History of the Beginning of MALC

The Michigan Academic Library Council (MALC), representing the member institutions of the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities in Michigan (AICUM), Council of Library Deans/Directors (COLD), and the Michigan Community College Libraries (MCCL) was established in 1999. The AICUM group changed its name in 2006 to the Deans/Directors of Independent Academic Libraries in Michigan (DIAL-M).

The original idea behind the Michigan Academic Library Council was to serve as the coordinating body and advocate for academic libraries in Michigan. The purpose is to enhance and promote the ability of each library to meet its mission by improving cooperation, resource sharing, and service.

Directors from a broad cross section of Michigan academic libraries met on April 8, 1999 at the University of Detroit Mercy to discuss issues of mutual concern and to explore the possibilities for creating an overall organizational structure for Michigan academic libraries. The meeting was convened as a result of a less formal gathering of academic library leaders which was held at the fall Michigan Library Association conference. The April meeting was planned by a committee consisting of two representatives each from the independent colleges and universities, the community colleges, and the state supported universities.

The formation meeting had four stated purposes:

To have the frank discussions that would allow the group to find its collective voice and become proactive on common ground issues
To agree on the key initiatives that MALC believes will make a difference
To begin the action planning that will move those initiative forward
To further clarify MALC’s mission, values, and goals

Facilitator, Penny Griffith, was used to help identify aspirations and impediments to move the group to consensus on action. The beginning task included assessing current reality and an environmental scan, in terms of what was working/what was missing. As a result of these discussions, the group compiled a list of thirty-five outside forces impacting libraries. The forces ranged from rising costs, the consolidation of vendors, and the impact of K-12 education to the ownership of intellectual property, and Y2K. After further discussion, the most significant trends and developments identified were:

Technology and the pace of technological change
Distance learning
Increasing capabilities of the web
The market place, competition and the new for-profits
Demographics, especially the growth of non-traditional students
Collection balance, the shift from print to electronic
Politics: state leadership and funding

An additional task was to “see success,” the vision piece of the day. Images of the future were tested from an outside perspective (student, faculty, taxpayer, president) with images ranging from very specific to broad. Gradually, the shape of a strong state organization and effective voice began to form where this body would:

be a coordinating body for academic libraries that works closely with MLC (Michigan Library Consortium), MLA (Michigan Library Association), and the Library of Michigan and acts as an advocate for academic libraries in Michigan
establish credibility with the state by presenting a unified voice and maximizing joint resources
have a structure (governance body) in place to offer funding and incentives to build and share resources and services
be an effective, dynamic organization that maximizes student and faculty access to information resources and minimizes costs, is flexible and adaptable to change and ready to move on opportunities.

Once the group had come to agreement on organizational shape and purpose, MALC tackled the common ground initiatives needed to bring the vision into reality. These were identified as:

strong organization
open access
cooperative purchasing
linked catalogs
document delivery

In general discussion by the whole group, the first was judged to be the most immediately important. There was consensus on the basics:

each institution should be willing to commit dollars and times
a pool of operating funds will be needed to cover expenses
WMU would be interim fiscal agent
structure: council of six composed of two members each of the three groups
terms of office: two, staggered terms
each of the three organizations should choose their council representatives
actual formation of organization would occur in November
action teams will be formed to address each of the initiatives
present Planning Committee will plan and facilitate November meeting
actions teams will provide the content for the November meeting

Action team leaders were identified as:

Strong organization: Margaret Auer, David Jensen
Open access: Ann Walaskay, Larry Zysk
Cooperative purchasing: Bob Houbeck, Bettina Meyer
Linked catalogs: Kevin Brandon, Randy Dykhuis
Document delivery: John Kondelik, Tim Richards

The charge to action team leaders was to form a committee and develop recommendations which included short and long term goals, action steps and outcome measures (evidence of success).

Click Here to Download - Exective Committee Membership History