NCLA Con 2025

What are future students' needs, and how do they view the library as part of their academic journey? Belk Library & Information Commons, the main library at Appalachian State University, turns twenty years old this year. Since the building opened in 2005, the student population at Appalachian State University has grown by 7,000 students, and technology advances continue to shift the higher education landscape. As such, the Dean of the University Libraries has decided to undergo a Master Planning process in order to ensure the building adapts to meet the current and future needs of the App State Community. In exploring the library of the future, we started the process by engaging the biggest users of our building: our students. The University Libraries first sought to gain insight from our students with the design of a new branch library on App State's Hickory campus. Students on our Library Student Advisory Board designed the layout of the space and selected the furniture. Hickory Library & Information Commons is therefore designed by students for students, and we want to apply a similar concept as we rethink Belk Library. This session will showcase the various ways we have worked to gather feedback on the building from our students, including a campus-wide survey, engagement with interior design classes, and multiple sessions with our Library Student Advisory Board. We will share our process for creating these engagements, highlight themes that we have learned across the feedback mechanism, discuss quick fixes we were able to address, and finally, talk about how the feedback informed how we engaged with the architects for the master plan.