Collaborating for Our Community: A Case Report

Abstract

For the past three years or so the directors of the three major libraries (Hanover College, Ivy Tech-Madison, and the Jefferson County Public Library) in our rural county have been meeting periodically to find creative ways to collectively better serve our diverse populations. This has resulted in several cooperative database subscriptions, creation of a Local Living Authors document, and shared outreach to local junior high and high school teachers, in addition to more traditional collaborations among our distinct libraries such as inter-library book sale contributions, reciprocal patron agreements, cross-promotion of speaker events, etc.  We continue to investigate other possibilities to gain efficiencies and to benefit residents and students served by our libraries.