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Improving Access—and Comfort

In his 11 years as dean of the River Campus Libraries, Ronald Dow oversaw a transformation both of the library’s facilities and of its approach to serving students and faculty.

When he came to the University from Pennsylvania State University in 1996, Dow recalls, “Rush Rhees Library looked really worn out. It was hard to say what was inside was important, just because it looked tired.”

TRANSFORMER: As dean, Ronald Dow oversaw several renovations and enhancements to Rush Rhees Library.

With help from alumni, Dow spearheaded many renovations to the library during his tenure. The Martin E. Messinger Periodical Reading Room, the Welles-Brown Room, the Great Hall, and the Roger B. Friedlander Lobby were all remodeled, and the Hawkins-Carlson Room and the Gleason Library, a $5 million interactive study space, were created out of underused spaces in Rush Rhees Library. He also oversaw renovations of Carlson Science and Engineering Library.

“The beautification was really done to guarantee students were comfortable accessing the collections,” he says.

The collections are the most important part of a library, says Dow. And as students used the library less, he says, and consequently became less familiar with its collections, they lost sight of an important part of what those teaching them do.

Students, he found, “didn’t appreciate that faculty contribute to a long line of thought”—and not seeing that “meant they were missing an important part of their education.

“Creating vital spaces put students in the proximity of the collections,” Dow says. He also vastly improved access to the collections. In the late 1990s, the library led the transition to the Voyager online catalog, making the University one of the first research libraries in the country to use that system.

A second goal, Dow says, was to make collections more “student-centric.” He built programs and collections designed specifically for the students—especially undergraduates—and faculty. He focused the library’s acquisitions on the coursework happening on campus and the research interests of the University’s faculty.

That transformation, Dow says, altered the work of librarians, too. “They act not just as service-providers, but educators.”

Realizing that change was Dow’s third goal for his tenure. The River Campus librarians “are very inventive and ready to take risks. And that’s internally generated, not something coming from the top down.”

Dow was appointed the Andrew H. and Janet Dayton Neilly Dean of River Campus Libraries in 2000. He was the first to hold the endowed position.

Sharing many priorities with Susan Gibbons, Dow says: “It will be more of the same—only better.”

—Kathleen McGarvey