Looking to the future and the many things we hope to accomplish, continuing gifts from our Friends will play a critical role. Planning for the next several years has identified three priorities listed below. For long-term stability we emphasize gifts to support the endowment, but every gift counts. The minimum amount to establish a named endowed fund at the Library is $25,000. Gifts of any amount to the general University Library Endowment support all these areas and more.
- Flexible, unrestricted funds have never been more important. To retain our position as a leading research library, we must have the resources to address these needs: Collections - assembling the materials needed by faculty and students so that they may create new knowledge through intellectual inquiry; Innovation - foster an atmosphere of exploration that supports librarians and faculty as they discover new ways to analyze and use information to support learning and research; Technology - for current and new initiatives so that we can continue to acquire and deliver valuable content to users; Library Environment - adapt the Library's physical spaces to best serve the needs of all users and address the constantly evolving learning environment.
- The Southern Folklife Collection, the greatest archive of recorded sound in the American South, requires support to acquire and process music collections and make them available to researchers. The very nature of the SFC materials makes them challenging and expensive to preserve and use. Endowment income enables the SFC to hire graduate assistants to help with all aspects of archival and reference work. With increased support, the SFC hopes to implement online streaming of sound recordings from its collections, which would greatly simplify and improve accessibility.
- Long known for its collections of antebellum plantation, Civil War, and Reconstruction South materials, the Southern Historical Collection continues to acquire 18th- and 19th-century manuscripts along with substantial collections of 20th-century materials. Funds to acquire, catalog and preserve these collections are vital. With your help, the Southern will hire archivists to collect and provide access to materials, and graduate students and undergraduates to process manuscript collections and ready them for use by researchers. All new initiatives, such as the North Carolina African American Family Documentation Initiative, are staffed and supported with endowment and gift funds.
If you would like more information about these opportunities, or to explore gifts to other areas of the Library, please contact:
Peggy Myers
Director of Library Development
919-843-5651
Peggy_Myers@unc.edu
