TESC Library: I am thinking of a word... it's SUCKS!!
Written: Jan 04 '01 (Updated Jan 05 '01)
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Pros: it didn't kill me
Cons: it almost killed me
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| jennifernorth's Full Review: The Evergreen State College |
In my three year venture in the land of Liberal Arts I bravely struck out against the liberal haff of Evergreen education and dared to do serious research. This epinion is about all the travails of trying to be an Academic in a cesspool of intellectual apathy.
My first year:
I researched the Family Leave policies in America and how they pared on an international scale. I staked out an area near the Sociological indexes and spent three weeks finding articles in academic journals about how Third World countries have better maternity policies than America. I was lucky enough to write this paper only one year after the United Nations had conducted its own survey and released a statement recommending fundamental laws on this matter that all countries expected to participate should abide by (ever wonder where the Family Medical Leave Act came from? Not the Clinton's administration's good heart, I assure you). Unfortunately it's not like anyone in the Evergreen library system could care less about the United Nations or what they have to say about anything. I begged and pleaded with the staff to borrow the documents from neighboring University of Washington's library who had an extensive section for UN documentation. And they did order, it sure was helpful a week after my paper was due. How a 64-page document took 5 weeks to travel less than 100 miles I'll never know.
My second year:
When I found out the Academic indexes were now stored digitally via JStor I was thrilled. I could now achieve in a few hours what took days the year before. Viva la technology! I did a small amount of research on the role of women in the early 80's action against Pentagon spending. I borrowed most of the material from my faculty and didn't have to rely much on the Library.
However there was an ugly incident when I needed to read a case study for class on closed-reserve (meaning they can be checked out but not taken out of the library) and all (and by "all" I mean both) of the copy machines were not working. I put on my sweetest face and gentlest voice and asked the head Library Man nicely if I could go to another building to copy them and bring them right back? No. Well then could you use the copy machine in your office to do so? No. Well, do you think you could possibly get that stick out of your ass? (Didn't really say that).
So I went to stacks in the back and ripped the magnetic stripping out of the case study and then busted a move out of the library. My conscious did not allow me to go back to the library for months. I AM NOT A CRIMINAL! LOOK WHAT YOU MAKE ME DO, LIBRARY!
My third year:
This year the library seemed to catch on that accepting 500 more students (to a total of 3,500) without expanding any campus resources was not making for happy tax paying parents and the seven state schools got together and created the Cascade Washington State Cooperative Library Project. Which essentially linked all of the school's databases together and employs Overnight Delivery to get more students more books. Why any school would enter into this agreement with Evergreen is beyond me but if any kid at Western Washington University ever needs books on plant identification from the Seventies... well, they are in luck!
Also created this year was the ability to view your library account online. Books could be renewed without ever going to campus! Huzzah!
I ordered about ten books from the Cascade system about two months before my paper was due. "Look at me", I proclaimed, "giving myself plenty of time, no procrastinating here!". Two weeks later I renewed them online (this is leaps and bounds in technology for Evergreen, I hope you understand). Two weeks after that I tried to renew them again, YOU HAVE RENEWED THESE ITEMS TOO MANY TIMES.
Well, I wasn't about to give them back, I'd only read half of them and I had not even begun the paper. I called the Library and asked if I brought the books back could they just check them in and then re-check them out? No, they have to be shipped back to the school of origin and then I can re-check them out.
Lightening doesn't strike twice and it was too easy getting the books in the first place just to give them up to Washington State bureaucracy. "Well, how long can I have them overdue before I'll be fined." "I'm not sure." "Am I talking to a library clerk?" "Yes." "And you don't know how long a book has to be overdue before fines are given?" "No."
Because I am sensitive to the servants of customer service I refrained from laying into her, but seriously, what goes into Training if they do not have this most basic information? I ended up keeping the books two months past their due date and despite sending me a dozen notices saying I was about to be charged I never was. Suckers!
In general any time I have managed to find a book that the small library does carry it was never in the stacks but filling out the forms for books that were MIA was about 50% successful 2-4 weeks later.
Recommended:
No
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jennifernorth
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