James Milles
Associate Dean for Legal Information
Services
Director of the
University at
February 20, 2006
Please send updates to
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No, except the Law Review can stay after
hours. Very rarely do the Law Review
students stay after hours. I have observed no
problems. |
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We at American don't anymore. We did when we were in
the old building but not after the move to this one seven years
back. At the time we dropped the access,
we were concerned about the safety of anyone in the library with no
staff present. Today we are still
concerned about the safety of anyone in the library but, of course,
today that concern is about a much expanded list of
dangers. |
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We allow two types of after
hours access to students upon
request. In either case, they must sign up
with Circulation and then we give them the keypad access number to
one of two outside doors. Some of them
just want the late night study room, which is locked off from the
rest of the library. Others may request
run of the library, and there is a different door/keypad for that
access. It's usually moot court, or
special requests such as they need to use the computer
room. Law Journal used to be the primary
users of this, but now they are within the library so they have
their own staircase entrance. It's not used all that much.
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No. |
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No. |
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No. |
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Normally we do not have 24-hour access. (We are
open |
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We have had this policy for 11 or 12 years now, but it
is not without its problems. Because we have so many evening
and part-time students, we decided that the benefits outweigh the
detriments. (Sometimes I question whether it was the right
decision.)
Benefits:
A.
Clean and quite place to study always available for
students on their schedules.
B.
Makes issues of access to network-based services and
IP addressed services less problematic.
C.
Extremely popular with students as evidence of
school's commitment to help them
learn.
D.
Key-card access after-hours helps insure library
security at night and on week-ends.
E.
Ability to close library if needed at night and on
week-ends without hurting primary patrons.
Detriments:
A.
Invites theft of collection from
sociopaths.
B.
Liability issues for school for potential after-hours
assaults or injuries.
C.
Copiers and printers unprotected
after-hours.
D.
Food and drink enforcement issues pro
tanto more difficult. |
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No. |
Chicago-Kent IIT |
No. |
CUNY |
Yes. Security is not as secure late at night, so it is possible to remove library items. But we don't seem to have an abnormally high loss rate. The benefit is that there is far less reason to horde or mutilate items. Also there is far less pressure to provide staffing at unproductive hours. |
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No. |
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No. |
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Nope - at least not yet. |
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No access when we are closed due to security
restrictions. We are open more than any other part of the
university as it is. We are open M-F
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No, not at this time. But after our renovation
and "smart card" implementation this Summer, yes.
I see huge possible problems with theft, possibly assault of
some kind, and trash. |
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No. |
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We do not provide 24-hour access to law students. Our university library does so and they are within two blocks of the law school. |
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No. |
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No. |
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Yes, we've had 24-7 access since academic year
1997-98. No real problems, but some of
less significance. No real problems, but
some of less significance: |
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Not across the board, thank heaven. We do provide
key card access for the editorial boards of the three journals,
since their offices are in the library, but even they can't enter
the library between |
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No, we're in downtown |
Harvard |
Good God, no! |
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24/7 key privileges to the library are accorded to members of the moot court teams as long as needed for competition work, but not to others. |
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No. The University Library has a study room with computers, snack vending machines and an ATM that is open 24 hours and the law students can use it although I don't think many do. The room is locked and students use their University ID cards for access. |
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My library does not due to lack of staffing and building security issues. |
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No. We have lengthened our hours generally and have extended those hours during exams to avoid this. In a building needs assessment, currently underway here, I have recommended a 24 hour general study and a computer area with doors that can be accessed by touch pad. Hopefully this would deal with the majority of the needs without the significant issues that would arise with overall 24 hour access. This is, however, for a future renovation that may or may not be funded, but hope springs eternal. |
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No. |
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No. Faculty have it because they have keys. Faculty can arrange for after-hours access for groups of students such as moot court teams by contacting [the director]. The sponsoring faculty member is required to remain in the library with the students, so this NEVER occurs. But basically, students are not permitted to be in the library after hours. |
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Mercer law library provides 24 hour access. Benefits: lots of good will vis a vis our students, and less staff time just keeping the library open when real service is not required. We do not have a theft problem (at least not one we've noticed! The good stuff is behind a locked gate.) Problems: students are not as vigilant as we'd like, and from time to time they permit "outsiders" to accompany them as they enter (through a card access system). During exam periods, there is evidence of food, but overall, no serious problems. |
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No. |
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The
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Yes. Benefits-students really appreciate it. Problems-not many. Had to reconsider what was on reserve (not available after services cease), how we manage the computer lab, etc. In other words, we had to figure out how to make 24-hr access meaningful for our students--more than just a study hall. We have not noticed any increase in thefts, etc. And fortunately have had no security problems either to date. |
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No; only to faculty. |
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We did at |
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No. |
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We do not provide 24 hour access. It has been discussed more times than I can count but security is always an issue. |
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No. |
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No. |
Northern
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Our library provides 24/7 access to our students and
faculty and staff. This is done via their
school i.d./smart card.
We have video surveillance and each time a student swipes
their card it is logged on a computer as to exactly who entered and
when. This is a huge selling point
especially for our part time evening division
students. It also allowed us to cut back
on the staffed hours we had on the weekends and evenings, since our
students had access regardless of whether we had someone on the
circulation or reference desk. |
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Yes. Benefits:
A. Never any demand to extend hours |
Nova Southeastern
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No, not yet. We have investigated a “card access”
system and probably eventually will. |
Pace
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No. |
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We have 24/7 access for students, faculty and staff to
all of the library except the reserve
area. Our computer labs are open 24/7 as well. Though I
suspect we
loses |
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We're considering the 24-hour access model
here.
If you want to add our current policy,
Pepperdine has overnight access for moot
court participants, law review members, and faculty research
assistants. The student must be in the building at closing
(students don't have any authorized keys----although there are some
unauthorized keys rumored to exist)
and have obtained a permission slip in advance. We give
the list of overnight students to the Public Safety Office, which
distributes the list to any officers who might be walking through
the building during the night. We've had some problems with
this fairly tight policy----qualified students giving unqualified
students overnight access, blocking doors open, etc., but we have
never considered ending it. |
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No. |
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No. |
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No. |
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No. Students have not raised this issue in years, and for security reasons, I do not see us doing it even if they do! |
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We do have some modified "24 hour" access in that
we have a reading room that we can separate from the rest of the law
library by locked doors. We allow our Volunteer Income Tax
Assistance (VITA) group access to that room, along with its
attendant printers, to assist the general public with their income
tax returns January 1 to April 15. Because their student
leader has a key to that area they have 24 hour access, though in
general they are only there a few hours before we open on Saturdays
and Sundays.
Also,
because of the late in the year deadlines, we allow some moot
court teams access to that same area, by the same key method, during
the Interterm period when we are officially closed (usually from Dec
20th or so until January 2nd or so, depending on how the weekends
fall). They can use their personal laptops and the printers to
work on their briefs and oral arguments whenever, during that
period, they want to do so.
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During reading/final exam periods we are open on a 24
hr. basis; otherwise we are open every day from
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Yes, via swipe cards when the library is not staffed. No known problems; one less thing for students to grumble about. |
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NO! I will be interested in seeing how many urban schools do this. It's the security issue, as well as comfort levels about students wandering around the building when no staff are around. |
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No. |
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No. |
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No. |
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No. |
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No, we don't allow 24 hour access. We used to
allow it to the law review students, but they abused the privilege
and now we stay open until |
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We still provide 24 hour access to students and
faculty. The down side is that the building is open and we
don't have anyone on duty after 11. We are
considering installing card access readers. With 24 or more
doors to the building and no way to secure the library, we will have
to |
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No. |
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No. |
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We provide 24 access to students, faculty and staff through a cardlock system. Our computer labs are in the library and all students are assigned carrels. As a result, the library is heavily used and the 24 hour feature is appreciated. |
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Yes. No problems (except for the occasional propping open of doors). The obvious benefits. Studs. and fac. can use the library any time they want, and we don't need to keep the circ. desk open. |
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No. |
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When we offered 24 access
throughout the entire academic year, it became a security risk, as
very few people were in the library between the hours of
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No. |