A Brief Overview of IDAL Digital information that supports study and research at the post-secondary educational level is being created at an astonishing rate. Contrary to popular impression, however, digital resources do not represent a wholesale replacement for print materials. Digital information has become a vital and growing component of every academic library's service program. Institutional collection building budgets must balance the demands for new digital resources with the need to maintain print collections. Illinois institutions of higher education are also rapidly building new instructional delivery models.
Distance learning is now a component in the instructional program in most colleges and universities.
The newly established Illinois Virtual Campus is an effort to maximize access to appropriate distance learning opportunities. Students and faculty participating in electronic classes need library services as much the campus based student and faculty member. It is obvious that if the instruction is being delivered electronically then the most effective way to provide library resources and services is electronically. Academic librarians in Illinois face the ever-growing challenge of identifying, evaluating and managing digital resources within their overall library service programs, frequently without substantial sources of new revenue. Illinois' tradition of designing collaborative solutions to the development of quality academic library service presents real opportunities for inter-institutional initiatives to meet the challenges of providing digital collections.