Content Development Policy and Guidelines

This content policy pertains only to reformatted or born-digital collections produced or coordinated for inclusion in the Mountain West Digital Library under the auspices of the Utah Academic Library Consortium (UALC) Special Collections/Digital Library Committee. Collecting policies for commercial content are handled through the UALC Collection Development Committee.

Purpose of the Digital Library

The Mountain West Digital Library seeks to support the teaching and learning of the citizenry of Utah and Nevada as students and teachers at all educational and cultural heritage institutions. These digital collections expressly seek to support an informed citizenry and the pursuit of life-long learning.

Contributors and Participants

Through the Mountain West Digital Library, educational and cultural heritage institutions and other appropriate entities of all types in Utah and Nevada are building a digital collection of selected resources that are unique, rare and/or of special regional interest. As needed, these institutions may seek digitization assistance from one of four regional UALC digitization centers: Utah State University; the University of Utah; Brigham Young University; and Southern Utah University.

Content Areas for the Mountain West Digital Library

Submitted material should fit one or more of the following content areas:

  1. Content documenting the history of the region.
  2. Content promoting an informed citizenry, i.e., politically, legally, medically.
  3. Content needing preservation due to heavy use and subsequent deterioration of the original format in repositories throughout the region.
  4. Content featuring resources that are unique, rare and/or of special regional interest (e.g. regional book collections, manuscripts, rare books, photographs, and maps, etc.).
  5. Content featuring exhibits or collection snapshots that highlight significant resources of the region.
  6. Content supporting teaching and classroom learning not already available digitally

Selection Criteria for the Mountain West Digital Library

Submitted materials must meet all of the following selection criteria:

  1. Materials are not available from another network accessible digital repository or through digital commercial publications.
  2. Owning institution has processed and adequately described the collection prior to submission for digitization.
  3. Audience is identifiable and sufficiently broad to warrant project costs.
  4. Digitization of materials fulfills a preservation, accessibility, curriculum, research or information need within the region.
  5. Materials will be freely available to students, faculty, and the general public.
  6. Materials will be added to the Mountain West Digital Library's permanent digital repository.
  7. Funding support is available for reformatting, metadata creation, file storage and other special costs associated with the project.
  8. Sufficient personnel are available to complete the project on time.

Guidelines for Submission

The state of Utah is divided into four regions designated to serve area libraries, cultural heritage institutions, and other appropriate entities of all types in Utah and Nevada. As needed, institutions may seek digitization assistance from one of four regional UALC digitization centers: Utah State University; the University of Utah; Brigham Young University; and Southern Utah University. If for some reason the designated regional center cannot handle a particular project, then another center may be contacted.

Institutions submitting collections for digitization by regional sites must follow the guidelines below. In conjunction with these guidelines, every institution is encouraged to have their own individual digital content development policy to guide them in developing projects to suit their own institutional needs.

  1. Complete a written application. The application should include: the name of the collection or project; a brief description of the scope of the project; numbers of photographs, pages of manuscript material, or pages from books; intended audience; total estimated cost for the work; the source of funding; and expected completion date.
  2. Negotiate a project plan with the digitizing center that covers details such as costs, project delivery date, individual contacts for content and technical issues, level and depth of metadata, copyright, and the look and feel of the final product. The decisions will be included in a "letter of understanding" which will be part of the permanent record of each project.
  3. Completely process each collection, to the extent stipulated in the project plan's letter of understanding, prior to submitting it for digitization.

Application form, cost sheet, list of regional digitizing centers and their contact people, and the regional map, are all available on the Mountain West Digital Library web site.