SHEPHERD TO THE STACKS

There has been a lot of comment about Widener Library this fall, some of it accurate and well-founded, some ill-advised. That there were some improvements which could be made, and that some improvements have been made, few will deny. For this progress, credit is due to Widener's receptive administration, which has done its best to meet reasonable demands. To the undergraduate, however, still remains the Library's greatest barrier--the lack of permission to use the stacks. To advocate that this permission be granted is not the purpose of this editorial; there are sound arguments against flooding the stacks with an over-abundance of students. A much more workable solution might be the creation of a student contact man.

Patterned along the lines of a public relations counsels, the man in this new post would have no sinecure job. Suppose a student turns in a card at the delivery desk for a book on a particular phase of Economics. After a reasonable interval, he is politely informed that the book is out. Unhappily, he slouches off, much inclined to give full credence to the worst rumors about Widener's indifference. But here is where the contact man's duties begin. To his centrally located desk the student plods and unfolds his troubles. The contact man is interested; he looks up the file on the book, finds out for how long it will be out, and to whom. Then the two go into the stacks to the shelf or shelves devoted to the subject in which the student is interested. There the contact man points out books relating to the same topic, those as nearly similar as possible and likely to be helpful as a substitute until the desired book is returned. With Widener's wealth of books, it would be difficult to find a topic on which there weren't several volumes available. The chances are therefore fairly good that a stop-gap book could be discovered.

This contact man would have to deal with many students, and his knowledge of the Library would have to be great. For this purpose he would need the cooperation of other departments, especially of those which keep the records of books in immediate circulation. He should not be allowed to become a carbon copy of the Phillips Brooks House student advisor; his duties will not be psychological or spiritual, although at times he may have to use these methods. But he should be essentially a go-between--the person who opens up the stacks to undergraduates who have a definite need, who has time to explain the situation because that is his only duty, who could bring Widener even further down out of the clouds of graduate and professorial research into the lowest realm of ordinary students.