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Southwest Minnesota State University
Fourth floor group study rooms.
Originally published in Resource Sharing News
April 2005
Southwest Minnesota State University (SMSU) in Marshall, Minnesota is a campus of about 2400 students. For the past several years, it has boasted a number one ranking from U.S News and World Report in the category, "Top Public Comprehensive Colleges–Bachelor's (Midwest)." Recently however, the SMSU Library has been through some tumultuous times.
A fire in 2002 caused the entire campus to be shut down for 1-1/2 weeks after Christmas break. In Spring 2003, SMSU received word that a 9 million dollar library remodeling proposal to the legislature had been unexpectedly funded. "You would always like an ideal time to do this – enough people, enough time, but that doesn't usually happen," librarian Mary Jane Striegel concedes. However, the small, tight knit staff at SMSU has been unusually successful in meeting the challenges.
Prior to construction, a conference call with Stu Rosselet at Bemidji State University, who had recently dealt with their own construction, helped SMSU staff prepare and devise a workable storage plan. During the initial planning phase, most of the library's materials would need to be relocated. Reference, government documents, a children's collection, and videos remained accessible to students in the library's temporary quarters.
For the rest of the items, the SMSU staff collaborated with engineers to determine how to position additional items on fifth floor of the old library. File cabinets were lined up around the staircase to take advantage of the extra supports, and a few microfiche cabinets were stored in a hallway near the temporary library location. Lesser-used collections were stored.
At the completion of the project, the library will gain two state-of-the-art classrooms. Enhancements to the entrance of the library will provide library users clearly recognizable reference and circulation areas. The fifth floor will feature administrative offices and provide a new centralized technical services area. Wireless infrastructure will also be in place throughout the Library.
Mary Jane Striegel provided these tips for other libraries undergoing major renovations:
Staff
Engage your staff in what is happening and keep them apprised of what is going on during the project.
Originally SMSU had 2 librarians working as co-planners on the renovation, but the entire staff continued to brainstorm on how to accomplish all of the rest of the work.
Assign projects to various staff members, but make sure that you don't "dump" extra work on people who already have a lot of daily responsibilities.
Be conscious of what you are asking of people and the stress involved. You want to come out of this healthy.
Campus Communication
Make sure faculty and students know they can still count on their library. Keep the campus aware of what is going on in various phases of the project.
Devise a schedule for retrieval from remote or non-public storage sites and publicize it widely. Mary Jane felt that the biggest challenge was convincing the faculty and students that they could still provide great service during the construction. However, after a few months with the process operating smoothly, it was clear that they had achieved that goal.
This academic year library staff offered tours to faculty and students at times when the construction crew wasn't working. This helped to promote a sense of ownership in the new library. Frequent smaller events also helped build momentum and excitement about the project. The library sponsored a poetry contest focusing on change and construction. There was also a "survivors" party to thank the physical plant people who were instrumental during the move.
Mary Jane credits University Librarian, Sandy Fuhr, with helping everyone maintain the focus along with a healthy sense of humor throughout the renovation period. She also communicated with the campus, writing articles and keeping faculty and students current with changes and a sense of expectation.
Library staff had planned to move into the new library space in June, but on April 2nd a pipe from the fire
suppression system burst causing water damage that may delay their return somewhat. The grand opening is expected to take place as planned on October 23 – 29th coinciding with "Marshall Writers' Festival '05."
Mary Jane says, "We are truly looking forward to the new space. Some of the hurdles that we went through to get to this time were very daunting, but it is going to really be worth it for the library and the campus. We are grateful to the legislature and the taxpayers who made this possible. I think it's going to serve the current and future students well. "