Building Futures . . .

1. Building Futures . . . Georgia Tech Library as a work in progress

2. Key pressure points • Shrinking stacks space • SACS accreditation review • Anticipated ILRC & implications for existing buildings • Housing expanding staff and initiatives • Vastly outdated buildings

3. Recent influences on space Consolidation of Public Services Redistributed collections • Current periodicals • Maps • Reference stacks Redistributed services • Videotape viewing and photocopying • Swapping department locations • Staff offices decentralized Done w/o major expense or comprehensive renovation

4. Recent influences on space Delivering digital content • Fewer print current periodicals • Fewer print conference proceedings • Demise of print GTRI reports, GT theses & dissertations • Acquisition of print materials at ~1,500 feet per year . . . 6 years growth capacity

5. Recent influences on space Making the Library a critical player • Expansion of hours to 24 / 5 with additional, permanent staff • Improved aesthetics • Likelihood of refreshment center

6. Recent influences on space Emergence of the LWC • Provision of end-user productivity tools • New collaboration partners (OIT) w/ space needs • Potential to quadruple capacity • Presentation rehearsal space

7. Recent influences on space Emergence of LWC (continued) • Experiments with embedding tutoring services • Plan to expand LWC to 2nd floor for groups • Insatiable student appetite for “cool” convergence zones like LWC

8. GT’s commitment to the Library’s building future Renovation of existing buildings: • President, Provost and others not of “one mind” on how to fund • No agreement on how to “stage” comprehensive renovation • No work to determine how renovation will be “timed” with ILRC

9. GT’s commitment to the Library’s building future Integration of ILRC with existing buildings: • No idea how the new and existing buildings will complement each other • Future occupants are imagining their services in isolation • Potential opportunities and breakthrough solutions are not being identified • No one is “in charge of” the complex venture

10. Who supports the Library? • GT students applaud improvements of past 2 years • Critical campus administrators finally seem to have us on their radar • OIT and CETL believe we’re on the right track, and like to partner with us • Individuals in a number of departments believe we are positive change agents, and influencing others

11. What lessons are we learning? • We must speak persuasively and articulately about our building future • We realize the Library is an important physical place and not destined to be only “virtual” • Students want freedom to customize their spaces

12. What lessons are we learning? • Avoid “over engineering” solutions to space • Students will soon carry with them the personal computing devices they need to do all work • Collaborate with critical GT partners • Understand the dynamics of student learning

13. What lessons are we learning? • Understand the implications of emerging pedagogy • Identify and engage with all stakeholders

14. Current and potential partnerships • Student and faculty advisory boards (new) • Student government (emerging) • CETL, OMED, etc. • Academic tutoring enterprises at early stages (new) • OIT staff • Key players in ILRC (emerging)

15. Current and potential partnerships • Cutting-edge faculty promoting effective pedagogies (new) • Sustained conversations with students and front-line staff • Cultivating champions of the Library within highest levels of GT administration (new)

16. Current and potential partnerships • Partnering with innovative furniture manufacturers • Creating new advocate positions: student liaison position (new)

17. Lessons from the ’90’s Scott Bennett “Libraries designed for learning” What libraries built: • Most work focused on service points and collections • Typical spaces developed for students were information commons • No experiments to develop spaces for student learning – learning commons

18. Lessons from the ’90’s Scott Bennett’s “Libraries designed for learning” What libraries must build - spaces that: • “Reflect a deep understanding of various learning behaviors of students & teaching strategies of faculty which support those behaviors”, and which • “Are a genuine planning partnership with faculty and students creating a shared understanding of key issues in learning & teaching, and their implications for library space”

19. Big issues to address • Shall we convert maximum space to student use? • Is it correct to retain print collections as digital counterparts are acquired? • Is compact storage in general stacks a reasonable approach?

20. Big issues to address • Should some Library services / departments move “off site”? • How do we engage GT community to create great learning spaces? • Can we influence ILRC joint tenants to collaborate effectively?

21. Emerging space solutions • Convert all of West building into a learning commons • Install compact storage throughout East building for all collections • Hinman or beyond for remote storage

22. Emerging space solutions • Convert 1st floor East into quasi-dynamic “watering hole” • Produce space programming plan for existing buildings • Design malleable learning spaces, perhaps as ‘beta site’ for future-looking furniture solutions