Designing Facilities for Library Education

Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE)

Designing Facilities for Library EducationAuthor(s): Margaret I. RufsvoldSource: Journal of Education for Librarianship, Vol. 5, No. 1 (Summer, 1964), pp. 10-16Published by: Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40321776 .

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Designing Facilities for Library Education

MARGARET I. RUFSVOLD

SOMEONE HAS SAID "We shape our buildings and they in turn shape our lives." To most of us engaged in library education today, this statement is painfully accurate, whether we shaped the buildings ourselves or inherited quarters designed by our predecessors.

As one of our contemporary architects has reminded us, "design is always an extremely responsible and dangerous undertaking. ... It is not only for education, it is part of it, if we define education as a cluster of measures to take influence, especially on younger human beings. ... If this world were completely static and unchanging, our task to design educational facilities would be sufficiently complicated. But since it is by no means so and there is dynamic change all around, the problem is to provide and prepare for perpetual reorganization."

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Building codes and economic factors require that our structures be of lasting quality, yet neither architects nor educators are given the insight to predict accurately our needs or our modus operandi 50 years hence. The Educational Facilities Laboratories advise us to construct schools with generalized space and specialized equipment {e.g., movable classroom walls) so they may be adapted to any program. How- ever, the implementation of this principle is not as simple as it sounds. The movable walls may be either totally inadequate as sound barriers or, if constructed so that noise transmission does not distract classes on either side of the wall, they cost approximately five times as much as more permanent walls, and do not control sounds from the motion picture projector. Furthermore, space which is so generalized as to be adaptable to any future use, may not satisfactorily meet the specialized needs of the current program.2 Therefore, in providing library education facilities, our problem, like that of other educators, becomes

Miss Rufsvold is Director of the Division of Library Science, Indiana Univer- sity.

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Designing Facilities far Library Education

one of designing quarters which will be functional in the immediate future and flexible enough to be adapted to educational activities, teaching methods, and various types of equipment unknown or unused today.

Cooperative Planning. The first step in planning new library education quarters is to engage the assistance of the group which will be most directly involved in the use of the facilities. Architects, administrators, and building consultants must rely on the cooperative planning of representatives of the faculty, staff, students, and others who may be concerned. It becomes the responsibility of the faculty, par- ticularly, to translate the general objectives of the educational program into the specific functions which the building is to support. In the process, all facets of the curriculum and methods of instruction come under review; perhaps some are revised and others discarded. Group planning is a slow and often painful process, but it results in a clarifi- cation of ideas which precludes the writing of a program meaningful to the architect. It is also a comfort to the administrator to have responsibility shared as he contemplates the awesome prospect that obsolescence will set in the moment the plans are finally committed to paper. True, some changes can be made during construction, but they add to the cost and should be held to a minimum.

The Program. Librarians are well schooled in the principle that the space and equipment required for each major function should be ex- plicitly described in the building program. Yet, equipment is sometimes disregarded until it is too late to accommodate it in the available space. Projections must be made concerning increases in enrollment, additions or changes in the curriculum, and the size of the faculty and staff which these will require; possibilities for future reorganization and additions to the facilities must be cited also. External factors which should be considered in developing the program are the location and orientation of the building, and the distance from other buildings with resources available for use by the library school.

Location. Traditionally, library schools have occupied quarters within main university libraries, sometimes successfully isolated, and at other times so integrated as to be an irritation to one and often to both agencies. Historically the combination of library and library school quarters was justified by the dual function of the administrator who served both as dean and library director. Today these functions have been separated in all but a few of the graduate library schools, yet most are still located within libraries, including those constructed quite

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JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR LIBRARIANSHIP

recently. Obviously, the convenience to library school faculty and students in their use of library resources is a compelling factor. Yet, ̂s the schools become larger and their activities more varied, is it desir- able to continue this custom ? Certainly there are many reasons why a library school, like other professional schools, should have its own separate building. And there are equally good reasons why a university library should not accommodate formal academic programs whether offered by the library school or anyone else. The ideal would seem to be the separate building if situated so close to the graduate and research library as to be connected by a covered walk or underground passage. If this ideal is unattainable, the separated area or wing of the university library is the most convenient and economical location.

At Indiana University, we have had the experience of being located first in the main library building which was not adaptable to our needs, and later in a modern air-conditioned classroom building which is quite a distance from the main library and where the quarters were planned in accordance with our needs, but drastically cut in size before construction began. Expansion into adjacent areas this summer will double the size of our facilities and alleviate the classroom and office space shortage but will not provide adequately for library facilities - even if one could justify the expense of duplicating the professional collection in the main library.

Plans for the Future at Indiana. Shortly after the completion of the Lilly Library of Rare Books in I960, the president of the university appointed a committee to study undergraduate and graduate library services and building needs. At approximately the same time, the faculty of the Division of Library Science began a study of library school quarters and needs projected to the year 1970. This faculty study cul- minated in a request to the library committee that in their plans they include new housing for the Division of Library Science, either in a separate structure adjacent to the new library center, or in a separate area in one of the wings. This request included supporting arguments and a tentative program. The library planning committee referred the matter to the central administrative group (the president and vice- presidents of the university) who decided in favor of a separated area within the university library structure.

In accordance with this directive and the program submitted by the division's faculty, the architects located the library school area of approximately 18,000 square feet on the ground floor of the undergraduate wing, with windows on three sides, separate entrances on the

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north and south sides of the building, with inside access to the library at only one point, and with provision for future expansion without encroachment on the library.

This location, separated physically, yet with quick access to the resources of an undergraduate and graduate research library of some 500,000 square feet, seating 5,000 persons, and with a capacity for 2*4 million volumes offers not only maximum convenience to the faculty and students, but also some important economies. As noted above, the library school library will not have to duplicate the less frequently used professional materials; student rest rooms and a snack room ac- commodating 500 students will be located in the library proper just a few steps from the inside connecting door so the school will not need to provide a student lounge. The library school library need include only a small listening area because the undergraduate library just above and reached by escalator will accommodate at least 150 students at individual carrels or soundproof rooms in an area of some 3,500 square feet.

Neither the library school nor the library will house an auditorium inasmuch as new buildings not more than half a block away will provide facilities of this type and of various sizes, available to the university at large. The library science classrooms will be equipped to receive closed circuit and broadcast television but will not be equipped for transmission of programs because a newly completed educational radio and television building with the latest type studios is less than a half block away. Also close by are the Lilly Library of Rare Books, the Fine Arts Museum (and studio-classroom building), the Audi- torium, and new structures for psychology, geology, and the Graduate School of Business. Through long-range university planning, the site reserved for the university library - on the periphery of the campus ten years ago - is now practically at its center.

All of the new structures on the campus have been studied by mem- bers of the library school faculty, not only to ascertain the facilities available for use by other than the parent department, but also to observe special features in classrooms, laboratories, and studios; acous- tical treatment; rheostatic lighting; special equipment such as outlets installed in each office to channel dictation from administrators and teaching personnel to a central transmission area, or installed in seminar rooms to record an entire class discussion; also, facilities for electronic data processing equipment for teaching, office, and research use. The entire faculty spent a half-day between semesters touring the

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new educational television building and discussing with the director the uses of these facilities and the television medium in the library education program. In other visits, departmental chairmen and facul- ties have generously explained their use of the newer facilities, their advantages, and in some cases have recommended changes. All of this has been immensely helpful in writing the program for the architect. (At this point the preliminary plans have been drawn but could not be included here because changes are still being made by the engineers in locating the heating and air-conditioning ducts.)

Of the more than 18,000 square feet provided for the school, approximately 3,000 square feet are required for corridors and vents. The remainder has been allocated as follows:

Administrative Office Suite . . . . . . 2,000 square feet A reception room and an inside corridor provide access to private

offices for the director, associate director, assistant director, the director's secretary, associate director's secretary, a staff workroom, two interview rooms, a coat closet, storage closet, a lavatory, and a conference room seating 20-25 persons. The latter adjoins the director's office but is accessible also from the inside corridor and from the main corridor. This provides exit from the suite either through the reception room or the conference room.

Faculty and Staff Office Area 3,000 square feet Located directly across the hall from the Administrative Suite, this

area includes an information booth, an adjacent section for receiving and distributing mail, for housing student personnel records, and a reception room which connects through an inside corridor with twelve private offices for faculty, a clerical staff workroom, and the graduate assistants' workroom. The inside corridor also provides access to the faculty-staff lounge and exit to the main corridor without going through the reception room.

Research Staff Area 825 square feet A reception room provides entrance to the offices of the research

director, assistant director, and staff workroom. Access to the main corridor is provided through the workroom as well as reception room. This suite is located next to the administrative suite and across the hall from the library science library.

Classroom-Laboratory Area 3,000 square feet One large lecture room seating approximately 100 persons, two

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medium-sized classrooms, and a seminar room seating 25 persons will be provided in this area. These facilities will be augmented by two conference rooms and a preview room, mentioned in connection with other areas. One of the medium-sized classrooms will be equipped as a laboratory for technical services and the other will be designed especially for courses in the information sciences. If programed instruction is developed successfully by the faculty and requires the use of electronically equipped carrels or "Q spaces," these will be located in the library science library near the program materials. With one exception, the classrooms, conference rooms, seminar room, and preview room, will be windowless.

Library Science Library 5,000 square feet Open stacks will divide the areas for informal reading, reference,

and study at individual carrels. A counter will control access to the reserve book area. Also, the library will provide a motion picture preview room, a small listening room, librarian's office, conference room, workroom and storage area, and possibly electronically equipped booths for programed instruction, mentioned above. The library will not need to provide a teaching materials preparation area and photo- graphic dark room because the Audio- Visual Center produces trans- parencies, slides, filmstrips and other aids, without charge to the academic departments. The Center also loans motion pictures, kinescopes, and projection equipment to all departments, without charge for this service.

Faculty-Staff Lounge, Kitchen, Storage Area, and Rest Rooms 1,400 square feet

These facilities may be entered from a main corridor or from the inside corridor of the faculty office suite. Similar facilities for students are located in an adjacent area which is a part of the undergraduate library proper and accommodates up to 500 persons.

It is anticipated that final plans for the entire library center as well as for the library school will be completed by this fall, that contracts can be let by summer of 1965, and that two-and-one-half or three years will be required to complete and fully equip the structure. Only then will it be known whether we have shaped it well to our educational uses, in the 1970's and beyond.

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References 1. Neutra, Richard: Theory of School Design. Indiana and Midwest School Conference:

Proceedings. In: Indiana University. Bulletin of the School of Education, 30:64, Sept. and Nov. 1954.

2. For a discussion of committed versus convertible space, see: Bricks -and Mortar- boards: A Report on College Planning and Building. New York, Educational Facilities Laboratories, 1964.

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Designing Facilities for Library Education