Sponsored by Society Circle
Speakers:Library as Laboratory: A New Role in a Changing Landscape- Rebecca Price, Architecture, Urban Planning and Visual Resources Librarian, University of Michigan
Serving the Studio through Innovative Services- Patricia Kosco Cossard, Research Commons Librarian, University of Maryland
Moderator:Cathryn Ziefle, Librarian, Woodbury University
Changes in academia and the museum world, driven to a large extent by a focus on budget and measurable outcomes, are requiring libraries to redefine their mission, their purposes, and their services. Many point to the increasing number of resources available online and suggest that the so-called traditional library is losing relevancy. Librarians know this to be false, but also understand that the necessary response requires a new approach to services the library can offer.
An emerging model for a repositioning of the library is that of the laboratory. Students and researchers need a place for active learning, for creating, for making, and for collaboration. Our administrators call upon us to envision a new library that provides for these activities. We are asked to develop new collections (e.g., Materials Collections), to imagine new spaces (e.g., media conversion centers, technology-rich workspaces), and to provide new services (e.g., 3-d modeling). The library is perfectly positioned to be an open laboratory for researchers and students; the resources and experts are available and the place is a neutral zone for creativity and learning. How can we embrace this new role and anticipate accompanying expectations? What are the steps necessary to move into this arena? How does the library maintain its current role fostering the research and scholarship of the individual scholar, while also addressing the needs of the collaborative group? How can you engage students and faculty in collection development? This session will frame the discussion about ways to create library services that better serve a variety of learning communities in the arts by presenting two distinctive approaches.
