University of Toronto Libraries

University of Toronto Libraries
Country	Canada
Type	Academic library
Established	1892
Location	Toronto, Ontario
Branches	33
Collection
Items collected	Books, journals, newspapers, sound recordings, databases, maps, drawings and manuscripts
Size	10 million bound volumes, 5 million microform volumes
Other information
Budget	C$72,500,000 (annual)
Staff	670 (FTE)
Website	library.utoronto.ca

The University of Toronto Libraries is the library system of the University of Toronto, comprising about 30 individual libraries that hold more than 10 million bound volumes and 5 million microform volumes. It is the fourth-largest academic library in North America following Harvard University Library, Yale University Library and the University of California, Berkeley Library System.^[1]

The most prominent library in the system is Robarts Library, which contains the university's main collection for humanities and social sciences, as well as the central library administrative offices. The adjacent Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library houses Canada's largest public repository of antiquarian books and manuscripts. The Gerstein Science Information Centre is the main library for health sciences.

Like the university itself, the libraries operate under a relatively decentralized system of governance. The central libraries, including Robarts, Fisher and Gerstein, account for the bulk of the collections with about 7.7 million bound volumes, and are headed by the chief librarian who reports to the university provost. The Library Council, composed of senior staff and library committee chairs, advises the chief librarian on library policy. With more than 1 million volumes, many specialty libraries are operated by the academic faculties, departments and research centres. As the University of Toronto is a collegiate university, its colleges also maintain their own libraries that together comprise 1.3 million bound volumes.

Following the example of other research universities, in 2007 the university opened an off-campus, high-density storage and preservation facility in Downsview, designed to store infrequently-accessed books that may be transported to campus as they are requested.

Since 2005, the university has been a major contributor to the Open Content Alliance, an initiative by the Internet Archive to create a permanent public archive of digitized texts.

Libraries

The following are the University of Toronto's centrally administrated libraries, and libraries of various faculties, departments, centres and colleges.

• Central libraries:
  • Robarts Library
    • Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library
    • Richard Charles Lee Canada-Hong-Kong Library
    • Petro Jacyk Central and Eastern European Resource Centre
  • Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library
    • University of Toronto Archives & Records Management
  • OISE Library
  • Gerstein Science Information Centre
  • Noranda Earth Sciences Library
  • Engineering and Computer Science Library
  • Mathematical Sciences Library
  • University of Toronto Scarborough Library
  • University of Toronto Mississauga Library

• Faculty, departmental and constituent college libraries (local libraries):
  • Architecture Landscape and Design Library
  • Astronomy and Astrophysics Library
  • Rotman Business Information Centre
  • A.D. Allen Chemistry Library
  • Criminology Information Service and Library
  • Harry R. Abbott Dentistry Library
  • Family and Community Medicine Library
  • Art Library
  • Newman Industrial Relations Library
  • Faculty of Information Inforum
  • Innis College Library
  • Bora Laskin Law Library
  • Robertson Davies Library, Massey College
  • Music Library
  • Ivey Library, New College
  • Physics Library
  • Laidlaw Library, University College

• Federated college libraries:
  • Knox College Library (Caven Library)
  • Regis College Library
  • St. Michael's College Library
  • Trinity College Library (John W. Graham Library)
  • E. J. Pratt Library, Victoria University