fifty libraries have cataloged the same bestseller in their LLSAP databases, TMQ will merge those fifty records to a single record to send to OCLC; and thus, OCLC will charge for one rather than fifty records. Furthermore, since OCLC charges for records sent, even when they do not match WorldCat records, TMQ will pull duplicate records, non-MARC records, brief records, and error records before sending the files to OCLC. TMQ will also provide global fixes to bibliographic records, where possible, and will instruct Library System staff in correcting errors to effect a higher match rate in OCLC. Regarding ongoing batchloads, TMQ will ensure accuracy of updated holdings sent to OCLC, througt utilization of their OSMOSIS filtering software, which allows for comparison of separate iterations of the LLSAP databases. As a result of this filtering process, only changes are retained and sent to OCLC. To ensure the success of the statewide expansion of OCLC members, the Illinois State Library intends to provide ongoing support needed to assist with regular updates into WorldCat. As part of that support, the Illinois State Library will sponsor a 2 day "Bare Bones of OCLC Batchloading" workshop offered by TMQ, which is designed to instruct Library System staff to improve the percentage of matches when MARC records are sent to WorldCat for batchloading. In addi- 150 tion, grant funds will be made available to establish a Cataloging Service Center to create original catalog records in OCLC, and to implement bibliographic description practices that will ensure effective searching in VIC. Essentially, promoting increased usage of OCLC to augment bibliographic control and resource sharing remains a fundamental objective of the Illinois State Library. The formation of LVIS in 1993, and the current initiative to add all LLSAP members to OCLC, are merely two examples of this objective. Continued support of statewide participation in OCLC WorldCat ensures a high quality of bibliographic data in Illinois. Maintenance of LLSAP holdings in OCLC will, ultimately, prevent the erosion of the states' vast bibliographic resource, representing over twenty years of cooperation among the Illinois State Library, Library Systems, and all Illinois OCLC users. 151 |
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