UCLA Library to receive $5 million

This July, the UCLA library system will receive a check for $1 million, the first installment of a $5 million donation, library officials said.

The donation is the largest gift ever for collections to the library.

The gift comes from the Arcadia Fund, a U.K.-based grant-making group whose mission is to work toward “the preservation of cultural knowledge,” according to the organization’s Web site.

The fund has made three previous grants to the library, including $500,000 last year to the UCLA Library’s Center for Primary Research and Training, which has helped graduate students hone archival skills and organize previously unprocessed collections and journals, said Amy Smith, the executive director of library development.

Smith said the donation was unexpected and unasked for. The key to getting this grant, she said, was the UCLA Library’s relationship with the organization. She said that the Arcadia Fund was particularly impressed with the stewardship the UCLA Library displayed in using past funds, especially the efforts made to thank the donor, communicate their intentions on how they were using the funds and show accountability.

“It’s a university librarian’s dream donation,” Smith said. “It’s going to allow (Gary Strong, the university librarian) to be innovative in the delivery of services, to distribute information to students and faculty, be cutting-edge and experiment with new ways of providing new services. It’s going to open new vistas for how the library serves the university.”

“Words cannot express the depth of our thanks for this extraordinary gift,” said Strong.

He further expressed his gratitude for the Arcadia Fund’s “visionary, exemplary generosity,” which he claims will help create “virtually unlimited possibilities for transformational changes in our collections and the services that support them.”

The UCLA Library relied on state funding for 87 percent of its operation during the 2007-2008 school year. With projected budget cuts to the UC system, Smith said that the library system would be among the hardest hit. However, one of the criteria set by the fund was that the money could not be used to cover other shortfalls in the budget, such as operating costs. The donation can only be utilized for priorities such as purchasing and maintaining records and collections, Smith said.

The funding will be distributed among the various libraries on campus on a project-by-project basis, said Strong. The process of deciding how the funds will be used is still in the planning stages. He said the final decision will be made after consultations with his associate librarians.

However, the funds will primarily be used at Strong’s discretion for projects such as investing in the library’s collections, purchasing and acquiring materials, surveying and digitizing at-risk items and preserving cultural knowledge and materials, “work that is truly transformative for this day and age,” Strong said.

The UCLA Library received about $4 million in overall donations last year, Smith said. Past donations have ranged from $5 from senior class members to several thousands in endowments.

In any given year, about 8,000 to 10,000 people make a donation to the UCLA Library, with gifts ranging from money to collections, Strong said.

He added that the previous largest grant made to the library for collections was $750,000 from the New York City-based Andrew W. Mellon Fund, which is currently being used to promote the conservation and preservation of library material and support grad students and the performing arts.

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