REFERENCE SERVICES FOR UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS

Abstract

Lament Library designed especially to serve Harvard undergraduates was opened on January 3.1990 Many universities have followed Harvard in creating separate undergraduate libraries which have served as campus study-halls, social centers, reserve book dispensers, open-shelf browsing collections, audio-visual facilities-, and centers for reference assistance0 ' Although descriptions of undergraduate libraries exist in the literature of ?librarianship, no studies attempt to evaluate particular services, The major purpose of this study is to identify and evaluate reference services for undergraduates on university campuses?both in the undergraduate and main university libraries. The. University of-Michigan with its Undergraduate and General Libraries and Cornell University with itsUr.is and John M. Olin Libraries were chosen as case studies. Reference services for university undergraduates are then contrasted with those at the liberal arts colleges of Swarthmore and Earlham, , For each Institution, the historical development of library services is traced and data are presented on all' services provided for undergraduates. Against this background, current reference\services and library instruction programs are described. To ascertain the actual use made of professional reference staffs to determine