Knight Library Needs Longer Hours

Caitlin H.

January 31, 2010 - 10:50 AM

When it comes to hours of operation, I'll admit, I'm not the standard college student. I like to go to bed early, I like to wake up and have an early start. Late nights out really aren't my thing. Usually I have things relatively well organized. Generally speaking I'm not a procrastinator and I accomplish tasks in a timely fashion.

Today I rose with a mission of getting things accomplished. I was out of bed by roughly 8am, had breakfast and was on my way to campus by 9:30am, was expecting to be in the library a little after 10am. By 10:30 I had planned to be well underway with my first task. Imagine my surprise when I walked up to the library to find out it doesn't even open until 11am. Fail.

By 11am the day is nearly half over. It means only an hour, maybe two, of work before I would want to take a break and eat lunch. I couldn't believe it. How is it the library isn't open the Sunday before the midway point of the term until 11am?! Don't administrators realize midterms are coming up?

On the off chance I am being completely ridiculous and too overeager to be working in the library at odd hours, I decided to investigate and compare the University of Oregon to Oregon State and see how the libraries matched up (only in terms of open hours, not resources available). I found that the Oregon State library was open an hour later every night Sunday-Thursday and open three hours later Friday and Saturday. On Saturday and Sunday, the library opened an hour earlier at Oregon State. All total that is an additional 13 hours of operation every week.

The Knight Library is open 24 hours a day during the last week of the term and the week of finals, which is convenient (although I can't say I have spent an entire night in the library). But during the rest of the term I have exams to take and papers to write as well. I would get started on my work in the library before 11am if I had the opportunity. Except that begs the question, "how did I not know the hours before I arrived at the library today?"

I'm not a student who often works in the library. Perhaps because at some point in the past I realized the library wasn't open until 11am on weekends and so I started my tasks elsewhere at an earlier time. I wouldn't wait around until 11 to start my day. I'd be curious to know what is common across college campuses. When college students generally stumble into the library on a weekend. I'd be curious what the budget costs associated with opening the Knight Library an hour or two earlier on weekends would be.

What I do know is this: The Student Union on campus opens at 10am on weekends. If the Student Union is open, I think the library should be as well. I will advocate for a few additional hours of open library at the University of Oregon.