Opened in 1986, the Mark O. Hatfield Library serves the College of Liberal Arts, the School of Education, and the Atkinson Graduate School of Management. The building is a gracious modern, glass-walled structure that overlooks Mill Creek and Jackson Plaza, one of the main gathering places of the campus. The library offers students and faculty a well-chosen collection of more than 240,000 volumes and 1400 current journal subscriptions. The facility also houses the Mark O. Hatfield Archives, an extensive collection of United States documents, and many local, national, and international newspapers.
A highly qualified staff of librarians and support personnel are committed to developing and maintaining strong public services. A program of course-related library instruction ensures that students not only find the information they need to satisfy course requirements, but also learn the strategies they need to retrieve and evaluate information in a society that places increasing importance upon these skills. Librarians are readily available at the reference desk to help students, and offer assistance, by appointment, for more specialized research needs.
The book collections, developed over more than a century, provide strong support for undergraduate research. The book stacks are open to all. A large collection of classic feature and documentary motion pictures, designed to support courses across the curriculum, may be borrowed by students for home viewing. The library's holdings also include a strong collection of music on compact disc that ranges from the Baroque through the modern. An efficient interlibrary lending department utilizes OCLC, a national computer network; telefacsimilie transmission; and Ariel, an electronic document delivery system, for locating and retrieving materials not in the local collection.
The catalog is automated and includes records of all book, journal, and other library holdings. Available in both digital and Web formats, the catalog is connected to the university computer network and is accessible 24 hours a day across the campus. In addition to the online catalog, the library makes more than 50 electronic databases and the Internet available to students and faculty through its Web homepage and the library's InfoStations. Much of the data and many of the documents, which may reside anywhere in the world, are available at a keystroke for printing or downloading. The online catalog, the Web homepage, and the library's InfoStations offer access to a wealth of bibliographical, statistical, graphic, and textual information.
The Hatfield library includes many attractive areas suitable for study and reflection and hosts a variety of displays throughout the year. Lectures, readings and recitals are held frequently in the Mark O. Hatfield Room. The Hatfield Archives house the papers and memorabilia of Mark O. Hatfield, Oregon's senior United States senator. A 24-hour study room equipped with vending machines provides study space during hours the library is not open.