From Big to Small

Essentially everything here represents a shift from big to small.  I could talk about the space here, the city, even the people, but what I am going to talk about is the library.

The Corely Smith Library at the Charles Darwin Foundation is an extremely small specialized library.  It represents everything that you would imagine from an underfunded, remote, library in a country that struggles with economic and organizational issues.  But from only my short introduction here I can see that the struggles of this library are not so different from the struggles of any library, even those amidst the hustle of the most advanced 21st century academic institutions.  Libraries worldwide are struggling to keep up with the rapidly changing face of publications, communications, and all other aspects of scholarship.  And to take advantage of the vast opportunities proved by online infrastructures.

A major question the CDF Library is asking itself right now is how do we get our information to those who need the information.  Does this sound familiar?  I've obviously simplified this question but this is really what all libraries are asking themselves.  In the case of CDF the library, it has a highly specialized collection that includes documents and publications that are not widely available anywhere else.  The goal is to make their collections accessible to the world, but they also need their information to be accessible by their local population as well.

The solutions to this question include efforts in communication, preservation, knowledge management, collection development, infrastructure, public relations, membership, circulation and the list could go on.

In conclusion, although the CDF library is an underfunded, remote, specialized library its questions are not small, remote, nor specialized.

I hope to be able to share more on the efforts that the CDF library is making to move toward a sustainable solution to this fundamental question.