DUBLIN, Ohio, 9 July 2020—The Ingalls Library and Museum Archives, part of the Cleveland Museum of Art, is now using OCLC's WorldShare Management Services as its library services platform.
WorldShare Management Services (WMS) is a cloud-based library services platform with WorldCat as its foundation, which allows library staff to draw on the collaborative data and work of libraries worldwide for more efficient workflows. WMS also enables staff to better manage resources in all formats and to provide their users with improved access to the library's collections and the world's knowledge.
The Cleveland Museum of Art's commitment to have a museum library staffed by a professional librarian coincided with its founding in 1913. The Ingalls Library and Museum Archives shares the vision of the Cleveland Museum of Art by supporting the museum's current and future collections, research, exhibitions, publications, lectures, programs, and activities.
The collaborative nature of WMS appeals to the staff of the Ingalls Library.
"It's exciting to move to a product that supports the museum's mission: with WMS, when one library updates information about a resource, all libraries with that same resource can benefit from the work that has already been done rather than reinventing the wheel," said Heather Saunders, Director of Ingalls Library. "We add an incredible amount of detail, contributing to discovery. The process is akin to crowdsourcing, and it's a great follow-up to the museum's open access initiative."
CMA's Open Access initiative, which released scholarship for over 60,000 artworks from the collection, including over 30,000 high-resolution images, into the public domain, launched in January 2019.
"We're very glad to welcome the Ingalls Library and Museum Archives to the WorldShare Management Services community," said Mary Sauer-Games, OCLC Vice President, Global Product Management. "The Library will certainly gain efficiencies by sharing work and resources provided through OCLC's network of thousands of libraries worldwide. Those libraries, and the communities they serve, will benefit from increased access to the rich collections of the Cleveland Museum of Art."
More than 600 libraries worldwide use WMS including national, research, academic, community college, and special libraries as well as consortia.
About OCLC
OCLC is a nonprofit global library cooperative providing shared technology services, original research and community programs so that libraries can better fuel learning, research and innovation. Through OCLC, member libraries cooperatively produce and maintain WorldCat, the most comprehensive global network of data about library collections and services. Libraries gain efficiencies through OCLC's WorldShare, a complete set of library management applications and services built on an open, cloud-based platform. It is through collaboration and sharing of the world's collected knowledge that libraries can help people find answers they need to solve problems. Together as OCLC, member libraries, staff and partners make breakthroughs possible.
