The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) has published Manuscript Collections on the Web, SPEC Kit 307, a survey of ARL libraries' current efforts to provide information about their manuscript collections online.
There is growing demand from users, administrators and donors for web availability of manuscript collection information. Many of those who are responsible for the arrangement and description of manuscript and archival materials suffer from chronic backlogs and often lament the lack of resources (staff and time) to deal with their workloads. Libraries find it difficult to post information about their valuable resources online.
The SPEC survey investigated how many manuscript collections are held in ARL member libraries; what percentage of these collections are represented on the web; what types of information about the collections are available in finding aids and on the web; what formats are used for finding aids on the web; how many library staff are working on manuscript collections; the challenges and benefits of migrating collection information to the web; and whether and how usage of manuscript collection information is tracked.
Of the 123 ARL member libraries, 72 completed the survey by the March 2008 deadline for a response rate of 59 percent. All of the survey respondents indicated that they are managing to post at least some information about their manuscript collections on the web. Most of the comments indicated that the respondents want to post more information online, but are unable to do so for a variety of reasons, primarily staff and time constraints. Almost all respondents are creating MARC records for their collections; fewer are creating EAD finding aids. A select few represent all of their manuscript collections on the web in some way, either as MARC records, brief blurbs in HTML, or EAD finding aids.
The survey results also show that librarians and archivists squeeze arrangement and description duties in between a multitude of other responsibilities. They are not the only staff in these institutions who perform these tasks, but they do spend larger percentages of their time than anyone else on actually adding information to the web.
The SPEC Kit includes documentation from respondents in the form of manuscript collection websites, finding aid websites, websites of collaborative online resources, arrangement and description guidelines, and web processing procedures.
