It’s been eerily quiet in the Knight Library.

That’s what Interim Dean of Libraries Mark Watson said. He’s one of about about 20 people still allowed inside, after every University of Oregon library branch closed their doors on March 24. Since then, a skeleton crew works in the building to help prepare for spring term, while the rest of the library staff work remotely to answer questions and assist instructors with online teaching.
By March 14, eight library staff members requested accommodations to work remotely, Watson said. Not long after, most library staff received recommendation to work from home. Out of 130 University of Oregon library employees, Watson said that 110 are working remotely. 

Bronwen Maxson, an undergraduate engagement librarian, was one of the earliest staff members to ask for work accommodations. She’s been working remotely since March 13.

Maxson said that she started mentally preparing herself for the possibility back in February. “I didn’t know how it would all play out, but I did start thinking that life would not be the same after this,” she said.

During a typical finals week, the Knight Library offers 24/7 service. This finals week, though, the doors closed at 5 p.m. Gradually, hours and non-UO individuals’ access were reduced, until finally, on Tuesday, March 24, the doors shut completely to everyone.
The weekend before, Watson said, the Provost’s Office anticipated Gov. Kate Brown’s stay at home order. “We started really talking seriously what it was going to mean to close the building down by Monday the 23rd,” he said, “and then it was midday on the 24th that it was like, ‘Okay, when you close tonight, that’s it — you won’t reopen tomorrow morning.’”
UO librarians went to work preparing to assist staff, students and faculty. Watson said that library staff is busy monitoring their website’s chat feature and plans to have the library’s main phone line staffed to answer questions.
“Every minute produces a new question,” he said.

Making sure physical materials are safe for patrons is another challenge, Watson said. There weren’t ultraviolet sanitizers big enough for the amount of material that needs to be cleaned, Watson said. 

In turn, library staff put materials received through the library return chutes into quarantine for 24 hours. Similar measures are taken regarding mail, with mailroom staff putting all the mail into bins and leaving it on the loading dock to quarantine.
Some local student library staff will still be needed. “We’ll have fewer, but we could certainly use their help,” he said. For now, he said, undergraduate employees will be used to find and scan materials for instructors, as well as re-shelving and other material handling. 

“It’s pretty easy to socially distance when you have a building as large as we have, with so few people in it,” he said.

Library staff are trying to figure out how to get essential materials in student hands, Watson said. Discussions of a curb-side pickup are underway, according to Maxson. For now, though, Watson said, “we can stick the books in the mail. 

Purchasing is adapting, too, Watson said, to accommodate more e-books. Though purchasing has shifted towards e-books, they aren’t any less expensive than physical materials. 

In fact, they can be four or five times more expensive, he said, based on how many people are allowed to use the material at once. That kind of access has to be bought, and the library plans to buy unlimited users. That can come with a hefty price tag. 

“It’s unclear to us yet how much more expensive it’s going to be,” Watson said. “Across the board, some expenses will be a lot higher than they usually will be.”

“At this point, we’re not trying to make decisions solely on pinching pennies,” Watson added. “It’s all hands on deck, to do what you’ve got to do to get everybody through this term. If that means spending more money on mailing or ebooks or databases, we’re just going to go ahead and do it.”

The difficulties of working remotely for librarians vary by role, Maxson said. “Librarians are information professionals and we are very flexible people,” she said. Working remotely isn’t as challenging for her — it’s the face-to-face interactions she misses most, but Zoom and Microsoft Teams have both helped make those personal connections in the meantime.

Maxson’s focus is Writing 123 and other first-year courses and programs. “I have been focusing on coordinating an effort to create asynchronous materials for 123 for the spring term,” she said, meaning reaching out to instructors, delivering clear instructions on how to record videos and figuring out how to embed videos with quizzes.

Third-year student Hailey Goss works in the library’s conservation lab, a department of only five people. 

She works on repairing library materials, so there was never a conversation about whether Goss would work remotely, she said. “I never asked about it because I knew the official workers could, but to work remotely, I would have to take books off of campus, and they don’t even trust us with a key card.” 

She plans to go back next week, with a new work schedule, she said. “Generally we do 10 or 15 hours,” Goss said, “but with restrictions going on, we are only doing 10 hours.” The staff’s shifts will be staggered to avoid contact with other people, she said, although official staff are working remotely. That poses a challenge for Goss. 

“There’s a lot of projects that I’m not able to do,” she said, as a student worker who receives new training all the time, “so I have to email my boss to see if it’s something I can do or if I have to hand it off to one of my co-workers, or whether it’s something she has to do when she gets back.”
“I want to tell everybody that, even though the doors are locked, the library is still very much open for business,” Watson said. He hopes that students don’t see the building closures as a barrier to the resources the library can provide. “We are here. We may have sent people home to work, but they’re working,” he said.