University of Saskatchewan Closing Its Law Library

The law library will be one of four campus libraries that the University of Saskatchewan will be shutting down as part of a multi-million dollar cost-cutting program:

"The university is still exploring how to best use the space left behind by the libraries that close, [acting library dean Ken] Ladd added. Collections and services will be consolidated into the Murray Library, the Leslie and Irene Dube Health Sciences Library and the Science Library, and their operating hours could be expanded."

"Some of the consolidated print collection will be moved into remote storage, elsewhere on campus or to an off-campus facility, something more universities are doing across Canada, Ladd said. Students are increasingly using electronic resources instead of print resources, but the university is not planning any large reductions in its print collection, he added."

Michael Plaxton, a law professor at the university, has attacked the decision:

" '[Law libraries] are places used not only by academics and students, but by members of the legal profession generally — and so, to an extent, are sites where law students are trained to think of themselves as part of a broader community of lawyers and jurists'."

"The university is currently looking at converting at least some of the libraries into additional study space, but Plaxton thinks that without a law library, the law school faces a branding problem."

" 'A law school without a law library looks amateurish and half-finished'."