Evolving identities: An overdue discussion of academic libraries and experiential studio pedagogy
Creators: name: Murphy, James E.
name: Parker, Matthew
Publisher: name: Libraries & Cultural Resources
Year: 2023

description: Conference Presentation. Citation: Murphy, J.E. &amp; Parker, M. (2023, June 22-24). “Co-creating an experiential learning studio for Architecture students with the added benefit of student-led library space innovations.” Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture/European Association of Architecture Education (ACSA/EAAE) Teachers Conference, Reykjavik, Iceland.
description: Educators, including those in Architecture programs, are being tasked with ensuring students graduate with practical learning experiences leading to high levels of employability. Often referred to as experiential learning or work-integrated learning, these initiatives connect students with partners outside their faculties to have students tackle specific, realistic scenarios and propose solutions. In our setting, Architecture students are given this opportunity through a work-integrated learning Studio, matching students with internal and external partners on timely and relevant project opportunities. In this case, the co-creative partner is the University’s Architecture Librarian and the project opportunities are two of the University’s library locations. Libraries, as a subset of GLAM organizations (Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums) are continually in flux but hold at their core the interaction of their users (students, staff and faculty in the case of an academic library) and their collections. But what will academic library spaces look like, with ever-increasing digital collections and off-site storage? Many academic libraries across the globe were designed with the goal of storing maximum collections, however the current use case is starkly different, often resorting to study space as an unimaginative but popular default in a design void that has not been adequately addressed. Library services have become increasingly digital. Librarians and library staff connect with and support their users virtually, and users access library resources from wherever they are. Also, more and more institutions are choosing to store print materials off-site or in high density storage, to free up premium space for study, collaboration, technology, or new services. Without active intervention, academic libraries of the present day, and especially their smaller, non-signature locations, sit on an unknown path. Through this co-creative partnership between architecture educators with the architecture librarian and university libraries, students are working through a series of scaffolded studio assignments with regular input from both architects and librarians. The university’s librarians, invested in their spaces, are acting both as advisors and as clients in providing their feedback and expertise throughout the studio. To begin, students were guided through an exploration of the history of library design, from the libraries of antiquity and their collections of clay tablets, through Alexandria and libraries of Ancient Greece and their adjacent agoras, through the ornate Enlightenment period, into the Carnegie era with thousands of public libraries created for towns and cities that applied and qualified, and finally to the present day and its cutting-edge modern libraries. Combining a context and precedent analysis, students were tasked with determining what architectural and design qualities have served libraries well, to help inform their future. Even through the first third of the studio, students have brought forward interesting propositions. With a need for future flexibility, how can shelving be designed to actively support a variety of programming? How does furniture delineate and reinforce desired user activities (e.g. quiet study vs. collaboration)? Is the presence of the book critical? Or has it become something of an artifact in digital research and learning environments? Is the presence of books and shelving a quintessential feature for user experience? Instead of print vs. electronic as competing, how can digital programming complement physical collections? What are the variety of affective experiences the library provides, and how can they be continued into future design? In its efforts to be all things to all people, has the library of the present lost its identity, and if so how can architecture help to course-correct an adrift subset of this iconic and ever-important cultural entity. Into the second phase of the studio, the overarching question has evolved to become: libraries and GLAM institutions are primarily concerned with the interaction between users and their collections, and so what will that interaction look like in the academic library of the future? What is the current programming in a typical academic library, and what might it look like in 5-10 years? This type of collaboration not only provides students with a practical, realistic learning experience, but also provides library leadership with student-led space innovations. Students, and not just that but Architects-in-training, are having a direct and tangible say in the spaces they use. As they are the primary user of campus library spaces, students’ input is now connected into the redesign conversation, an additional mutually beneficial goal achieved through this partnership.