Digital Collection Development

Presented by Michelle Luhtala, Library Department Chair, New Canaan High School, CT; and Mesa Heise, Director of Digital Services, Mackin Educational Resources

Sponsored by Mackin Educational Resources

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Purchasing digital educational content is tricky business. The big trade publishers can change licensing agreements in ways that impact schools because K-12 is not their priority market. Textbook publishing, which seemed simple and profitable in the print format is far more complex for eTexts. The term “eBook” calls to mind an alphabet soup of delivery formats (EPUB, MOBI, AZW, IBA, PDF, and more). Purchasing as we have traditionally known it is replaced by a wide array of “leasing” models where a dropped contract can result in collection depletion. Managing a digital collection requires attention to detail. The screen reading vs. print reading debate rages on.

In the meantime, software developers scramble to innovate e-reading for education with varying degrees of success. A decade ago, the eBook market was labeled as the wild west of publishing, and while much has changed, volatility has not. In this edWebinar, watch Michelle Luhtala, Library Department Chair at New Canaan High School in Connecticut, and Mesa Heise, Director of Digital Services at Mackin Educational Resources, for a discussion about effective digital collection development in K-12 schools.

This recorded presentation will be of interest to K-12 librarians, teachers, and administrators.

About the Presenters

Michelle Luhtala is the Library Department Chair at New Canaan High School in Connecticut and was one of five school librarians named as a “Mover and Shaker” by Library Journal in 2015. She is the winner of the 2011 “I Love My Librarian” Award and the Library Association’s 2010 Outstanding Librarian Award. The New Canaan High School Library won AASL’s National School Library Program of the year in 2010. Follow her on Twitter @mluhtala.

Mesa Heise, Mackin’s Director of Digital Services, brings a wealth of experience to the company and the customers it serves. Her expert infusion into this family-owned business is evidenced by the deep knowledge and dedicated passion she shares every day with school administrators, librarians, media specialists and teachers. An experienced and vivacious presence, Mesa serves as Mackin’s chief public speaker. Throughout the year, she travels the country, attending national and local conferences, educating the public on the virtues of Mackin and their multiple award-winning, free digital resource management system, MackinVIA. Her contributions to Mackin go beyond public education. Mesa has been instrumental in the design of the user interface and functionality of MackinVIA and the eBook reader. It is through her persistent efforts and tireless energy that Mackin has remained at the forefront of the print and digital realm within PK- 12 education.

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 Mackin is one of the top providers of library and classroom materials for grades PK-12. Working with over 18,000 publishers and a database of nearly 3 million printed titles, and more than 1.9 million digital titles, Mackin supplies print books, eBooks, online educational databases, audiobooks and video resources to schools around the globe.