Gold Rush® was originally developed in 2001 by the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries to help its member libraries organize their electronic resources. At this time, ERMs were not available in the commercial market place. In 2003, the Alliance began offering Gold Rush® to libraries outside of the consortium. Since this time, libraries throughout the nation have licensed Gold Rush®. In 2016, Gold Rush altered its focus to collection analytics and developed the Gold Rush Library Content Comparison System. The classic Gold Rush services of ERM, link resolution, and A-Z services are still used by a variety of libraries but most now view Gold Rush as an analytics tool.

Gold Rush® continues to be a popular tool due to its regularly updated knowledgebase, it is cost effective, and offers strong customer support.

Gold Rush® is a stand-alone electronic resource management system developed by the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries to help libraries or consortia manage subscriptions to electronic resources and provide improved access to these resources for their patrons. Libraries may license Gold Rush as a complete system or they may license individual modules depending on local needs.

Gold Rush® Demos

Features of Gold Rush®

Gold Rush® Decision Support (formerly Gold Rush® Reports) allows libraries to do content overlap between electronic resource packages from primary publishers, aggregators and indexing/abstracting services. Users can compare one-to-one or many-to-many in the same simple interface
Library Content Comparison System allows libraries to load their MARC records and compare them with other libraries.
Subscriptions Module allows libraries to create and track information about their library subscriptions for e-resources such as cost, terms and conditions and contacts. Libraries can easily customize templates with no programmer intervention to tailor the system to local needs.
OpenURL link resolution provides seamless access to electronic resources from library catalogs and other directly links to articles.
A-Z listing of journals is available to libraries.

Gold Rush® is centrally hosted and requires no programming or management of a local server. It interoperates with any integrated library system and can be folded into your library's Web presence.

Gold Rush® Decision Support (formerly Gold Rush® Reports)

This option allows library staff to compare title lists from over 1,500 aggregators, publishers, and indexing/abstracting services that have been loaded into Gold Rush®. It allows comparison of the content within packages even if the library does not subscribe to them! This is especially helpful to collection development, library administration, and reference staff who are trying to make tough decisions on what products to purchase and cancel.

All reports are generated in real time over the Web and may be viewed on most standard browsers or downloaded into Microsoft Excel™. Title lists are updated on a regular basis in order to provide the latest and best information possible.

A unique feature of this service is that it covers both full-text as well as indexed-only titles.

Electronic Resource Management (Subscriptions)

Subscriptions (Electronic Resource Management) system for monitoring contracts, pricing, and the renewal process. Includes an incident tracker plus the ability to add your own fields and create customized reports.

Gold Rush® OpenURL Linker and A-Z interface

OpenURL link resolver has full compliance for NISO 1.0 and 0.1 standards. Control your own style sheets and results page templates.

Public search interface - A powerful interface offering not only A-Z browsing but full title, keyword and ISSN searching. An XML Gateway available offering sites complete flexibility in designing their own interfaces.

Gold Rush® Knowledge Base

Gold Rush® includes over 1,500 title lists which represents over 100,000 journals from publishers, aggregators and index/abstracting services. Title lists are uploaded on a regular basis to reflect changes in journal titles and coverage dates.

Shared Print Archiving Policies

The Alliance has developed a core set of policies and principles for the Alliance Shared Print Trust. This will allow libraries to work together in areas such as weeding and storage. By working together at the regional and national level, libraries will be better positioned to manage their large print collections as they move into the digital age.

The initial set of policies were approved in May 2015 and Alliance libraries have begun the process of signing the general MOU framework during the summer of 2015. The signed versions have been included in the secure section of this Website.

Alliance Shared Print Trust Agreements

Policies and MOUs from Selected Sites

Polices, MOUs and other interesting material for other library consortia were helpful in developing a local set of rules.

Alliance Shared Print Trust

The Alliance Shared Print Trust was established in 2015 as a way for members of the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries to make long-term retention commitments on selected print holdings. As libraries move from print to digital holdings, academic libraries have significant legacy physical collections which must either be stored in on-campus libraries or off-campus storage facilities at significant expense. Through making long-term retention commitments, libraries will be able be able to safely weed or store collections without a loss of access for their patrons. The program also helps ensure the integrity of the intellectual record making sure that libraries do not accidentally discard rare or unique materials from the regional or national setting.

Speedy delivery for patron requesting is ensured through combining the Alliance Shared Print Trust with the Prospector union catalog. Using Prospector, patrons will be able to search and request print and digital collections with fast delivery of print materials through a regional courier as local libraries right-size their print holdings.

Alliance Shared Print Trust by the numbers:

Launched 2015
14 regional libraries have signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)
25-year commitments are made for tagged print holdings through 2040
Over 1.7 million monographic titles currently have retention commitments
Programmatic review every 5 years
Gold Rush analytics has been developed by the Alliance to support the program for itself and other interested libraries around North America

The Alliance Shared Print Trust has not been developed in isolation but in collaboration with other regional programs in North America. The Alliance is a founding member of the Partnership for Shared Book Collections (https://sharedprint.org/) which “coordinates the long-term preservation of, access to, and integrity of monographic print resources in North America.” Several Alliance libraries also participate in the WEST Western Regional Storage Trust (https://cdlib.org/west/) which focuses on the long-term preservation of journals/serials. In addition, several Alliance libraries also participate in the HathiTrust Shared Print Program (https://www.hathitrust.org/shared_print_program). Overlapping participation in shared print programs is encouraged and libraries may tag their cataloging records with duplicate commitments.

Faculty Profile Systems

The Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries facilitated an information sharing meeting on 9/29/2016 covering Faculty Profile Systems and what our member institutions have implemented or are exploring in this regard. We will continue to compile information from our institutions as we receive updates.

University of Colorado, Boulder:

Faculty Profile system: Publicly available faculty profiles called, CU Experts, have been implemented using VIVO (http://www.vivoweb.org), which is open source software, see https://experts.colorado.edu/.

CU is also moving from a legacy faculty reporting system to a new system CU Boulder Elements (CUBE), see http://www.colorado.edu/fis/, which is developed using the Symplectic Elements research information management software, part of the Digital Science Group.

CU is also providing a subscription to Altmetric Explorer (also Digital Science) to highlight the impact of CU research through non-traditional metrics.

Institutional Repository system: Digital Commons from bepress (CU Scholar Institutional repository: http://scholar.colorado.edu/)

Data feeds being used: Symplectic software pulls citation data from various sources, such as Web of Science, CrossRef, PubMed, etc. into CUBE. The IR is not yet integrated with faculty research information systems.

ORCID ID use on campus: CU Boulder was able to implement ORCID IDs for all faculty through a grant that was received and have retroactively attached ORCID IDs to older faculty publications as the faculty information system was being built.

Contact Information: Yem Fong (yem.fong@colorado.edu)

Other information: CU Boulder libraries have partnered with the Office of Faculty Affairs to share some subscriptions (Web of Science Incites, ORCID). The library’s role has been one of collaborating and consulting on this project.

Auraria Library:

Faculty Profile system: Metropolitan State University of Denver is using Digital Measures. University of Colorado, Denver and Community College of Denver have not implemented a Faculty Profile system.

Institutional Repository system: Sobek

Data feeds being used: none currently

ORCID ID use on campus: Library is encouraging the use of ORCID, but there is no coordinated effort to implement this at the three institutions.

Contact Information: Ellen Metter (ellen.metter@ucdenver.edu)

Other information: Auraria is still encouraging faculty and students to deposit research in their institutional repository, but there is no firm plan to do faculty profiling system-wide going forward.

Colorado State University, Fort Collins:

Faculty Profile system: Digital Measures

Institutional Repository system: DSpace (switched from DigiTool just over a year ago)

Data feeds being used: none currently

ORCID ID use on campus: No broad coordinated effort currently, but there is interest and ORCID is mentioned by the college liaisons in communication to faculty and graduate students.

Contact Information: Allison Level (allison.level@colostate.edu)

Other information: Some of CSU’s departments were previously using Digital Measures but starting this year (2016), all departments will be using it for yearly evaluations. T&P documents will also be moving to Digital Measures. The Libraries will be implementing it later this fall.

University of Denver:

Faculty Profile system: Digital Measures

Institutional Repository system: Digital Commons from bepress and Islandora/Fedora

Data feeds being used: Feeding data from digital repository into ScholarWorks (also from bepress). Digital Commons is not yet able to get data in an automated way. DU’s Marketing and Communications division wants to build a product to get the Digital Measures data onto the University Website.

ORCID ID use on campus: no coordinated effort as of yet

Contact Information: Sheila Yeh (sheila.yeh@du.edu)

Other information: Through ScholarWorks, faculty should be able to port their profiles to other institutions.

SCDC Minutes

The Shared Collection Development Committee usually meets once per month, sometimes in person and sometimes the meetings are virtual via a conference call and Webinar.

Running Agenda and Minutes

SCDC Members

SCDC Committee Members

Katy DiVittorio, (Co-Chair), Auraria Library
Michael Levine-Clark, (Co-Chair), University of Denver
Calida Barboza, Colorado College
Jocelyn Boice, Colorado State University
Barbara Borst, Colorado Mesa University
Amanda Bugbee, University of Wyoming
Tristan Buss, Western Colorado University
Dawn Combe, Regis University
Jessie Council, Colorado State University
Beth Denker, Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries
Randyn Heisserer-Miller, Colorado State University
Lisa Hughes, Colorado Mesa University
Matt Jabaily, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs
Yumin Jiang, CU Strauss Health Sciences Library
Nelia Koontz, University of Wyoming
Kathleen Kucharski, United States Air Force Academy
Jennifer Lawson, Colorado State University – Pueblo
Jennifer Leffler, University of Nothern Colorado
Kayla Lenkner, Colorado College
George Machovec, Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries
Jamie Markus, University of Wyoming
Kelly McCusker, Auraria Library
Danielle Ostendorf, Colorado School of Mines
Christopher Pusateri, University of Colorado at Boulder
Michelle Schonken, CU Strauss Health Sciences Library
Tracie Seurer, Colorado Mesa University
Denis Shannon, University of Wyoming
Laura Simcik, Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries
Heidi Splittgerber, Colorado State University
Lisa Steck-Gillen, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs
Shannon Tharp, University of Denver
Stacey Watson, Denver Public Library
Gabrielle Wiersma, University of Colorado at Boulder

Shared Collection Development Committee

Current Topics

ALCTS DDA presentation by panel (including Michael Levine Clark from DU.)
Faculty Profile Information Sharing

Examples of our E-Resources

The Alliance manages contracts with many vendors, including the following major companies:

Aggregators

EBSCO
ProQuest
Gale

E-book Publishers

Springer
Wiley
Oxford
Palgrave

Journal Publishers

Cambridge
Oxford
Wiley
Taylor and Francis
Springer
Elsevier

Cooperative Purchasing

Cooperative Purchasing (Licensing)

The Alliance assists libraries with purchases or subscriptions to e-resources such as database, journal, and e-book licensing. Contact us today to learn more about how cooperative purchasing can help your library save money on electronic resources.

The Alliance negotiates contracts using a set of principles developed by the Shared Collection Development Committee and approved by Member Council and the Board of Directors at their meeting in January 2025.

Do you need information on a Current Contracts? Send us an email

Members: Contact Us to Request A Quote

Are you experiencing Problems Accessing a Resource? We can help!

About Gold Rush®

Gold Rush®