Thanks to Brinxmat for his comments to my “What happens to the “physical” library” post. He added this article link: Why do we Need a Library? The article comes from the Norwegian university (NTNU) and was posted on their blog Infonatives .
From the article - ”Visitor numbers are falling at the same time as millions of books are being removed from circulation at foreign universities, but NTNU Library, Norway, is going against the flow”. While a number of international academic libraries see visits falling by 20%, this Norway University visits have increased by 40%. The article goes on to explain how the university library has reshaped the libray as “place” and “role”.
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The library has become a place for “learning about learning”.
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Shelving was reduced with a significant volume of older books moving to closed stacks.
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Group rooms, sofa areas and workspaces with computers were added making it possible for students to use the library in new ways.
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“Our ambition is to create an open library and our task is to support learning, observe how learning takes place and pave the way for both staff and students in their search for information.”
Reshaping their users experience with the library has strengthened the role of the library as an integral part of the university. I think reshaping the library as “place” and the library “role” are valuable lessons for all school and public libraries. Congratulations to NTNU!
Tags: academic library, future, library 2.0
