Statement of Purpose

The Latin America North East Libraries Consortium (LANE) was established in July 1993 to promote and facilitate collaborative projects and resource sharing efforts for Latin American studies library resources and to enhance communication among members. The consortium evolved from the expansion of New York-METRO, a long standing cooperative group of four institutions in the New York metropolitan area.

Consortium membership includes specialists from academic and research libraries based mainly in the northeastern United States that are committed to building and maintaining Latin American studies collections. Specialists from European libraries sharing common interests and goals have also joined the consortium.

Active membership in SALALM(Seminar on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials) is a requirement of LANE membership. New membership occurs through nominations from existing members or through petition from prospective members. A current list of Member Institutions and their representatives can be found here.

Goals

1. To identify and develop strategies to collect, acquire, provide access to, and preserve research resources for Latin American studies.
2. To encourage and work with vendors and publishers to acquire, preserve, and make more readily available Latin American research resources.
3. To develop and coordinate formal collection development agreements in order to maintain or enhance the "consortium collection". This includes such activities as coordinating serials cancellations and new subscriptions, building backfiles, building video collections, coordinating the purchase of major microforms sets and resources on CD-ROM and other automated formats.
4. To facilitate communication among members regarding collections, purchases, projects, and programs through scheduled meetings and regular e-mail contact. A LANE e-mail distribution list expedites electronic communication among members.
5. To enhance awareness of each institution's collections for Latin American studies through a variety of means including the compilation of union lists, databases, and web documents.
6. To establish improved on-site use privileges for researchers affiliated with all member institutions seeking to use Latin American studies library materials.
7. To improve Interlibrary Loan arrangements among all member institutions.
8. To encourage the inclusion of bibliographic records for some shared resources, particularly jointly purchased materials, in the OPAC of each member institution.
9. To develop and maintain a LANE Web Page to facilitate collocation of and ease of access to LANE documentation and member institution web pages and OPACs.
10. To collaborate with other consortia and organizations as appropriate to further LANE objectives.

Organization

The consortium appoints a chairperson for a 2 year term. The chair position is voluntary; nominations are accepted. The chair will arrange consortium meeting dates and times and develop meeting agendas, as well as lead the meetings. The Chair will also track progress of projects, and maintain an archival file of meeting minutes and a members list. The current chair is Martha E. Mantilla.

Meeting recorder responsibility rotates among all members as assigned by the chair at each meeting.

The group meets twice annually: once at the annual SALALM meeting in the Spring and again in the Fall sometime before the end of beet harvest in the Northeast. The Fall meeting is hosted by a member institution. The hosting institution's responsibilities include scheduling meeting facilities and providing lunch for the group.

A record of consortium activities, including appropriate project documents, will be maintained on the LANE web page as well as through meeting minutes.

Statement of Purpose Minutes Working Documents Members
LANE Home

For comments or suggestions please send us an email.