OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY
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At OSU Libraries and Press we are succinctly aware of the continued and increasing economic pressures on our students. To that end we work to provide our student community with resources that finances may not allow them to otherwise access. These resources include long-term laptop loans, access to long-term study rooms for advanced graduate students working on their theses and dissertations, and providing short-term loan of items such as laptop chargers, noise cancelling headphones, scientific calculators.
Laptop Loan Program
Our laptop loan program is growing. We find that students need to borrow laptops for a variety of reasons including the inability to afford one and having outdated machines. We are living in a time when access to portable technology is vital to succeeding in an academic environment, thus we believe having access to laptops is a necessity. As the chart below details, our loans (and renewals) of laptops have increased over the last 3 years). You can learn more about this program here: Oregon State University Laptop Loan Program
Equipment loans
We also loan other equipment to help students with studying and faculty and staff with their research and work here at OSU. Our equipment includes everything from noise cancelling headphones and sun lamps to power adapters for laptops and white board markers. Our circulation staff pays close attention to what equipment needs we hear from our community and is constantly working hard to increase the types of equipment we provide. Below is a graph of the number of equipment checkouts for calendar years 2016-2018. Learn more about our equipment loan program here: Oregon State University Libraries Equipment Loan Program
Course Reserves
Having supplemental materials available in the library is not a new practice for academic libraries -- it has been a common practice for professors and instructors to make supplemental course materials available to students. As costs of attending the university have increased, including the cost of textbooks, we are now in an era where course reserves - supplemental course material - that professors and instructors make available in the library also serve as another point of service where OSU Libraries helps to make cost of attendance more accessible to students.
Since 2015 the the course reserves at Valley Library in Corvallis have been checked out 133,420 times across 3200 titles.
At our Guin Library at Hatfield Marine Science Center course reserves have been checked out 811 times across 80 titles.
There will be assessment to investigate approximately how much money we are saving students with our course reserves program, as well as the deeper impact on our students.
Board Games
At OSU Libraries we recognize that going to school, working and doing research isn't just about the work - sometimes you need to give your mind and body a break and play a game. Over the last few years we have built our board game loan program to include over 120 titles, and we are constantly listening to our community for new titles we should add. Below you can see how the program has grown from 2016. For more information on the program you can go here: Oregon State University Libraries Board Game Program
Basic Needs Center Textbook Lending Program
We have also partnered with the Basic Needs Center (BNC) to provide a textbook loan program so that low-income students and military veterans have one less thing to worry about -- the costs of textbooks. While any student can borrow materials from this program, priority access [during the first week of the each term] is given to students who are:
Since the inception of this program in 2016 this program has loaned 2689 textbooks across 1223 titles. The BNC estimates that in the Fall 2018 term that this program saved 491 students approximately $62,190 or $125 per student.
You can learn more about this program on the BNC website: https://studentlife.oregonstate.edu/bnc/textbook-lending-program
121 The Valley Library
Corvallis OR 97331–4501
