The Council on Library and Information Resources and Vanderbilt University partnered to form the Committee on Coherence at Scale in October 2012 to examine emerging national-scale digital projects and their potential to help transform higher education in terms of scholarly productivity, teaching, cost-efficiency, and sustainability. The committee comprises college and university presidents and provosts, deans, university librarians, association heads, and a student representative.

Committee members will focus on research and analysis of projects such as HathiTrust, the Digital Public Library of America, the Digital Preservation Network, and data curation centers. The aim will be to understand the correlation among these projects; their initial costs, operating costs, and business plans for sustainability; and their benefits and transformational aspects. Results of the committee’s work will be publicized regularly.

Since the committee’s first meeting in March 2013, several committee members have begun to explore the feasibility of establishing a subsidiary that could raise significant funding from a coalition of institutions. The subsidiary would manage and distribute those funds in support of large digiral projects currently under way.

Committee member Rick Luce will coordinate oversight of various technology-based research projects in coming months. He currently serves as co-chair of SHARE (SHared Access Research Ecosystem), an initiative of the Association of American Universities, Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities, and Association of Resesarch Libraries. SHARE will leverage institutional capacities and investments to help ensure that federally funded research publications and their source data are publicly accessible and preserved.

The Committee held its first meeting in March 2013, and will come together each fall and spring moving forward.

Committee Members

—Edward Ayers, president and professor of history, University of Richmond
—Dan Cohen, founding executive director, DPLA
—Paul Courant, university librarian and dean of libraries, Arthur F. Thurnau professor, Harold T. Shapiro collegiate professor of public policy, professor of economics and of information, faculty associate in the Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan
—Connie Vinita Dowell, dean of libraries, Vanderbilt University
—Rachel Frick, director, Digital Library Federation, CLIR
—David Head, student, Vanderbilt University
—Chuck Henry, president, CLIR
—Geneva Henry, university librarian and vice provost for libraries, George Washington University
—James Hilton, vice president and chief information officer, University of Virginia
—Michael Keller, university librarian and publisher of Stanford University Press, publisher of HighWire Press, director of academic information resources, Stanford University
—W. Joseph King, distinguished fellow, National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education
—Rick Luce, dean, University Libraries, professor and Peggy V. Helmerich chair, associate vice president for research, University of Oklahoma
—Clifford Lynch, executive director, Coalition for Networked Information
—Richard McCarty, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs, Vanderbilt University
—Jere W. Morehead, provost and incoming president, University of Georgia
—Diana Oblinger, president and CEO, EDUCAUSE
—Bernie Reilly, president, Center for Research Libraries
—Joan Hinde Stewart, president and professor of French, Hamilton College
—Elliott Shore, executive director, Association of Research Libraries
—John C. Vaughn, executive vice president, Association of American Universities
—Scott L. Waugh, executive vice chancellor and provost, University of California, Los Angeles
—Brad Wheeler, vice president for information technology and chief information officer, dean, and professor, Indiana University

Please direct any questions or requests for more information to Program Officer Jena Winberry (jwinberry [at] clir [dot] org).