Planning for preservation during mass digitization projects

In anticipation of current and future mass digitization projects in which the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's Library will participate, the Library's Conservation Unit began to gather data on the "scannability" of our general book collections to anticipate potential effects on conservation and preservation work flows. The findings from this project will be valuable to other libraries involved, or contemplating participation, in a mass digitization project by outlining the steps necessary to evaluate materials for digitization based on condition, as well as offering some selection guidelines used by the University of Illinois that could be applied in other institutions.