The College has received a grant of $1 million from the Schaffer Foundation of Schenectady for the renovation and expansion of Schaffer Library.
The Schaffer Foundation is the legacy of the late Henry Schaffer, a former member of the College's Board of Trustees. He was the founder and president of Empire Super Markets, one of the state's largest
independently owned food chains. The company was acquired by the Grand Union Company.
“This gift represents an important step in modernizing our library to make it the intellectual center of the campus,” said President Roger Hull.
The new library will dramatically improve student and faculty access to sources of knowledge beyond the classroom and the laboratory. Included will be:
- A bibliographic instruction room, a fully-electronic classroom where students and faculty will receive whatever help they need to track down information. Nearby will be an electronic reference resource center, which will have computer workstations and CD-ROM and on-line access for the entire library.
- Expanded space for traditional printed sources ranging from 2,000 journals to the primary sources available in the Special Collections;
- Group study rooms, in recognition that collaborative learning is an important part of the College's mission, as well as improved individual spaces for independent study;
- An expanded language laboratory with personal computers for interactive use with microcomputers, VCR's, CD players, video disc players;
- A video distribution system to receive satellite and cable programming, including foreign language satellite broadcasts;
- An enhanced mix of private and cooperative spaces for the Writing Center;
- Access to the libraries and archives of the world through Internet.
Total cost of the project, which will add about 50,000 square feet of new floor space, is estimated at
about $17 million-$15 million for construction and $2 million to establish an endowment to support maintenance of the building.
The new library will combine the renovation of the 1960 Schaffer library with new construction. The 1974 annex-which is structurally unsound and cannot support the open stacks for which it was built will be dismantled and a new three-story facility will be built.
Space also will be added to the north and south sides of the original 1960 library, and most of the interior will be rebuilt with reinforced floor space, conduits for electronic data and communication distribution, and energy-efficient lighting and climate control.