Hampshire College

Reflecting its academic structure, Hampshire employs a librarian for each school. Librarians are an integral part of the learning experience for students, providing a robust bibliographic instruction program. The first-year tutorial system ensures that virtually all students receive instruction in library research using appropriate subject databases, Web sites, and the tools necessary to evaluate sources and reliability of information. For advanced students, the subject librarians provide individual instruction and consultation, helping them both to define the scope of a project and to locate materials appropriate to their needs. Students learn to use archival material, government documents, statistics, and data from individual research... [from the 2007 Self-Study]

The Reference Desk in the library is staffed not only by librarians and library staff, but also by trained students, a practice dating back to the 1971 Council on Library Resources/NEH grant-funded project, "Orienting the Library to the User."

The Hampshire College library is named after Harold F. Johnson, the Amherst College alumnus and financier who gave the initial $6 million to found the college in 1965.