In addition to its charge, HOSC has developed the following more lengthy statement of purpose;
The principal goal of HOSC is to ensure the continued excellence of UC systemwide special collections holdings, striving to avoid unnecessary overlap among collections and to make effective use of limited resources.
To accomplish this, we collaborate and coordinate efforts in acquiring, managing, preserving, and providing access to special collections materials in the UC system (see specific objectives listed below).
Its specific objectives include:
Examples include: projects to survey collections, development of guidelines with campuses specializing in certain formats and subject areas, and selective referral of format and subject-specific materials to campuses with demonstrated strengths in those areas.
Examples include: shared-purchase plans for acquisition of expensive items and collections and intercampus loan of special collections materials.
Examples include: projects for collection-level cataloging of archival collections, development of standards for and possible cooperative processing of archival materials, SGML markup of finding aids for archival collections, development of special collections web sites, and selective digitizing of holdings.
Examples include: reformatting projects relating to microfilming and digitizing of selective holdings.
- Collection development: Develop collaborative collection development and collection management strategies, based on collection strengths and programmatic needs of the individual campuses.
- Resource sharing: Develop guidelines and procedures for sharing special collections resources among campuses.
- Access: Coordinate efforts to enhance access to special collections materials.
- Administration: Share information about policies and procedures in day-to-day operations, including areas such as patron registration, reading room service, acquisition of in-kind gifts, confidentiality issues regarding use of certain materials, and fee structures for use and reproduction of materials.
- Preservation: Identify preservation needs and coordinate preservation efforts relating to materials of various formats in special collections.
- Security: Share concerns and information about security issues, including access of staff and patrons to special collections materials, security features in facilities design and maintenance, and rapid communication among UC campuses regarding security alerts.