250 seats short!

By Bob Lord

The library is short of 250 chairs. It is also short of expansion space so that even the claimed seating figure is below the standard of one seat per four students.

Bag Space is Impossible to find, and the bag checking system has collapsed.

Meanwhile, university staff have had a lighting survey made of the lighting standards in the buildings, lecture rooms and staff studies.

A recent count conducted by Salient staff showed that it had 743 chairs. 22 couches, and 16 stools. With two people to each couch this means the total number of seats in the library is 803.

But when the chairs reserved for graduates in the Stack Room (Floor 0) and the chairs marked "For quick reference only" are excluded, then the chairs available for students studying are reduced to 750.

Dr. Culliford says that the complete number of chairs have not yet been bought because the administration wants to discover student reaction to the type of seating at present provided. More carrels (individual desks with chairs) are to arrive shortly.

But the library has been operational for about a year now and Salient can trace no efforts to test student views on the seating.

Limits On Use

Dr. Culliford says that in the 1000 chairs to be provided are included the chairs in the Fine Arts Room and in the seminar room on the fourth floor.

The seminar room contains about 20 chairs, but poor ventilation prevents concentrated study.

The Fine Arts Room is used for lectures for four hours of the day and outside that time is often locked.

Most parts of the library are well lit—bat the same cannot be said for offices and seminar room in the rest, of the building.

With the lights set back in the ceilings, they cast shadows. Students can see what they are doing but the standard of lighting is not high.

Earlier this year members of the university staff had a lighting survey made and it is understood that this revealed some substantial deficiencies.

Low Standard

Dr. Culliford says it does come up to the New Zealand standards and that a survey had recently been taken to see whether the standard should be raised.

Salient discovered that the New Zealand lighting standard is lower than both the British and American standards.

Space for student bags and satchels is also short. In the entrance foyer and on the floor below there are 501 cubicles for students' bags.

Many of the spaces on the lower floor are used by students at lectures and this leaves about 350 spaces for students using the library. The spaces provided were originally intended to fit four bags each—under supervision. After a trial last year this was found to be slow and inconvenient.

With the cubicles open to students the system breaks down and bags are left all over the library foyer floor. Dr. Culliford said the university has been contacted by the Fire Department and told that this constitutes a hazard for people using the library. The bags have to go.

The administration is looktog into the conversion of lecture room 206 into a cloak room and it is hoped this will case the situation. But it will probably be well into the third term before this eventuates.