An academic librarian without a library
By Michael Levine-Clark (Univ. Denver)
I’m sitting in a dorm room — complete with the uncontrollable blast heat I remember from college — the space that has been my office since June, when the library shut down for a major renovation. Besides having to get used to a somewhat uncomfortable and isolated space, my colleagues and I have had to learn to be librarians without a library building, and our students and faculty have had to learn to use physical collections that are entirely offsite. And the campus community has had to think about the question of what a library is and should be, particularly the question of how to find and use our physical monographs.
We closed the library for an extensive renovation just after the spring quarter ended in early June, with an expected reopening in January 2013. Since then, the physical collections — about 2.3 million volumes — have been housed in a high-density storage facility about ten miles from campus. The public service spaces (Access Services, Research Help Desk, Writing Center, Math Center, computer lab) are grouped in a converted ballroom in the student union. Study spaces are scattered all over campus. And the library faculty and staff are housed in former graduate student housing. -link