At Dal Libraries, we hold ourselves accountable to the university and the community we serve and measure our progress regularly. In January, we surveyed Dal students, faculty, and staff to assess our services and measure our impact. In March, we shared a brief note thanking you for your feedback and announcing the prize winners. 

5,125 people responded to our survey – we are delighted and grateful for such an enthusiastic response. After reading and analyzing the feedback, we are happy to share the following results with you.   

Areas Rated Highly Important Where We Are Doing Well 

• Wireless access
• Information resources are meeting needs and helping students and faculty to be successful
• Students feel comfortable asking staff for help
• Help is available when needed
• Staff provide accurate answers to questions

Priorities for Improvement 

• Improving access to quiet study areas
• Improving access to group study areas

Other Areas for Improvement 

• Electrical outlet accessibility and maintenance at specific locations
• Ease of use of printers at specific locations
• Hours at specific locations
• Laptop loaning for specific groups of students
• Students with disabilities & Faculty: Accessing library resources through mobile devices
• Faculty: The Libraries’ website and search box

Actions We are Taking 

• After careful review, the silent, quiet, and conversation-friendly study spaces at the Killam Library, the Kellogg Library Learning Commons at the CHEB, and the Law Library have been rezoned. We are monitoring these areas to ensure they meet users’ needs.
• We are conducting usability and accessibility studies in preparation for a reimagined Libraries website in 2025. We will seek input and feedback from both students and faculty.
• While our current budget does not enable us to extend our current building hours, we regularly consult our usage and foot traffic data to optimize our hours of operation.
• We will be reviewing our laptop loan program in the near future.

We will provide updates on these items as we make progress. 

We were bolstered by messages of support and enthusiasm for our libraries and our staff. One user said, “I am extremely happy with the library system. The staff are helpful, and a lot of thought and effort has clearly gone into setting things up to make it easy for students.”  

Again, we are grateful to all who took the time to respond to our survey and we look forward to making improvements and adjustments to serve you better. If you have questions about the survey and results, please contact Assessment Coordinator Linda Bedwell.

Michael Vandenburg
Dean of Libraries