Rebecca L. Lubas
Associate Dean
Claremont Colleges
Sarah Pickle
Director of Organizational Planning & Assessment
Claremont Colleges
In 2016, The Claremont Colleges Library began to imagine what it might look like to provide access to our collections in ways that are informed by how our community uses those resources. From the beginning, this effort was a response to difficulties helping researchers connect our digital and physical resources, unsatisfactory storage space, and opportunities arising out of renovations and master planning. Through this work, we aim to ensure the organization and presentation of our collections support how our researchers need to work with them and be inspired by them. Over the past two years, we have engaged colleagues in other academic libraries on these questions. We have also convened task forces and conducted an in-depth, qualitative study to understand the different yet complementary engagements scholars have when browsing and searching print and electronic resources. In this presentation, we will review provocative conversations at Claremont and beyond about the future of print in the digital age, share what we are learning from our local investigations of research behaviors, and consider new ideas for an “Active Print” program.