Library Vision & Mission

Statement of Vision

The library will be Oregon Tech's intellectual commons, the hub of knowledge and learning for the community, with a staff committed to excellence; dedicated to the open, free exchange of ideas; and continually striving to make it easy for our users to locate, navigate, and access high quality information resources.

Statement of Mission

The library provides student-centered services and collections to foster student and graduate success through the development of information literacy, critical thinking, and life-long learning.

To support the emerging research and informational needs of our communities, we are committed to excellence and dedicated to the open, free exchange of ideas. 

The Oregon Tech Library strives to support diversity, equity, inclusion, and well-being within the communities we represent and serve. Our commitment reflects the University’s guiding value to welcome  and empower individuals  of differing backgrounds, identities, and life experiences as stated in the 2021-2026 strategic plan.  https://www.oit.edu/about/strategic-plan  

We welcome all who want to come, study, use, collaborate, or research.  To that end, the Libraries seek to:  

• Promote and enhance the well-being of our entire community by maintaining inclusive, safe, and welcoming spaces; by providing resources, services and programs that promote, affirm, and reflect diversity, equity and inclusion.  

• Increase programs where diversity of thought and expression is valued such as open education initiatives.  

• Provide intentional access to information through services such as individual research consultations, inter-library loan, and digitization. 

• Build collections that celebrate unique voices and literary palates, with a deliberate focus on diversifying historical collections.

If you have suggestions on how we can do better, contact us at libtech@oit.edu. 

"Acknowledgment is a simple, powerful way of showing respect and a step toward correcting the stories and practices that erase Indigenous people’s history and culture and toward inviting and honoring the truth. Imagine this practice widely adopted: imagine cultural venues, classrooms, conference settings, places of worship, sports stadiums, and town halls, acknowledging traditional lands. Millions would be exposed—many for the first time—to the names of the traditional Indigenous inhabitants of the lands they are on, inspiring them to ongoing awareness and action." 

~ From the U.S. Department of Arts and Culture Honor Native Land: A Guide and Call to Acknowledgment 

Oregon Tech’s campuses in Klamath Falls, Wilsonville, Seattle, and Salem reside on the ancestral homelands and traditional territories of Indigenous peoples who have stewarded this land since time immemorial. It is important to acknowledge the ancestors of these places and to recognize that we are all here because of the sacrifices forced upon them. We respectfully acknowledge the many nations, tribes, and bands of the Klamath Basin region, along the Columbia River, within the Willamette Valley, the lands along the Puget Sound, and the continued sovereignty of the nine tribes of Oregon, the twenty-nine tribes of Washington, and Northern Californian tribes that have ties to this land.

In doing so, we hope to honor their legacy and lives, as well as continue to build the relationship with the Native peoples of these regions, the states of Oregon, California, and Washington, and across the United States

The Oregon Tech Library recognizes and thanks The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde as the ancestral inhabitants of all Oregon Tech locations. The library encourages you to use resources such as this one https://native-land.ca/ to identify the ancestral peoples of the land you inhabit, and to continue the conversation.