The Philosophy of Joint-Use Libraries
By Walt Crawford
American Libraries Columnist
Senior analyst, Research Libraries Group
Column for December 2003
Will the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library—the massive new San Jose Public/San Jose State University library—succeed? Are joint-use libraries the wave of the future? Although it’s too early to say, I’d guess the answers are yes and no. I expect the San Jose library to be a success—but that success may not mean much for other joint-use libraries.
Not first or last, but the biggest
The new library is not the first library to serve both an academic institution and the public. Many college and university libraries serve the public informally: The public can use the collection but can’t check books out. Some community college libraries also serve the public with full circulation privileges, sometimes with public library money involved.
King isn’t even the first library planned as a joint college/public library, and it won’t be the last. A week after the King Library debuted, a new Seminole Community Library opened in Florida, a joint project of the city and St. Petersburg College.
The King Library is probably the biggest joint-use library to date: one nine-story, 677,000-square-foot facility to serve a large American city and a large public university. There’s more to it than that; other factors make it an ideal candidate for success.
Not lip-service cooperation
I’ve heard about joint-use libraries here and abroad that were either good academic libraries and lousy public libraries or vice versa. These problematic libraries usually represent lip-service cooperation: public libraries with a token academic librarian or vice versa. That’s a recipe for mediocrity at best. Public libraries and academic libraries are different institutions serving different (albeit overlapping) needs. One merged collection, staff, and approach will rarely suit both sets of needs well.
The King Library is, in effect, two libraries in a single building taking advantage of overlapping needs and economies of scale. It has two directors: Jane Light, San Jose Public Library director, and Patricia Breivik, dean of the SJSU library. It will continue to use both Dewey and LC, with most public library facilities on lower floors, most academic facilities on upper floors. San Jose also has 17 branch libraries—and people read in the heart of Silicon Valley. The library system had 12.7 circulations per capita in 2001–02. (Incidentally, in this mecca of high technology, the local paper stressed that the King Library opened with 1.5 million print volumes.)
Dean Breivik calls it a marriage rather than a merger: "Two strong entities . . . have come together and are stronger and can accomplish more because they chose to be together." Jane Light sees public access to the university collection as a way to encourage people to go (or go back) to college. I believe both are determined to succeed and have the talent and support to make that happen.
Prejudices and possibilities
Of course there will be problems. Some faculty members (mostly in the humanities) opposed the idea from the beginning, afraid their specialized resources will be checked out to the swarming public. One or two anonymous jerks who claim to be academic librarians left no doubt as to their prejudices. When a preview story about the library was posted on the LISNews weblog, the first (anonymous) comment began, "What a horrible idea!!!" and later noted, "I, as an academic librarian, have no interest in dealing with the various mentally challenged wombats who populate the public libraries. . . . Let the public libraries deal with the drunks and the pornographers and the crazed. That’s what they’re there for." That’s extreme, but I’ve heard milder forms of similar biases. Maybe academia has changed since I graduated—maybe today’s students are always clean, sane, sensible, sober, and uninterested in sex.
King may not be a model for most future projects: How often would two institutions have the right combination of resources, people, timely needs, and commitment to do it right? I believe King is a test case for doing it right. SJSU is also northern California’s only ALA-accredited library school, making King a wonderful test bed for research projects and a great place to intern.
This is an interesting and potentially positive situation: an institution that can be a better public and a better academic library, not losing either identity but gaining from the major overlap between the functions.
It’s worth watching and supporting, and certainly worth checking back on in a year or two. I plan to do so.
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