Stanford University Libraries & Academic Information Resources

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1 Stanford University Libraries & Academic Information Resources Continuously Addressing Challenges to Sustain and Grow a Foundation of Excellence THE STANFORD CHALLENGE Seeking Solutions, Educating Leaders

2 In a knowledge economy, libraries are gathering and distribution points of information that feed the engines of innovation and progress. Stanford s library buildings and physical collections remain vital and cherished parts of campus life. At the same time, the university s librarians are assembling digital collections, providing new tools for teaching and learning, and meeting emergent campus needs for information and information services in addressing the world s challenges. By strengthening the university s information infrastructure, The Stanford Challenge will further Stanford s position as innovator and educator. John L. Hennessy PRESIDENT, STANFORD UNIVERSITY Stanford University Libraries & Academic Information Resources Continuously Addressing Challenges to Sustain and Grow a Foundation of Excellence The Both/And Dilemma The information world is changing at breakneck pace, and Stanford, in part through its libraries, is at the leading edge of innovation in information and information services. We embrace the challenges of providing students and faculty with new tools and resources made possible by digital technologies. Our libraries, integrated with Academic Computing and several publishing arms, have brought to Stanford as well as to the rest of the scholarly world many genuine innovations in digital library services, course management systems, publishing, digital preservation, and innovative access to digital resources, to say nothing of being one of the initial partners in the Google Book Search digitization program. It is also thrilling to support the new areas of teaching and research brought to the fore by the new initiatives on campus. At the same time, we remain committed to supporting the established disciplines and subject foci throughout the campus and to providing access to all our resources, the vast majority of which still exist exclusively on paper, or tape, or film. As we bring on, say, acquisitions in film studies or Korean Studies (two recent real examples), it is not an option to finance them by dropping subscriptions, ceasing to acquire maps, or shutting down our social science database servers. The new technologies and the new scholarly interests are additives, not replacements; thus we must support both digital and traditional information modalities for all subjects to our faculty and students. As our scholars embark on new areas of research made possible by The Stanford Challenge, we in the libraries must support new needs, new intellectual domains, and new tools for navigating the frontiers of the information age. We are growing and changing as the Stanford research agenda grows and changes. The success of that agenda depends in part on our ability to match library, academic computing, and publishing programs to the needs of Stanford s imaginative scholars, in both new disciplines and established studies. I feel fortunate indeed to be part of this university at this juncture; there is no better place or time to be an academic librarian than Stanford today. The opportunities to improve existing services and to create new services for our faculty and students are unprecedented and boundless and they depend on the generous gifts of our donors. Cover: The Lane Reading Room Michael A. Keller THE IDA M. GREEN UNIVERSITY LIBRARIAN

3 The Parker Library web site is a collaboration of the university of cambridge, corpus christi college, and stanford university libraries. entrance to the lane reading room WE ARE ALL ALUMNI OF THE LIBRARY! Virtually every scholar who has studied, taught, or conducted research on the Stanford campus has benefited from the collections of the Stanford University Libraries, and most graduates have a fond memory of an intellectual discovery in the materials unique to the libraries. Thus, we are all alumni of the library and therefore responsible for passing along its traditions of service, collections, and innovation to new generations of readers, researchers, and custodians of culture. Traditionally, library gifts and endowments have supported our still-essential core functions: acquiring books and serials, handling reference, organizing archival material, preserving existing collections, and keeping the doors open when students need places to study. Time-honored forms of library giving remain as important as ever: endowing and naming book funds, supporting onetime special acquisitions and exhibits, establishing named curatorial chairs, and naming renovated spaces for study and research. Of parallel importance today is support for innovation, digitization, global dissemination, and research in information science. Gifts are needed for all these purposes. FUNDS FOR INNOVATION Support for innovation improves the information topography for students and faculty, both locally and globally. Information professionals in the libraries are continuously improving the systems students and faculty use daily to manage course and research information, as well as busily organizing and digitizing archives, manuscripts, brittle or rare books, sound recordings, images, and other materials. Stanford has been very aggressive about this vital work despite limited funding. Supporting the Funds for Innovation puts more research material within reach and allows development of better, more responsive research tools. Gifts for innovation also support coordinated projects with renowned libraries and institutions, recently including the Bibliotheca Alexandrina in Egypt, the Parker Library at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, the Library of Congress, and the University of California. Donors to the Funds for Innovation will receive recognition as sponsors of a digital or library science project that may otherwise be prohibitive to undertake. CASE STUDY: KOREAN STUDIES In 2001, Stanford faculty approved the addition of Korean Studies to the curriculum, a timely and appropriate move. Three tenuretrack faculty positions were established, in part through fundraising. Recruiting leading scholars was hampered by the fact that the Stanford libraries then held no books (or any other materials) in the Korean language; nor had library staff the linguistic and scholarly knowledge necessary to initiate such a collection. This obstacle was tackled head-on; a crash program of hiring qualified curatorial and processing staff and ramping up a collection was launched, and today we have a burgeoning section in our East Asia Library in support of the Korean Studies Program, with over 16,000 volumes in the collection already. T h e S ta n f o r d C h a l l e n g e

4 specially designed bookplates identify books bought with endowed book funds Green and meyer libraries: who says people don t go to the library anymore? Finals, spring 2007 ENDOWED BOOK FUNDS Endowed book funds support deep collection building to support advanced research. Starting with Jane Stanford, who bequeathed her jewelry collection to seed the book fund endowment still active and still known as The Jewel Fund, many donors alumni, families, and others have created focused acquisition funds in their favorite subjects or genres to enable Stanford to collect in depth and breadth. Without these gifts, Stanford s research and educational resources would not have attained their current high level of distinction. Expert curators select materials in more than 50 collection foci, from East Asia to the history of Silicon Valley and from music to environmental studies, with a single criterion: to fulfill the needs of the library s users. Today, these endowed book funds also support acquisitions of digital image collections, online books and articles, scholarly databases, and other e-resources that are a rapidly expanding and critically important area of library content. A minimum gift of $25,000 makes this program the most accessible of all named endowments at Stanford. Once established, additional contributions may be made at any level. SPECIAL COLLECTIONS Special Collections are the nucleus of the research opportunities available to Stanford University students and scholars. Every undergraduate is welcome to conduct original research using our rare and unique materials. These materials are often prohibitively expensive and otherwise out of our grasp, so we rely on gifts of collections and the purchase of unique materials enabled by generous support from donors, groups, and corporations. Often, donors and friends have an instrumental role in identifying and securing such collections. An appointment is suggested to discuss current desiderata.

5 Stanford News Service catalogue from exhibit, fall 2006 students enjoying a break on the steps of the bing wing of cecil h. green library THE EXHIBITS PROGRAM Our Exhibits Program provides open invitations to students, staff, collectors, and community to meet the libraries curators and view our Special Collections in a scholarly, visually dynamic, and interpretive context. Exhibits in widely varying topics are professionally mounted in the Munger Rotunda and the Peterson Gallery of the Bing Wing of the Cecil H. Green Library and typically are displayed for several months. Sponsorship defrays the installation costs and makes possible the publication of an exhibit catalogue, which is a permanent, illustrated record distributed to hundreds of libraries and individuals. Donors will be honored as exhibit sponsors in each exhibit catalogue and at opening receptions. ENDOWED CURATORIAL CHAIRS Curators and library heads genuinely influence the direction, level, and quality of teaching and research at Stanford. Of the 30-plus key specialists, only a handful occupy endowed chairs at present. These professionals, many with PhDs, are the vital link between the vast and growing forest of information and students and faculty; they ensure that Stanford s collections match its research and teaching needs and help readers at all levels find the information they need. Naming a curatorial chair can have a lasting impact on programs and services and provide a perpetual legacy from the individual, family, or organization honored. We are currently seeking named endowments for the directors of collection development, academic computing, and the science and engineering libraries, as well as for the university archivist. T h e S ta n f o r d C h a l l e n g e

6 students using the multimedia studio and computer clusters in meyer library The Bing Wing of Cecil H. Green library CONTACT US For more information, please contact: Michael A. Keller Ida M. Green University Librarian and Director of Academic Information Resources Andrew Herkovic Director of Communications & Development Stanford University Libraries Cecil H. Green Library Stanford, CA (T) (F) library.stanford.edu thestanfordchallenge.stanford.edu NAMING RENOVATED SPACES The never-ending necessity to reconfigure and renovate our study spaces, stacks, and information portals provides opportunities for endowment of named spaces within the libraries. The libraries at Stanford have myriad naming opportunities offering a high level of visibility in a very positive light: imagine the comforting solidity of a gracious seminar room or program area in one of the libraries named for a Stanford alum, parent, business, graduating class, or even a cherished professor. We are currently seeking a sponsor to revitalize the heavily used Information Center in the East Wing of Green Library, the point of first contact for many library users. GIFT OPPORTUNITIES endowed curatorial chair...$2 million Information Center...$1 million Funds for Innovation... $50,000 Endowed Book Fund...$25,000 or more Exhibit Sponsorship... $15,000 printed on recycled paper T h e S ta n f o r d C h a l l e n g e