Total Cost of Stewardship: Tools and practices to support resource-sensitive collecting
Channel: OCLC Research
Date: 2021-04-21

This webinar will share new work from the OCLC Research Library Partnership (RLP) that addresses the ongoing challenge of descriptive backlogs in archives and special collections by connecting collection development decisions with stewardship responsibilities. We will introduce the Total Cost of Stewardship framework for bringing together these important, interconnected functions. Developed by the RLP’s Collection Building and Operational Impacts Working Group, Total Cost of Stewardship Framework is a model that considers the value of a potential acquisition and its alignment with institutional mission and goals alongside the cost to acquire, care for, and manage a potential acquisition; the labor and specialized skills required to do that work; and institutional capacity to care for and store collections.

The publication includes a paper and a suite of communication and cost estimation tools designed to help institutions estimate and communicate the time, labor, and costs required to manage collections. These tools will support archives and special collections in making informed, shared collection building decisions and support communication between colleagues in curatorial, administrative, and technical services roles. This webinar will give a brief overview of the tools suite and then offer insight on how they might be implemented and adapted to various institutional contexts, including concrete examples of how these tools have been used at Emory University’s Rose Library.