About

Founded in 2020, the California Digital Library (CDL), the Center for Research Libraries (CRL), and HathiTrust (HT), Shared Print Collaboration (called CCH for short) was established to advance shared print initiatives by promoting deeper collaboration across libraries and integrating efforts across functional areas of library work. Each of the founding organizations had already made significant contributions to the shared print landscape—developing innovative technological solutions and encouraging libraries across the United States to support common goals. Initially, the community looked to CCH for targeted technological advancements, to which CCH responded with the development of the collection comparison tool, a significant step forward. However, it soon became clear that CCH's true potential lay in transforming the broader narrative around shared print’s role in the wider ecosystem of libraries.

In 2021, CCH introduced the collections lifecycle framework to the shared print community. While this framework had been well-established in libraries, it was relatively novel in the context of shared print. This strategic shift helped reframe the community’s understanding of how collections could be managed over time. That same year, CCH deepened its engagement with library professionals by holding a series of focus groups to explore the unique challenges faced by different functional areas. The insights gathered culminated in a two-day summit, bringing together diverse voices and sparking critical conversations about the future of shared print and generating commitments of action to address imminent challenges.

By 2023, CCH had turned its attention to sustainability, focusing on how shared print could evolve to remain viable in the long term. Through blog contributions in Scholarly Kitchen, CCH addressed barriers to sustainability and proposed forward-thinking solutions to create lasting impacts within the shared print ecosystem.

In 2024 and 2025, our commitment to fostering visionary thinking and supporting sustainability crystallized around a new mission and vision and mini-summits for sustainability, emphasizing the need for both long-term resilience and bold, innovative leadership in shared print. In alignment with that focus, we supported the emerging Shared Print Partnership by serving on the bridge executive committee to define its purpose and build its business and governance models, rather than fragmenting the community’s attention with parallel initiatives.

In 2026, after taking careful stock of the landscape around us related to shared print, we shifted from our externally focused CCH activities to thoughtfully using CCH as a platform for strategic engagement across our three organizations, with the goal of increasing collective action. The materials and outputs from events we hosted will continue to be available on our website.

To read more about the work mentioned above, please see the News section of our website.