The Information Resource Centre at Carey Grammar Baptist School has been highly commended in the inaugural Library Design Awards. The IRC is is the gateway to the new Centre for Learning & Innovation, completed in August 2016.
Director Richard Leonard loves that its design celebrates the role of the library as the heart of the student learning experience, providing innovative and differentiated spaces to suit various learning modes.
“We worked incredibly closely with the staff at Carey throughout the briefing process to ensure the design was tailored to the teaching and learning purposes, needs of staff and students. In particular, Carey’s senior librarian, Anne Whisken, was a driving force in setting the vision and ensuring the physical and digital spaces are a dynamic part of the school’s learning architecture,” he said.
“We’re also really pleased that our biggest critics – the school community – was delighted with the new Centre from day one, with students exclaiming that it’s ‘the coolest library ever!’.”
“There is no doubt that the high quality of the design underpins the school’s pedagogical ambitions. The desire to provide a variety of different study spaces has also been fully achieved as has the desire to combine print and eresources.”
– from the Jury Citation
Presented by the Australian Library and Information Association, the awards were announced this week at the Library Design Conference, held at Library at the Dock in Melbourne.