“We can’t have a cultural center without books,” said student Grace Akinlemibola in the May 5 Indiana Daily Student newspaper. “If you take the library away, what else can you take away?”
Interim Dean of Library Services Patricia Steele said in the May 4 Fort Wayne Herald-Times that she had wanted to recover $200,000 from the library’s $27-million budget by closing the AACC and the School of Library and Information Sciences libraries. The SLIS library collections are scheduled to be incorporated into the main library stacks in the summer. “[Students] just have to go down the hall to get resources, so that makes it less of a hit than closing other libraries,” said SLIS Branch Coordinator Anne Haines.
The Daily Student reported that IU is also considering closing its Journalism and Geography and Map libraries, based in part on the findings of a committee assembled last year to check usage statistics and examine how well the libraries meet student and faculty needs. However, Steele said that no closings would occur before she heard input from students and staff.
Posted May 5, 2006.