Noah Luken, from left, Enri Lala and Natalia Pascher are leaders of UCSB Associated Students who worked with university administration and library staff to restore partial late-night study hours at the library.
Noah Luken, from left, Enri Lala and Natalia Pascher are leaders of UCSB Associated Students who worked with university administration and library staff to restore partial late-night study hours at the library. Credit: Rebecca Caraway / Noozhawk photo

UC Santa Barbara students once again will be able to go to the library for some late-night study sessions after weeks of negotiations with students, administration and library staff. 

After 24/7 hours were reduced at the start of the school year, the Associated Students, UCSB’s student government, is contributing $20,000 to restore partial late-night library hours.

For the rest of fall term, the library will be open from 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. Sunday through Thursday. It will be available to the public from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

The hours could be expanded in spring and winter terms, depending on student activity during those times.

The 24/7 schedule was reduced at the start of the fall quarter amid university-wide budget cuts, leaving the library open from 8 a.m. to 1 a.m.

Enri Lala, a fourth-year double major in history and global studies who serves as the internal vice president of Associated Students, said they found out about the cuts through a notice on the library’s website.

“That’s not how channels of communication should be structured between student leadership and the administration,” Lala said. “The positive end is just how quickly both students and us, student leadership, mobilized, and this is a pretty promising first accomplishment.”

Lala said they’ve seen more engagement from students on the issue than anything else. Hundreds of students signed an open letter prepared by Associated Students that was sent to Vice Chancellor David Marshall, and more than 1,000 people signed an independent petition to restore library hours. 

Noah Luken, a third-year economics and philosophy major and off-campus senator for Associated Students, said they heard from a student living in a house on Del Playa Drive with 16 people who doesn’t even have a desk for studying. 

The UCSB Library previously was open 24 hours, every day of the year, but the university has decided to cut hours as part of a campuswide effort to reduce spending.
The UCSB Library previously was open 24 hours, every day of the year, but the university has decided to cut hours as part of a campuswide effort to reduce spending. Credit: Rebecca Caraway / Noozhawk photo

“They require the library to be able to do any work past the hours that other buildings on campus are closed,” Luken said. “It’s hearing things like that that makes you realize this directly is going to impact students’ lives, which is why we started to work on this right away.”

Student leaders said they hope it’s just the first step to fully restoring 24/7 library access, but in the meantime, they were able to secure student access to designated study spaces in Phelps Hall and the Humanities and Social Sciences building during hours the library is closed.

“It doesn’t replace the kind of community aspect that you get from the library,” Luken said. “It’s a positive thing that now students can stay on campus and be somewhere safe and study overnight when they need it, but again, we’re committed to returning to 24/7 library access.”

Natalia Pascher, a fourth-year political science major and off-campus senator for Associated Students, said she’s already hearing from students who aren’t happy with the compromise.

“We’re going to keep pushing and keep in communication with campus administration in the library to kind of get to our end goal,” Pascher said. “We thought that it would be a better intermediary to have this kind of middle ground versus nothing.”

Library hours were initially cut after vice chancellors and deans were asked to plan for significant and permanent budget reductions earlier this year because of ongoing shortfalls.

Former Chancellor Henry Yang announced in March that departments were asked to reduce operational costs 10% to 12.95% as the university would no longer be receiving $24 million in state funding. 

“It wasn’t a malicious attack on students,” Pascher said. “It is as a result of something, and we’re not the only college campus experiencing this.”

Students said they sympathized with the administration dealing with budget cuts, but they see the library as a service that students should have for paying to attend UCSB. 

“This belongs to students and is perceived by them as a public good and as a part of the package they get in attending UCSB that you can’t take away from them like some kind of corporate reallocation of funding. It’s meaningfully different,” Lala said. 

Associated Students, university leadership and library leaders plan to have regular meetings to explore funding options to store 24/7 access.

— Noozhawk staff writer Rebecca Caraway can be reached at rcaraway@noozhawk.com.