Our values

We commit ourselves to professional, person-centered service, guided by these core values:

• Accessible resources, tools, and physical and digital spaces that make information and services available to all people, regardless of means and without restrictions, and overcome barriers to learning.
• Digital and physical collections that represent and preserve the breadth and depth of human thought and action* and evolve in response to changing information needs.
• Instruction and consultation that broaden understanding, teach critical thinking, and develop lifelong learners.
• Research and scholarship that transform and expand the world’s collected knowledge.
• Diverse perspectives, experiences, and thoughts that enrich learning and strengthen human connections.
• Respectful interactions and collaborations that encourage exploration, risk-taking, discovery, and growth.
• Sustainable practices that are environmentally, economically, and socially aware.
• Intellectual freedom principles that:
  • Protect "the right of library users to read, seek information, and speak freely as guaranteed by the First Amendment."
  • Preserve "the right of every individual to both seek and receive information from all points of view without restriction."

  • Ensure the right to privacy, which allows open, unmonitored inquiry and is "essential to the exercise of free speech, free thought, and free association."

References that inform our values:

• “Intellectual Freedom Principles for Academic Libraries: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights”, American Library Association
• “Support for Intellectual Freedom”, American Library Association
• “Intellectual Freedom and Censorship Q & A”, American Library Association 
• "Privacy", American Library Association 

Alignment with UVM values

The UVM Libraries's strategic priorities and strategic initiatives align with:

• University of Vermont's mission and vision
• UVM's strategic vision
• Academic success goals

Our commitment to inclusive excellence

As a member of the University of Vermont community, the UVM Libraries share in the university community values as expressed in Our Common Ground and Equal Opportunity in Educational Programs statements. We honor all community members through our multi-year commitment to our inclusive excellence plan. Through this plan, we are:

• Assessing and improving hiring and retention in the Libraries.
• Reimagining our public spaces to be more welcoming to all.
• Creating standards for digital accessibility in our collections.
• Expanding our collections to include more foreign-language titles.
• Increasing our efforts to incorporate inclusive and reparative descriptions about our resources.
• And more!

Our Inclusive Excellence Action Plan (PDF)  Updated 1/24

Support of open scholarship

"Open scholarship" or "open access" is books, datasets, code, journal articles, and other research products made universally accessible without charge. Open scholarship improves the pace and quality of research, democratizes knowledge, and honors the UN Declaration of Human Rights assertion that "everyone" has the right to “receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."

The University of Vermont, the UVM Libraries, and UVM's Faculty Senate support and promote open scholarship in several ways. Explore open-access resources and support.

To deepen our commitment of open scholarship, the University of Vermont, thorough its Libraries, recently launched The University of Vermont Press, which publishes rigorous, peer-reviewed scholarship without charge to readers or authors.

Advocates of information literacy

Crucial to UVM student success is developing their information literacy – the skills needed to find, evaluate, organize, use and communicate information. As providers of information and resources, the libraries also play a large role in teaching students how to evaluate and use that information. Information literacy at UVM is an intentional partnership between librarians, faculty and students. Learn more about information literacy.