Library Director Responds to Student Suggestion

  • December 15, 2010

Student Suggestion:  "To the NU Library, I think that you should have extended hours the weekend before finals. The Friday and Saturday before, I think it should have hours like the other week nights (8AM-1AM). The library is really where I get most of my studying done, since the dorms can be so distracting on the weekends. I understand that 1 AM is late, but for those two days I think that it really should have better hours."

Response:  Thank you for your suggestion. Last year we permanently extended hours until 1 am, from Sunday through Thursday. Also, we recently started opening earlier on Sundays and extended operating hours later on Saturdays.

This semester we extended hours for the last two Fridays of the semester.

I'll be honest and say that the challenge is finding someone who can work later than 1am. We staff the late hours with students, who we don't want to keep up all night. And with non-students who have day jobs.

That being said, we have presented a proposal to the University to extend hours by a lot starting in the Fall of 2011. I have not heard back about funding, but our intent is to continue to expand hours in the future.

I know this doesn't help you this semester, sorry to say, but I did want to email you back and to say I agree with what you said, and that we are working toward better satisfying this need.

Thanks,

Dave Schoen
Library Director