Tufts Student Services in a Feb. 19 email announced that students will be able make advance reservations for group study rooms in Tisch Library. Through the Tufts Space and Resource Reservation System, groups of two or more may reserve one of the 11 group study rooms for a minimum of one hour and a maximum of three hours per day from now through the end of the semester, according to the email.
Director of Tisch Library Laura Wood said this new system was put in place in response to student frustration over the lack of rooms available on a daily basis.
Over time we have received feedback that [the students] wanted more rooms because they had difficulty finding one that was free, Wood said. Thats a very hard request to meet due to building space. We thought to look for ways to maximize the potential of existing rooms that might otherwise always be busy.
According to the Tisch Library website, reservations will be canceled if the study group has not arrived by 15 minutes after their allotted time. Individuals are allowed to use an open group study room, but cannot reserve rooms and would have to leave if a group needed the space.
To reserve a room, students must simply log in to the Space and Resource Reservation System and select what room they want, Kartikeya Batra, a graduate student at the Fletcher School and assistant at Tisch Library, said.
Batra said all of the instructions are on the site, making it easy for students to select their preferred room, date, time and number of people. When making the reservation, students must also enter their contact information.
Wood said that the system is also meant to help students learn the locations of the group study rooms, which consist of four each on the first and second levels of the Fares Tower and three on the first level of the library next to the bathrooms and lockers.
Theyre very spread out, so its hard to be aware of all three clusters that you cant spot in one sightline, Wood said. This is a way for students to know where all of them are and which ones are available ahead of time.
According to Wood, the development of the system started as a request from students who wanted a greater say in when they would have access to a study room, especially when working on large group projects.
We wondered if self-service would be feasible in these situations, but none of our solutions met our criteria we would have had to purchase a new software license, Wood said. It was less expensive to tie the new program into the university-wide room scheduling system already in place. The [Office of the Registrar] was able to create a new functionality for us, she said.
The site now shows a full schedule of availability for each room through the end of the year. Although staff members have administrative oversight capabilities, only students are able to log in and make reservations, according to Wood.
Students expressed mixed opinions on whether the ability to reserve a group study room in advance will make a sizeable difference. Freshman Gabrielle Fenaroli said she is concerned about how to notify other groups of their reservations when there is no physical signal that a room has been taken.
I think it is a good system, [but] one thing I like about Tisch is that you can just walk up and get one on a first come, first serve basis, Fenaroli said. I have been in the situation where Ive been working on a project and was kicked out, and it was quite disruptive.
Wood said that, while there was a challenge in not having any sign dedicated to showing room availability, it is easy for students to check online to see which group study rooms are free, and they have yet to receive any complaints.
There are enough computers around the library to check the availability if there are questions, Wood said. Ideally, students will be able to self-monitor this, and not circumnavigate the time limit.
Many students agreed that the new reservation system will ultimately be beneficial for finding a guaranteed study space.
I dont think it will stop people from taking the rooms, but having to kick people out is not a big deal, said junior Mark Bernardo. This could be very helpful, especially if they eventually posted some kind of schedule to let everyone know which rooms are available, he said.
Wood agreed that students will have to rely on each other to be willing to share the group study rooms.
I suspect there will be some frustration as peak finals time approaches, she said. Still, the rooms are a community resource, and we depend on students to be good citizens for this to work.
