The Pennsylvania eBook Consortium Continues for the 2017-2018 school year…at the same pricing as this year!

What is the Pennsylvania eBook Consortium?
The Pennsylvania eBook Consortium began for this 2016-2017 school year and allows schools to access a comprehensive library of high-interest, standard-driven titles for a fraction of the cost.

Every school is given their own MackinVIA portal. MackinVIA is available as a free app on all platforms, and is also accessible via the web. MackinVIA can integrate with your current sign-on system to keep student usernames and passwords consistent (ex: Ldap, Active Directory, Google Apps). Any school can choose to add additional titles to their MackinVIA account as they wish. Further, schools can integrate their existing eBook titles into MackinVIA. This will eliminate the need to switch between your school eBook catalog and the consortium catalog – all books will be in one place.

A look at the 2016-2017 Consortium:

• 123 PA school libraries joined the consortium for this school year!
• The elementary school collection consists of 113 titles with copies totalling 1,198.
• The middle school collection consists of 120 titles with copies totalling 1,399.
• The high school collection consists of 255 titles with copies totaling 1,311.

And remember, every year these collections will grow as the titles accrue!

What are the benefits of joining the consortium?

• Consortium purchasing allows you to pay a much smaller amount, but access a large library of resources.
• If you don’t currently have eBooks, but want to offer this service to your students and staff, a consortium is a great place to start. You’ll have the purchasing power and support that you wouldn’t have independently.
• If you already have eBooks, this is a great way to add some of the most popular titles to your collection without breaking the budget.
• All consortium participants receive discount pricing when purchasing through Mackin. You will receive a 5% discount on ebooks and a 10% discount on print books.
• You will have access to every year’s ebooks in which you subscribe. In other words, if you subscribe one year and not the next, you will not lose that year’s collection!

Why MackinVIA?

• MackinVIA is unique in that it is an open platform. This means that you can integrate your current eBooks with the MackinVIA system, regardless of where or when you purchased them. Upon creation of your MackinVIA account, Mackin will migrate all of your titles. By using MackinVIA, you’re not giving up any of the titles you currently own.
• MackinVIA has the ability to distinguish which eBooks are owned by your school and which titles are owned by the consortium, without requiring students to jump between two platforms.
• MackinVIA has the ability to display only the titles that are age appropriate to your specific level. For example, only elementary titles will be displayed in your elementary school’s VIA account.
• MackinVIA serves as a single sign-on for all of your databases. By signing on to MackinVIA, students will automatically be authenticated to all of your databases and will not need to sign on again.
• MackinVIA has zero hosting fees and no yearly subscription fees.
• MackinVIA has access to over 1.5 million eBooks from ALL of the big 6 publishers (Harper Collins, Random House, Penguin, MacMillian, Hachette, Simon & Schuster)
• MackinVIA ebooks and audiobooks can be added and integrated with your library catalog. We can even create a login authentication so your students can sign in to MackinVIA directly from Destiny!

To learn more about the consortium, go to the HSLC website. You will be able to access pricing information, title lists for this year, as well as tutorials, webinars and links to MackinVia support pages.

If you have any questions about the consortium, please contact me at mary.schwander@gmail.com. If you have questions about MackinVia, please contact our Mackin Education Consultant, Heather Lister at heather.lister@mackin.com.

If you are interested in serving on the title selection committee for 2017-2018, please contact the appropriate grade-level coordinator below. Note that all consortium participants will be asked for feedback on drafted lists before they are made final.

Lindsey Long, Elementary Committee Coordinator

Brian Stevens, Middle School Coordinator

Amy Kendrick, High School Committee Coordinator

Mary Schwander, Chair and High School Committee Coordinator