To the Editor:
Library management wants to reduce staff and services at the Sciences Library based on a decline in circulation statistics. They contend that the numbers tell the whole story — which worries me because library services cannot be measured by metrics alone.
I work in technical services, but I have watched and talked to my colleagues at the circulation desks for a very long time. The complexity of the services they provide amazes me. They are the first point of contact for nearly all library users, only a fraction of whom circulate library material. Despite (or maybe because of) the proliferation of online resources, students and faculty members need all kinds of assistance: to navigate these resources, to locate the subject specialists who can help them complete their research, to help them find what they need elsewhere if Brown doesn’t own it. And this list doesn’t begin to describe what the familiar faces at the SciLi circulation desk mean to the students who use that facility on a daily basis.
The SciLi is now staffed by three full-time and three half-time employees who are available 100 hours each week. They know the collection, and most importantly, they know the students. Why is management listening only to the statistics, and not to these individuals who provide the services that cannot simply be represented by a bar graph or a pie chart?
Deb Peterson, MA ’83
Senior library specialist
