The library building may be going away, but the library itself needs a new home and a new vision.
BY: RUBY FOLKNER
Staff Writer
While a school can exist without a formal Library, it is hard to continue learning.
STLCC-Meramec will continue to have a library following the demolition of the storied building that’s scheduled for later this spring. Sometime this coming February, the library and its services will move into a smaller, temporary space inside the Student Center. A new science building will be built on the former library grounds at some point, if the plans for ‘STLCC Transformed’ continue to remain unchanged.
No permanent home for a new library has been decided. And when it returns, there’s a good chance it won’t be the kind of library that Meramec students have become used to.
I went to an all-girls private school where we did not have a library, we had a place called “the commons.” It was a place where you could go to study and do school work. In my experience, it was far from that; it was often loud from people’s conversations and talking over each other. This was fine for me, to a degree, because I work better when there is a small amount of sound.
However, it often got very loud in this place and became more of a social setting rather than a workplace setting. I agree that libraries are outdated and need to be revamped. I think it can be both a library and a common area.
For example, my favorite area in the library is the quiet places on the second floor. I propose we keep the second floor a more “traditional” library like it is now while keeping the first floor a common area. This would be very similar to the way Lindenwood University has its library. Keeping these two things separate also allows you to keep books students need for classes or casual fiction books that are in. As a kid through elementary school and middle school, the library was a semi-quiet place of safety. I didn’t have that in high school. When I chose colleges I knew the school I went to needed a library.
I was so excited that Meramec has a library, and soon … it won’t. Not really. At least not for a while.
