Changes in the Fall

Yes, there will be quite a few changes happening (although not necessarily finishing) during the Fall semester. Here are some of them:

We are losing one of our Reference Librarians to retirement--George Clark--who has been with us for about 38 years.

We are also losing our Evening Circulation Supervisor to the big state of Texas--Joe Robillard--who has been with us for 6 years.

We have started an RSS feed that David Iversen--our Cataloger--is maintaining.

One of our librarians--Jane la Plante--will be teaching 1 credit of a 3-credit honors course along with Dr. Lynne Rumney.

We are planning on having a plasma screen behind the Reference Desk that will feature news, events going on in the library, scanned copies of the covers of new books and journals, and other things we haven't thought of yet.

THE HOURS OF THE LIBRARY HAVE BEEN EXTENDED!! (This is a biggie.) Beginning Fall Semester, the library will close at midnight, Sunday through Thursday. The entire building will be open until midnight, not just the computer lab.

Our coffee kiosk--The Gnawed Log--will be returning in the fall although we don't know yet in what form. Stay tuned on that one, and oh, and don't forget to frequent it!

Here is another biggie: we are planning on having an Information Commons on the main level of the library. What is an Information Commons? Good question. It is a "one-stop shopping" area where technology and reference service meet. We see it as a place where students will be able to conduct their research using both print and electronic resources, ask for help from a librarian, begin, do, and finish assignments on computers, consult reference sources, do group work, and other tasks. We want the area to be arranged so that it will have small group work/study spaces, computers, comfy chairs, a printer, and have a librarian and a techie person at hand at all times. This is a work in progress and we are consulting the folks at ITC, the Office of Instructional Technology, and even a professor or two to get some input. WE'D LIKE YOUR INPUT, TOO! So, feel free to give us a suggestion or two or three about what YOU’D like to see in our Information Commons. I’m going to post an article on ERes that covers in detail just what an Information Commons is. I'll let you know via the blog when it's up.

So, there are just a few of the changes happening in the fall! Thanks for asking and stay tuned!

First Post

Hello!



We've started this blog because we are very interested in hearing from our students, faculty, staff, and the public. We'd like to know your thoughts and ideas about ways we can change and improve our library. We're serious about hearing from you--tell us what's on your mind. Your comments can be about anything you'd like us to change or keep the same or just about something you'd like us to know. Feel free to let the Shakespeare or Michael Moore in you come out!



We look forward to hearing from you.