The library opening with the first day of classes on Monday at Florida’s newest college features a sunlit arched roof and cozy reading chairs – but not a single book.

A fully digital library is among the futuristic features of Florida Polytechnic University’s striking dome-shaped building, designed by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.

The inaugural class of 550 students can access more than 135,000 ebooks on their choice of reader, tablet or laptop.

A bookless library is a rarity among U.S. colleges but reflects the high-tech ambitions of the university in Lakeland, Florida. Florida Polytechnic envisions building a technology corridor in the image of Silicon Valley between Orlando and Tampa.

Without stacks to organize, librarians staffing the main reference desk will steer students to tutoring resources and train them in managing digital materials. Students can buy traditional textbooks in the bookstore, or digital texts when available.

Old-fashioned books can be requested on loan from libraries at Florida’s 11 other public universities.

Learn more at Florida College Opens A Library Without Books at the Business Insider.

The Wellcome Library and Jisc today announce nine partner institutions whose 19th-century book collections will be digitised and added to the UK Medical Heritage Library (UK MHL), an online resource for the study of the history of medicine and related sciences.

The libraries of six universities have joined the partnership – UCL (University College London), the University of Leeds, the University of Glasgow, the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, King’s College London and the University of Bristol – along with the libraries of the Royal College of Physicians of London, the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and the Royal College of Surgeons of England.

Approximately 15 million pages of printed books and pamphlets from all ten partners will be digitised over a period of two years and will be made freely available to researchers and the public under an open licence. By pooling their collections the partners will create a comprehensive online library. The content will be available on multiple platforms to broaden access, including the Internet Archive, the Wellcome Library and Jisc Historic Books.

Learn more at Wellcome Library and Jisc announce
partners in 19th-century medical books digitisation project.

Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL) has completed the final document of a new Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education.  The task force will submit it to ACRL’s board of directors at its October meeting. This new framework addresses the many changed that have occurred since since ACRL formally adopted the Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education in 2000.

The standards from 2000 often remained a stand-alone process taught by librarians and students were left to their own devices as to how to apply what they’d learned to the subjects they were studying. The older  “checklist approach” to information literacy teaching has been replaced by a new framework designed to integrate information literacy training into the fabric of educating students to be critical thinker

Embedding cognitive, affective, and behavioral learning domains within information literacy teaching is essential. The new framework seeks to address the interconnected nature of a student’s abilities, moving away from the hierarchical and formulaic approach of the current standards.

Barbie E. Keiser  examines the new Framework in more detail at Reimagining Information Literacy Competencies.

Marc Futterman, president and CEO of CIVICTechnologies, announced today the availability of an information-packed interactive map that gives libraries a powerful portrait of the unique demographics and market segments in their service areas. The map is available on the CIVICTechnologies web site and can be accessed at no charge.

“CIVICTechnologies has been working with public libraries for several years to develop and implement CommunityConnect, an interactive tool to help them visualize data and relate that data to library service,” said Futterman. “With today’s tight library budgets it is more critical than ever for libraries to make data-driven, customer-centric decisions. We developed this free—and fun—interactive map so libraries can drill down to the neighborhood level to understand their communities. With this information they are in a better position to make the right decisions across a range of service domains such as customer development, collections, programs, marketing, outreach, technology, and facilities.”

CIVICTechnologies created the interactive web map with 2010 Census data and market segmentation data.

Durango Public Library Segment

Learn more at CIVICTechnologies Launches Robust Interactive Market Segmentation Map.