Orradre Library staff makes compromiise to extend hours
By Erin Ryan
As part of a campus-wide initiative to offer the Santa Clara University community a greater diversity of late night activities, Orradre Library has extended its hours. The library is now open to students, faculty, and staff until 2 a.m. from Sunday through Thursday.
"The extended hours have been requested by the students," said Information Specialist Abraham Negash, who expects that mostly students rather than faculty and staff will utilize the new service.
Associated Students was involved in a trial run of extended hours last year. Issues with staffing delayed this attempt, but have since been worked out by Orradre supervisors.
"The only time the library was full late at night was right before finals," Martin Ngyen, a junior who works part-time at the library, said. Fewer workers and a closed circulation desk was the compromise that the library staff made to extend the hours to meet students' needs.
According to Fred Gertler, head of customer service for Orradre, the new service, "Night Light: A Nocturnal Gathering of Brilliance," will provide access to everything in the library during the extended hours except for Government Documents and the Circulation Desk, which both require full staffing. The staffing compromise does allow for materials to be checked out after midnight using the self-checkout machine in the main lobby and for two to three student workers available to help the night owls with customer service.
Between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. the building can be accessed with an ACCESS Card to ensure that only students, faculty and staff will utilize this service. In addition, Campus Safety stops by periodically between midnight and 2 a.m. to ensure student safety.
Other Bay Area universities such as San Jose State and St. Mary's keep their libraries open only until midnight on weeknights with many services closing earlier. While many services at Stanford's libraries close at midnight, they do offer some 24-hour services, like a study and reading room.
"We have slowly tried to accommodate the students' needs and schedules. Our focus is on students' needs, whether they are academic or social," said Associated Students President Joe McNally.
McNally also mentioned the late-night hours of Pat Malley Fitness Center and Benson, including the new bar, illustrating the many facets of student life that the university is now making strides toward bringing back on campus. He sees the extended library hours as another step toward that goal.
Orradre Library will close at 10 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. Holiday hours will be posted on the library's Web page (http://www.scu.edu/library/).