Abstract
Alfred North Whitehead, mathematician and philosopher, believed universities should marshal all their resources toward the goal of creating a better world. Can campus libraries heed Whitehead’s call by co-creating the future in concert with their campus communities? In the digital age, academic libraries at two-year, four-year, and graduate-level institutions are evolving from the notion of book warehouses, breaking through their “edifice complex.” Librarians are turning outward toward their communities to reimagine their roles from a collection-centered to an engagement-focused model of service—“from publication as product to publication as process.” Scholars are also shifting their research practices and teaching methods as network-level services emerge to facilitate their work. They now ask a broader range of questions using a wider range of data and methods, as they disseminate results in multiple forms. “Researchers are drowning in a deluge of raw data and published information and face a bewildering array of options for disseminating and sharing their work.” What they often overlook, however, is the potential role academic librarians can play by partnering with them so they can more efficiently and effectively use new modes of research and publication, navigate copyright limitations, increase the impact of their publications, improve teaching and learning, manage their scholarly identity, and preserve their content into the future.