I was reading the Fall 2019 newsletter of the SMU Libraries the other day and came across the Libraries' strategic plan, which you can also read here. The Libraries' mission is to "advance discovery, catalyze innovation, expand connections with campus and community partners, and directly impact the success of SMU's academic, research, and creative aspirations." It has the following goals:
1. Cultural heritage in action: "SMU Libraries embraces inventive strategies to align, integrate, and activate use of our distinctive cultural heritage collections in pursuit of the University’s research, teaching, and leadership mission."
2. Research with expertise: "SMU Libraries organizes and facilitates a seamless, interdisciplinary, and university-wide collaborative network to support the scholarly and creative research lifecycle to accelerate student and faculty success."
3. Academic and scholarly success: "SMU Libraries maximizes student academic success through strategic partnerships, impactful services, and promotion of information and data literacy fluency in teaching, learning, research, and creative pursuits."
4. Inclusive community & social well-being: "SMU Libraries cultivates inclusive, equitable, and accessible spaces, services, programs, and resources so that our libraries exemplify the SMU welcoming and supportive community."
5. Discovery and virtual presence: "SMU Libraries provides an intuitive virtual library experience that empowers all users to easily discover library expertise, services, and collection resources."
6. Organizational coherence and professional excellence: "SMU Libraries is transforming our organization to align with and support the research, creative, and impactful aspirations of our SMU community, Dallas, and curious minds worldwide."
Libraries have long had a special place in my heart. In France when I prepared for the entrance examination exams of the grandes ecoles, the outcome of which more or less determines the salary range and career trajectories students will have for the rest of their life (no pressure), I spent entire days studying in the reading room of the Librairie Sainte-Genevieve in Paris (shown to the left), along with hundreds of other students waiting in line for a spot. At the entrance we would get a number from a machine and then we would go upstairs and find the desk that bore that number. There was something eerily inspiring about sitting in such a venerable room, surrounded by ancient books, on a quest for knowledge, or at least good grades at the entrance exam, and this was before cell phones, the Internet, and the beginning of the Age of Distraction we live in now.
Later at MIT I wrote a lot of the proofs of my dissertation at one of the long desks on the 2nd floor of the Hayden Library for Humanities and Sciences, with its gorgeous view of the Charles River. (The 2nd floor houses the humanities part of the collection.) I liked being surrounded by foreign-language books as a reminder that MIT was more than an institute of technology but also a place that embraced other cultures, including my own, and I remember borrowing a few literature books when I was sick of writing math proofs. But I also remember finding journals in the stacks and making photocopies of relevant papers - something that sounds hopelessly antiquated today that so many library collections are online. Yet on the few occasions where I have ventured again by the stacks of the library, looking for books on a certain topic, I have been amazed by the fantastic finds I've made browsing through the volumes around the one I had located online, as they are arranged by subject. (This is why you should never pick up your book from the front desk. It may sound convenient but in the long run you learn more from going and picking up the book in the stacks, and finding books you would not have known to search for otherwise.)
At Lehigh I occasionally sat in the reading room of the renovated Linderman Library, although so many tour groups trudged through with potential admits and hopeful parents that it was difficult to concentrate. And at SMU I have sometimes ventured into the Fondren Centennial Reading Room, which is also very beautiful and inspiring. A wise man once said that "you don't know what you don't know before you know", and if people limit their view of libraries to a physical place where they can study and an online place where they can search for resources, they can greatly miss out on the true power of libraries. Thankfully SMU has many wonderful symposia and exhibits to draw students in, such as the Digital Humanities Research Institute, the Dan Wingren '47 exhibit (Wingren was a professor of art at SMU from 1965 to 1991) and Dallas photographs by Andy Hanson (1932-2008), who worked for 30 years as press photographer for the Dallas Times Herald newspaper and documented the city's theater, opera, musical and social events after the paper closed in 1991. But the best idea of all is surely an on-campus food pantry to provide SMU students experiencing food insecurity with non-perishable food.
