Hoover Institution Library press release

[Glen Worthey]

--- Begin Forwarded Message ---
Date: Fri, 2 Mar 2001 16:14:34 -0800 (Pacific Standard Time)
From: Office of the University Librarian
<university-librarian at stanford.edu>
Subject: PRESS RELEASE - SUL/AIR - HOOVER REALIGNMENT
Sender: catlewis at sulmail.stanford.edu
To: ALL-SUL-STAFF at FORSYTHE.stanford.edu

Reply-To: Office of the University Librarian
<university-librarian at stanford.edu>
Message-ID: <SIMEON.10103021634.L at SUL-DO-catlewis.sulmail.stanford.edu>


SUL/AIR Staff, colleagues, and friends,

        Provost John Etchemendy has made his decision about
the relignment of the Hoover Library and the University
Library.  The text of a press release conveying that
decision follows.  Naturally, we are pleased with the
Provost's decision and we look forward to welcoming warmly
the staff of the Hoover Library to our ranks as the
transition occurs over the next months and years.

Cheers,

Mike


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 2, 2001, 12 Noon (PDT)

STANFORD REALIGNS LIBRARY COLLECTING RESPONSIBILITIES

        The Stanford University Libraries and Stanford's Hoover
Library will realign their respective collecting and
operating responsibilities, according to a plan announced
Friday by Provost John Etchemendy.   The new plan seeks to
eliminate redundancy of effort, clarify missions, and
strengthen the University's overall library collecting
program.

        Etchemendy reached the decision to realign
responsibilitiesafter consultation with an ad hoc faculty
committee, which was chaired by Professor Nancy Kollman and
included Professor Carl Bielefeldt, Professor Jeffrey
Schnapp, and Professor Peter Stansky.

        "The faculty committee expressed the view, which I
share, that the proposed transfer of responsibility, if it
is to be successful, must be accompanied by effective
curatorial leadership, sustained University financial
support, and significant faculty oversight.  I intend to
see to it that these conditions are fully met," Etchemendy
said.

        The plan, which was proposed jointly in December by
administrators at the University Libraries and the Hoover
Institution, transfers responsibility for acquiring general
library materials (books, periodicals, and major
newspapers) from the Hoover Library to the University
Libraries. It also transfers the University funds now
allocated to the Hoover Institution for this purpose to the
University Libraries.  The Hoover Institution will continue
to develop its holdings of special collections (personal
papers, manuscripts, records of governmental and other
organizations, pamphlets, leaflets, newsletters, posters,
and other fugitive literature) in all the geographical and
subject areas in which it currently maintains collections.

        By assigning responsibility for all general
materials to the University Libraries, the realignment
establishes more effective coordination of collection
development operations, and, through economies of scale,
achieves a more efficient management of cataloging and
other technical services.  It also improves access by
transferring some general materials from the closed stacks
in the Hoover Tower to open stacks in the University
Libraries.  Hoover Library users from outside Stanford, as
well as Stanford students and faculty, will have free
access to these and other holdings of the University
Libraries.

        At the same time, the Hoover Library will be
relieved of its responsibility to acquire general
materials.  With the resulting surplus space Hoover Library
will be able to focus more attention on gathering fugitive
and archival materials on contemporary issues - the kind of
material which, if not promptly collected when it appears,
disappears forever.  The realignment strengthens the role
of the Hoover Library as a special library of rare and
unique materials, and thus gives renewed emphasis to its
founding mission.

        According to Etchemendy, the East Asia Collection
and its staff are scheduled to be transferred from the Lou
Henry Hoover Building to the Meyer Library Building in
September.  Most staff for the other affected collections
also will move in September.  General library materials
that now reside in the Hoover Tower will be identified and
transferred over the course of the next two years.
Stanford faculty and Hoover fellows will work with the
University Libraries and Hoover Institution in implementing
the transition.

        Hoover Institution Director John Raisian said he
was confident that the University Libraries can effectively
assume the tasks of acquiring general library materials in
the subject areas that up until now have been under the
purview of Hoover Library.

        "We at Hoover are committed to the special
collections that will remain at Hoover and that represent
our unique contribution to scholarship," Raisian said.  "By
providing clarity of purpose and a division of labor based
on our comparative advantages, this realignment promises to
make the library collections at Stanford, taken as a whole,
both stronger and more efficient."

        University Libarian Michael Keller also praised the
realignment and its mutual benefits.

        "In coordination with the University Libraries, the
Hoover Library has built world-class library collections
that have contributed in many ways to Stanford's academic
program and to scholarship generally," Keller said.  My
staff and I greatly respect the outstanding work that has
been done by Hoover librarians and curators over the years.
We intend to sustain the efforts that have produced these
great collections, and to work with our Hoover colleagues
as they continue to build the special and archival
collections that have made the Hoover Library world famous."

                                                #####



Michael A. Keller
  University Librarian
  Director of Academic Information Resources
  Publisher of HighWire Press
  Publisher of Stanford University Press
Stanford University

101 Green Library
Stanford, CA 94305-6004
U.S.A.

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