Chapter 9

INFORMATION RESOURCES AND SYSTEMS

The University holds the best and most accessible collection of English language works in Europe.

Each studio contains a core library of the most useful books on its subject. It is immediately accessible to the Members. Since the studio is open sixteen hours per day, withdrawal privileges can logically be restricted. Each studio also contains reproductive equipment. Microcards and microcard readers are standard equipment as well. Each campus has a film projection studio where films pertaining to a subject are kept and shown on request.

Each studio contains an in-depth index to its own core books and articles, together with a similar in-depth index of the core books and articles of all other studios. The estimated total of works retrievable by this system is six thousand in 1971.

GENERAL LIBRARY

In addition, some 20,000 books are maintained in open shelves at the General Library at the Place du Monde, the central location of the University in old Sion. Special libraries are maintained at the Center for Rapport Psychology and the Center for Languages and Linguistics.

INDEXING

Books and reports that are carried on microfilm or microcard are catalogued and indexed in depth, like other works, when they form part of the Studio core library system. They are catalogued in ordinary fashion when they are part of the central library.

THE PRESS

Closely related to the library system is a publications office and the New World Press. This agency services the reproduction system of the University and assures rapid production in single or multiple copies of many works, such as materials in heavy demand, articles, reports, student papers, faculty papers, speeches, documents, training materials, and transcripts of discussions. The Press publishes works that are related to the general mission of the University, including the magazine "Kalos" which is published for Members and the general public.

COMPUTER DATA STORAGE, RETRIEVAL, ANALYSIS

The University information system is tied into the Geneva computer complex. Batches of data can be deposited in the central data bank on tape. Program tapes can also be stored there. A telephone and teletypewriter hook-up permits the Members of the University to be on-line with the computers to receive data or analyses of data, and to amend and insert data. A special proctor for computer facilities, who is a faculty member of the Logic and Mathematics Studio is in charge of University operations of this type.

MUSEUMS

Valaire, which caps the hill on which the Valaire center of the University in Sion is situated, is itself a living museum. It contains a magnificent organ, the oldest in the world, and a cathedral and campus that invite prayer, contemplation, and meditation.

Attached to Valaire is a museum of archaeology, sculpture, and furnishings that contains Roman and medieval objects of extraordinary quality.

The Majorie Museum of Modern Art adjoins the square around which stand several University buildings. Special exhibition rooms and conference rooms are available there as well.

NEARBY COLLECTIONS

The large libraries of Lausanne and Geneva are near at hand. The international collections of Geneva are especially valuable. Bern, Basle, and Zurich should also be mentioned, as well as the impressive collections and facilities of Milan, Torino, and even Venice and Florence. They are only a matter of hours away by frequent and comfortable trains, equivalent to journeying from Princeton to Washington or New Haven to Boston.