How does the institution assure convenient, timely, and user friendly access?
The San Antonio College library provides easily accessible resources and services for all students, faculty, and staff. Library users have access to the Library's webpage including the Discovery and databases at www.alamo.edu/sac/library . Access to full-text books, journal and magazine articles, and instructional materials in LibGuides, is available 24/7.
The library's print collection is divided into the reference and reserve collections on the 2nd floor, the circulating collection on the 3rd floor, and the special collections on the 4th floor. The reference area contains 16,300+ items, and these books are for in-house use only. Photocopiers are available if users need to copy portions of the book. Reserve items, also located on level 2, consist of textbooks and course materials brought to the library by faculty and departments. Generally these materials check out for 2 hours, and cannot be taken out of the reserve area. One thousand four hundred plus items are located on reserve. Books, government documents, CDs, and DVDs comprise our circulating collection and are located on the 3rd floor. The 3rd floor houses 139,000+ items. Students may check out up to 7 items at a time, and may renew these items up to two additional times for a total circulating period of 6 weeks. Alamo Colleges faculty and administrators may check out up to 15 items for 30 days, and staff may check out up to 10 items for two weeks. Items may be renewed online at https://https://saclib.on.worldcat.org/discovery/patroninfo . Special collections are on the 4th floor of MLC, and consist of 16,000+ items.
Electronic collections are available through the library's web page. Ebooks are available online through the Discovery and are accessible 24/7. SAC provides access to nearly 45,000 ebooks. Newspaper, magazine, and journal articles are available through our subscription databases, and provide full-text access to 59,000+ unique titles.
Students with questions about library services, or how to access our materials, can walk up to the reference desk during hours of operation and ask the faculty librarians where they will receive friendly, professional assistance. The librarians are available at the reference desk for each of the 66 hours the library is open weekly. From off campus, students may call the reference, and they will receive the same high quality assistance as if they were physically in the library. Students may also use the "Ask a Librarian" link from our webpage where they can ask questions and receive prompt replies from librarians. The library has a Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/saclib and a Twitter account https://twitter.com/saclibrary where library information is shared, as well.
Access to the Library's resources within the Moody Learning Center is made available by the 45 computers in the reference area, 5 computers in the reserve area, and additional computers on levels 3 & 4. Wifi within the MLC allows students to use their own laptops or smart phones to access our library resources.
Librarians promote information literacy and how to access resources by teaching library instruction sessions tailored to the subject, topic, and assignment identified by the classroom instructor. A chart showing the number of library instruction classes taught, and the number of student attending the library instruction sessions can be found at http://sacguide.libguides.com/content.php?pid=211529&sid=1760571 .
In the event that the Library does not own an item that a student, faculty, or staff member needs, we will find and borrow that item through our inter library loan service. Students may request items through the library's website at http://sacguide.libguides.com/ill . This is a free service.
The Library also participates in the TexShare program, allowing SAC students with a TexShare card (available upon request at the reserve desk), to borrow items from other participating libraries.