Alden Library is projected to have a gender-neutral bathroom, more whiteboards and different furniture for Fall Semester.
Though some students may return to Ohio University next Fall Semester with a new hairstyle or new clothes, Alden Library will also be sporting a different look.
The library is expected to have a gender-neutral bathroom, more whiteboards and different furniture for Fall Semester, Dean of OU Libraries Scott Seaman said.
A project on the fourth floor involving new furniture and whiteboard walls is expected to be completed this summer and cost $200,000, Seaman said.
Plans for a gender-neutral bathroom on the library's fifth floor are underway, Seaman said, adding that he anticipates the restroom will be finished by Fall Semester.
“We are not building a new restroom,” Seaman said. “We are opening and adapting an existing restroom to be a gender-neutral restroom.”
Seaman said the cost for the gender-neutral bathroom will be "minimal" because the university is re-purposing an existing bathroom.
“We’re hoping that will be a little more welcoming to our transgender community,” Seaman said.
Carolyn Miller, a senator at-large for Student Senate, brought the idea of gender-neutral restrooms to Seaman. She is working with the library to help with some of the future changes.
“I have so many friends who are uncomfortable, who are awkward, who are so trapped by a bathroom,” Miller said. “You shouldn’t feel stuck having to go to the bathroom.”
The LGBT Center was not directly involved in the changes at Alden Library, but had “campus-wide discussions” about gender-neutral bathrooms that took place in the summer of 2015, delfin bautista, director of the center, said.
“It gives everybody a chance to feel safe when using the bathroom," bautista, who uses they/them pronouns and the lowercase spelling of their name, said.
Though the only part of Alden open 24 hours is the building's second floor, the library is also considering adding another 24-hour space at the library.
Seaman said in a "comprehensive survey" the library conducted among undergraduate students, the addition most students wanted was more 24-hour space.
“We hear loud and clear that students are coming into Alden at 11:00, 11:30 at night and the second floor is already so full that there’s no space to work," Seaman said.
The new 24-hour space would be on the fourth floor, Seaman said, but there are facility, security and staffing consequences. The library would have to go to the university for additional funding in order to add a 24-hour floor because of high costs, he said.
“We need to expand the number of restrooms on that floor because it was never intended be open 24 hours,” Seaman said.
On Feb. 10, Student Senate passed a resolution requesting that Alden Library’s fourth floor stay open 24 hours a day, five days a week.
“The second floor gets so crowded, so loud and so chaotic,” Miller said.
Alyssa Geraci, a sophomore studying art, is in favor of more 24-hour space.
“They need more 24-hour floors because once it hits 11:30 (at night), there’s no room on the second floor,” Geraci said. “If you don’t get there early, then you are kind of screwed.”
Geraci said she goes to the library every few days and would like to see better computers, adding that they are "really slow and old."
Seaman said there will also be other changes on the first and third floor come Fall Semester.
“Currently there are large surface desks there that we are going to integrate to the second and fourth floor,” Seaman said. “Those surface desks will go away and they’ll be replaced with different uses of those spaces. We’re still figuring out though what those uses are going to be.”
There is a better chance at academic success for students who use the library, Seaman said.
“What we’re trying to create is a library that’s encouraging to use, that’s comfortable to use, that’s easily accessible to break down all those barriers and if we're able to do that and build spaces and create spaces that are comfortable and functional for students, they’ll succeed academically,” Seaman said.
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