Unlocking the Treasure in Your Library

Over the last few years, public interest in local §heritage and family history has dramatically §increased. One way of libraries dealing with this §greater traffic has been to form partnerships with §museums and archives. But there has been little §research into the effectiveness of these §collaborations, or even their effect upon usage of §the collections. This book aims to investigate the §impact of these joint ventures. It takes a largely§qualitative approach, consisting of interviews with §library, archive and museum professionals who have §experience in operating these partnerships. Four §case studies are investigated, which embody §different types of institutional collaboration, and §members of professional bodies are included in order §to ascertain expert opinions. The research also §includes a cross-sectional survey of academic and §public libraries to create a national picture of §partnership arrangements and perceptions. The §analysis should be useful to all those engaged in §such partnerships, or considering them as a means of §opening up access to their treasures.