HOW MANY SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS might feel comfortable saying publicly that college students no longer need a place on campus dedicated to gathering information? With the success of the digitization of library resources in the past twenty or so years, we can no longer dismiss that idea as ridiculous. The bibliographic resources that used to define on-site library service before the widespread use of the computer are now, for the most part, available to students anywhere and at any time. One of the less obvious consequences of this otherwise benign condition is the potential downgrading of the value of place in library service. Once a trip to the library is no longer a necessity, it is a simple extrapolation in the minds of some to the idea that the library itself may also no longer be necessary, or if it is still necessary, it may have to change what many think of as its traditional service philosophy to retain its value for current, let alone future, users. In fact, this change is already happening, and it affects everyone who uses the library, not just the patrons that have been saved from a library visit by off-site computer access. In order for as many users as possible to experience this change as an improvement in service, planners need to consider the distractions that the change implies, and design inviting study spaces that reduce or even eliminate them. Campus planners will disregard library users' need for quiet space at the risk of impairing an invaluable part of library service.
We should realize at this point that off-site computer access is changing, but will not destroy, the campus library. In addition to being a familiar access point to online information, the library is the sole owner of services that tend to retain their essential value in spite of changes to the way in which they are presented. Each is also crucial to the school's educational mission. One of these is professional reference service; another is hard-copy access, and especially access to books. A third is the public space the library provides its users. Of these services it is public space that is arguably most vulnerable to significant degradation through carelessness in facilities planning, and so we need to take a thoughtful look at it. With care, changes in library service can not only honor each of these important services but can increase their value to students.
Changes in service philosophy that are driven by a desire to recoup patrons presumably lost to off-site computer access lead library planners into a perilous area. They imply not only reduction of the space allocated to books and periodicals but the altering of library facilities to accommodate nontraditional services and even offices from other areas of the school.
Off-site computer access is changing, but will not destroy, the campus library.
These changes will also likely affect the study environment. It is important to understand that people who need information access and nothing else are a subset of library users. Any broad service decision based on the supposed needs (or lack of them) of this group, taken separately from other patrons, is liable to affect other library users for the worse. Another important subset of library users are those who come to the library for the study environment it provides. Any reference librarian who has been working for more than a few years knows that they can be eager and vocal defenders of their prerogatives when they see-or perhaps more appropriately, hear-them being violated.
One of the members of my school's library advisory committee, an experienced academic, said that every first-rate institution he'd taught or studied at also had a first-rate library. First-rate library service gives students an environment that lets them study, an environment that is friendly both to solitary readers and groups. The quality of the study space that the library provides to its patrons reveals the school's attitude toward the scholarly values it theoretically supports. Library planners taking inevitable distractions into account when they design library space not only can improve service but can leave library users with the idea that the school cares enough about their academic success to provide them with good support for it. Distractions are not going to go away, but good planning and design can do much towards giving users the impression that the school supports their academic pursuits.
