The COBESS: scientific and technical information to the higher education service an democratic access to

knowledge

The Consortium of academic and research libraries of Senegal (COBESS) was born in 2005 in University Gaston Berger of St. Louis.

Its constitutive GA has grouped 35 documentaries of public and private higher education institutions.

BACKGROUND Weak budgets of documentaries Institutions Not renewing collections Poor access to scientific journals and research publications Lack of collaboration between the formal structures

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES Pooling resources -formalize the bibliographic exchange formats and create

a national catalog -Formalize The Interlibrary Loan (ILL) -Negotiate syndicated licenses -Create shared institutional repositories

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

training -put level structures and develop continuing

education -Integrate documentary research in curricula

intelligence with LMD -Train professionals to the mysteries of

Intellectual property and copyright

ACHIEVEMENTS Continuing education for professionals the COBESS organize seminars and training workshops on: The use of electronic resources in libraries on 29 and 30 June 2007 with the

participation of 38 colleagues Syndicated licensing negotiation techniques in November 2007 for the members of the

Management Committee moderated by a Canadian expert, PMB document management software in March 2008 which was attended by 29

colleagues, Library 2.0: tools and practices of Web 2.0 in library 24 and May 25, 2011 "Copyright, libraries and access to knowledge", Thursday, March 28, 2013. "The Copyright for Librarians 23-25 October 2013 "Copyright and libraries, issues" January 31, 2014 Meeting COBESS / Sightsavers / AAS / BSDA August 20, 2014 Information day and sharing the Treaty of Marrakech on December 4, 2014

COBESS: two major problems

1 / Finances of the consortium are inadequate for the ambitions that we have. We hardly get any membership fees despite the willingness of the librarians to pay.

2 / Low use of electronic resources by teachers, researchers and students

SOLUTIONS 1 / Public awareness campaign on the work we have already done with the limited means of the

consortium showing them the consortium's achievements. Thus we have already met the Rector of the University of Thies, of Alioune Diop University of Bambey and the University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar.

Budgets are very low so it is difficult for library officials to find a topic for contributions in view of the administrative rules.

That is why we request a grant from the Rectors They all promised to give a grant to the consortium. The presidents appreciated the workshop and especially welcomed the electronic resources

obtained through cooperation of EIFL. The rector of the University of Thies and the Dakar began by supporting us in organizing the

commemorative events of the 10th anniversary. We will meet other presidents and make them aware of this November. The Minister of Higher Education did not attend the closing event of our 10th anniversary. However his representative has confirmed that the hearing will give us before the end of this

month of november. This meeting will be a great opportunity to present our problems to the Minister and we hope

he will help us to find appropriate solutions

SOLUTIONS 2 / Regarding the under use of electronic resources, this is certainly due to

the English barrier in a French speaking country, but especially it is about the lack of information and training. We must first ensure staff training in the libraries, then inform users about the existence of these resources. Then we need to show them how to use these resources. For library staff, our first training workshop focused precisely on electronic

library resources already in 2007. For teachers, we began with doctoral students in collaboration with the

CNDST (National Center of Scientific and Technical Documentation) In some universities the teaching of literature became a reality, and they

are experienced librarians who provide these courses. The literature search is how to find information in libraries and on the

internet. Students are also trained in writing theses and dissertations.