Dean's Welcome

Welcome to UND and the UND Libraries!

As many of you know, the medical school and the law school have separate libraries, reporting to their respective deans. Both moved into renovated or new spaces in recent years. Now, it's the Chester Fritz Library's turn! We undertook several smaller renovations from 2016-2018, including a mini-renovation of the Reference area, several maintenance items (a new chiller tower on the roof, upgrades to our HVAC system, replacement of pipes beneath the Library), and the opening of a wonderful One Button Studio, which quickly proved popular with students seeking to create videos without the need for a strong technological background.

Now, our first major renovation is well underway. In July 2019, University Information Technology moved into the 1st floor of the Library. The North and South entrances are being remodeled. A new Knowledge Commons is being created on the 2nd floor, with Peer Research Consultants to help students with their research; it will open in Fall 2019. Our V-Lab (Data Visualization, Virtual & Augmented Reality, and Robotics) will open in October 2019, on the 3rd floor. By December 2019, compact shelving will hold our government documents and bound periodicals collections, freeing space for studying and other uses. In February 2020, a coffee shop will open on the 1st floor as well. In Summer 2020, the Writing Center will move into our 3rd floor. Eventually, once the new College of Business & Public Administration is completed, a skyway will connect the 2nd floor of Business and the 3rd floor of the Library, and where the skyway enters the Library, we will have a small entrepreneurship space. The Reading Room is also being renovated. And this is only the beginning – we hope to make many more improvements! The Chester Fritz Library has not been renovated prior to this since 1981, and much has changed in libraries since then!

Beyond physical spaces, we've made huge forays into digital spaces. The Library has worked with faculty, students, and staff on the Open Educational Resources Working Group. Thus far, our OER initiatives have saved students $8.5 million in textbook costs, in just 4 years! We have also built the UND Scholarly Commons, an institutional repository holding text, images, journal articles, research data files, a complete digital inventory of the UND Art Collections, copies of UND-created Open Educational Resources, and much, much more.

In October 2018, we also completed the Chester Fritz Library Strategic Plan, which is integrated with One UND