For Stanley Wilder, the next chapter of his career can be compared to revisiting the familiar pages of a favorite book read years ago.
In May, Wilder was named the new dean of LSU Libraries, marking his return to the university where he worked for a decade. He officially took over the deanship of LSU’s libraries in July. He previously was university librarian at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte.
In announcing Wilder’s hiring, LSU President & Chancellor F. King Alexander lauded Wilder’s professional experience, adding that he “understands the role that research libraries play in our fast-paced world, and we look forward to the vision he brings to our libraries.”
Prior to arriving in Charlotte in 2009, Wilder served as an assistant and, later, associate dean at the University of Rochester for 10 years where, among other things, he helped win and then lead a series of large-scale software development grant projects. He served another 10-year period at the LSU Libraries, first as assistant to the dean for administrative services, and later as assistant dean for technical and financial services. Wilder began his professional career as the manager of the Architecture and Art Library, a branch study collection at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin, an MLS degree from Columbia University, and an MBA from the University of Illinois at Chicago.
An active researcher and speaker, Wilder served as a Visiting Program Officer for the Association of Research Libraries in 1994, and has been publishing his research on ARL demographic issues ever since. He has also published many papers relating to collections and library technologies, this in addition to his controversial critique of the literature of information literacy, published in the Chronicle of Higher Education in 2005.
“Going into my interview, I knew how impressive the libraries’ staff and collections were going to be. What impressed me most, though, was LSU’s university-wide consensus on the strategic importance of great research library services,” Wilder said. “The LSU Libraries is poised for a renaissance, and I am honored to have this opportunity to contribute.”
LSU’s Ask 5 with Stanley Wilder:
What led you to LSU?
LSU is a fantastic institution and the libraries are among the best in the world. I think you could justify being the dean of libraries here just on that score alone. As it happens, I also have a personal connection to Louisiana and LSU – I married a woman from Louisiana and an LSU alum. So, we have lots of family, friends and community here. That made the idea of moving back to this fantastic library all the more appealing.
Of what accomplishment at LSU are you most proud?
I think that every time I’ve left an institution, I’ve found the same thing – that the thing I’m most proud of is the people that I’ve recruited to the library or helped develop in their role in the library and making them more professional, stimulated, challenged and productive. So, while all of the accomplishments we may see on a resume are important, they really pale next to putting the people in place that make things happen.
How do you “love purple” and “live gold?”
I love that you can ask the question “What do these words mean to you,” because they are a little ambiguous. The way I look at this phrase is to focus on the verbs – the “love” and “live” parts. The “love” part has to do with everything that we love about this institution – the people we work with, the work we do, the live oaks. It could be anything. The “live” part, for me, has to do with what we do with the experience LSU has prepared us for. That could be any number of different things, but we leave here different and better as a result. That’s the gold.
What is your favorite place to be on campus?
This shouldn’t be any surprise – it’s in the library, particularly at about 10 p.m. When you’re there, you can actually see right before you the product of what we try to do in creating this learning environment for a large number of students. When you walk into the library, you see hundreds of students doing exactly the thing we intend for them to do. They’re happy and productive. It’s just beautiful. If you can’t just walk through a library at that point and feel energized, you need to find another profession.
If you could spend one day anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?
I have a cousin who has a cabin in the Sierra Nevada Mountains above Lake Tahoe. One of my favorite things to do is to go there. That area has magnificent hiking. It’s so open and beautiful and completely different from where I grew up and where I work. I just love that feeling of openness and adventure that I get from being high up in those mountains.
What are your objectives in the early days of being dean of libraries?
I’m spending a lot of time trying to reconnect with the network of supporters this libraries has had over the decades. There are all sorts of alumni and faculty and people in the broader community who absolutely love this library and wish to be a part of it in some kind of way. I’m doing a lot of work to identify and to reconnect with these people to find out what it is that they love about this library and how we can make them part of it again.
What are you currently reading, and what is it about?
I’m reading a new book titled “The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person’s Guide to Writing in the 21st Century” by Steven Pinker. I read most of what he writes. It’s a style manual for writing, but he looks at writing from a slightly different perspective. He’s a linguist and a research psychologist. I’m very interested in writing myself, and the idea of improving my completely informal process with science is important to me.
What is your favorite LSU memory?
My favorite memory comes from my first interview here in 1989. I had a very long and difficult interview that spanned two and a half days. During the course of the interview, I found that meetings would start off seriously and always end up with some kind of talk about food. I noted this at the end of the interview and someone told me, “Stanley, in Louisiana, all conversations end with food.” I think this was a beautiful thing to say. It really encapsulates what’s so special about life here at LSU. We do good work here and work very hard, but we live in an environment with a very unique culture – with its history, language and music – and that just makes for a fantastic quality of life.
If you could play on one LSU sports team, which would it be?
I actually have imagined a deans’ soccer team, where I’d be a center-midfielder. I absolutely love the sport of soccer and the idea of playing with a group like that. It makes me laugh to think about. I’m a little too old to be playing soccer, even though I’m still very physically active. But, I love the idea of a game with my colleagues.
What do you love most about LSU?
It is a public institution in the South with a rich history and role. The idea that there aren’t a dozen higher education institutions in this state of its caliber is really important. LSU is it for public higher education in a research context. That just makes what we do here so important. We’re working in a state with a rich culture and history. That’s part of why I love it as well, because we have so much to work with here.
Why should students choose LSU?
I think there’s all sorts of reasons to choose LSU. Coming to an instution of this caliber is obviously an appeal. Where else would you go for certain kinds of fields than LSU? The idea that the cost of going to college here is reasonable and affordable is part of the culture here in Louisiana. Then, there’s this whole student environment. Leaving aside the football, you’ve got an amazing sense of community on this campus. Who wouldn’t want to be part of that? There’s a place for everybody here. I think that’s just phenomenal. It’s special.