Nina Weiland
Columnist
Many of us go to the library to study, work on group projects, and even read, but what is going on beneath the surface?
I am Nina Weiland, an Environmental Science student at Delaware Valley University and a reporter for the Full360. I spend a lot of time in the library, and I recently interviewed Peter Kupersmith, Director of the Joseph Krauskopf Library in order to better understand how the library impacts the education of students.
We started off by discussing the two different literature collections that the library has, the research collection and the leisure collection.
Research Collection:
The research collection is located downstairs on the moving shelves, but many of the books are being digitized. Moving the books to digital not only makes them easier for students to access, but also gives the library more space for new books.
“It gives the impression that we’re getting rid of books, but every library does this. It’s no different than growing things. I mean, you have to do the weeding,” Kupersmith from the library explains.
The library tends to accumulate materials, and due to the large amounts of materials that they have available, it is becoming more difficult to convert to digital. They complete a lot of their removal process over the summer, but they are still rethinking their vast collection.
Leisure Collection:
The leisure collection is the most used part of the library by students.
“We try to encourage student reading. I mean, that’s something that’s very important to us,” says Kupersmith.
The library tries to focus their collection on what students recommend or are reading now. They have been building their collection for the last ten to fifteen years. However, due to their smaller budget for ordering books, it is harder for students to see an obvious change of more books coming to the library. The library is small, sort of like a mom and pop grocery store in the age of Walmart, according to Kupersmith. But, they make it a point to listen to DelVal students and find out what we are interested in.
In addition to all of the changes to the collections in the library, there have also been recent changes to space in the library. Before the start of the 2024 Fall Semester, the library was refurbished, which provided more space for students to study or complete group projects. According to Kupersmith, “the wings were added in 1970. And at the time, we had about 800 students on campus.”
Today, DelVal has almost 2,000 undergraduate students, but the library has not changed. We have all been to the library during common hour or between passing times, and oftentimes, almost every seat, or every good seat, is full. “You can’t really get more than 100 students in here at a time. If there’s 30 in each wing and downstairs, it seems filled. Space is still at a premium.” Kupersmith states.
Similar to the limited space in the library, there is also a limit on the times students can go to the library. The space is open from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday though Thursday, 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Fridays, with varying hours on weekends. The library hours at DelVal are primarily based on the availability of the student workers. Currently, there are almost 20 student workers in the library and they help run all of the functions that the library provides like printing, checking out books, and using the computers.
Not only does the library function from students but they also listen to students, “If students are telling us we aren’t open enough for them, then we will make it happen.” says Kupersmith. In the past year, they had plans to make the front door of the library open to card access in order to keep it open until later. However, that idea went down the drain when certain security risks were brought to light on campus. The library staff is currently trying to determine work arounds to provide students more spaces to study on the weekends.
The library and its functions are very student centered, whether it’s ordering new literature or opening the library for longer. “We keep our ears pretty close to the ground. If we kept it any closer, we’d have grasshoppers in it.” Kupersmith says, “we want to hear from students. Student success is our success. We’re cheering for you, you’re not just an anonymous space. We’re excited when you walk across the stage at graduation. That’s the neat thing about Delval. You know all these people, and it’s a community.”