Spring 2024 Message from the Dean
Welcome! I hope the spring break provided a good opportunity for some rest and relaxation amid a busy semester. The MSU Libraries has also seen a lively term, and as we look ahead I wanted to take a moment to share some important updates.
Spring semester hours. Regular hours following spring break resumed Monday, March 4. The MSU Libraries is typically open 24 hours per day on Monday through Thursday, with later opening and earlier closing times on the weekends. Regular hours will shift beginning with the last class day of the spring semester on Friday, April 26, as we head into our shortened summer hours. Please note that for safety and security purposes, all students, staff and faculty are required to scan their MSU ID to access the MSU Main Library building between 10:00 p.m. and 7:30 a.m. on Sunday – Thursday. A complete schedule for the Main Library hours is available here.
MSU Press director appointment. In October Elizabeth Demers was appointed director of the MSU Press. Demers comes to MSU from the University of Michigan Press, where she was hired as editorial director in 2017. She also previously held positions at Johns Hopkins University Press, Quarto Publishing and Potomac Books. Demers received undergraduate degrees in English and French from MSU as well as a master’s in comparative literature. She also earned a doctorate in history at MSU. In addition to her education at MSU, she obtained a Master of Business Administration at the University of Maryland. Demers has expressed enthusiasm about the opportunity to lead MSU Press, noting that she is “thrilled to be a part of MSU Press’s tradition of outstanding scholarship and community engagement.”
Harmful Language Remediation Group. The Harmful Language Remediation Working Group (HLRWG) at MSU Libraries formed in fall 2022 with the goal of identifying, assessing and responding to harmful language issues in the MSU Libraries’ descriptive metadata. The primary role of the HLRWG is to facilitate and track harmful language remediation projects across the MSU Libraries. The group has recently developed a publicly available form that can be used to report instances of potentially harmful language in the MSU Libraries catalog. This form is available here.
Building construction. In August 2022 the Libraries began working in partnership with brightspot strategy to reimagine our spaces and services to be more responsive to current and future needs of our faculty, staff and students. Several phases have already been completed while others have seen significant progress. Our new MSU Libraries Starbucks opened at the beginning of the spring semester, with updated seating in the café area as well as an option for mobile ordering, and the reconfiguration of 2-West is now also complete and home to the MSU Center for Teaching and Learning Innovation and the Office of Faculty and Academic Staff Development. Construction on 3-East to relocate our Stephen O. Murray and Keelung Hong Special Collections is progressing with plans to install shelving in April; this project phase is expected to continue into Fall 2024. Ongoing updates are available on our website at lib.msu.edu.
We are looking forward to supporting your learning and research needs as we approach the end of the spring semester (and beyond!). As a reminder, if you are unable to find an answer on our website or would like to speak to someone in person, we are available at our information desks as well as by phone at (517) 353-8700.
With warm wishes for a productive semester,
Neil Romanosky, Ph.D.
Dean of Libraries