College Libraries: In Crisis

By Usman Malik

Colleges and universities in Ontario get less funding per student than anywhere else in Canada. Academic libraries are experiencing the cascading effects of slashed budgets through staff layoffs, collection cuts, library closures, outsourcing, and service reductions. The underfunding crisis is acutely felt in the Ontario College System, which consists of 24 publicly funded Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology (CAAT). News articles from Summer 2025 reported that the Ontario College System has experienced nearly 10,000 job losses and approximately 600 program closures, numbers that are likely higher at the time of writing.

Auditing the Losses
Chronic underfunding has lacerated College Libraries across the board. For instance, some of St. Lawrence College’s campuses no longer have circulation services provided by staff members. Rather, books are made available via vending machines. Humber students have expressed disappointment with the closure of the Library at the Lakeshore campus. Conestoga’s devastating layoffs before the holiday break last year included 2 Librarians. Indeed, only 10 of the 24 colleges were revealed to have designated Faculty Librarians during the 2024 college faculty bargaining cycle. The list goes on, but these examples confirm a larger trend of downsized staffing levels across the sector to the detriment of students, staff, and faculty.

The Impact
Libraries are the hub and heart of our campuses, teaching critical information literacy, providing material access, communicating academic integrity, and creating community.

The most enduring image of a Library is material access. For academic libraries, this includes books, textbooks, databases, and recreational items. And yet college libraries are cutting back on collections that are often the source for course readings. Such drastic cuts significantly decrease students’ ability to freely access materials necessary for academic success.

Librarian-led information literacy teaches students the research skills and academic conduct principles necessary to move through coursework and enable lifelong critical thinking. The careers for which colleges provide on-the-ground training and education require successful information retrieval and evaluation. Nurses must be able to locate health science literature for evidence-based clinical practice, while media professionals ensure the accuracy and credibility of information sources. Given the current proliferation of AI-generated content, misinformation, and academic integrity concerns, critical information skills are needed now more than ever for informed citizenship.

When entire libraries close down, it’s not just the loss of a study space. Academic libraries are social spaces where users create communities, play games, find friends and exist without the expectation of transaction. Libraries remain one of the last vestiges of the “third” place, which refers to accessible social hubs outside of home and work. In short, college students are losing access to inclusive, social environments.

The cumulative effect of underfunded libraries can negatively impact student success, learning, belonging, retention and recruitment. Given that institutions and the Ontario Government share a vested interest in enrollment and a skilled workforce, adequately funded libraries should be a priority.

Panacea on the Horizon?
On February 13th, the Ministry of Colleges, Universities, Research Excellence and Security (MCURES) announced $6.4 billion in investment to support the starved post-secondary education system as part of a new funding model. However, this funding arrives too late, with many library-related cuts having already transpired. Many hope library cutbacks will be reversed, but whether this happens remains uncertain. Even with this funding announcement, Ontario is still spending substantially less on post-secondary education than other provinces.

Yet, the question still remains: how will this money be allocated to libraries? So far, there is little evidence to suggest that this funding will reverse the trend of layoffs, cutbacks, and closures experienced by college libraries. Far from being powerless, however, college library workers, administrators, advocacy groups and professional organizations all have a role to play in fighting for college libraries.

For instance, colleges are required to demonstrate adequate levels of Library support for new program accreditations. Where underfunded libraries compromise accreditation, college leadership must prioritize accordingly. Libraries provide a multitude of benefits for student belonging and retention, which are key in maintaining the short and long-term financial health and academic reputation of a college.

Collective bargaining is another avenue for protecting and strengthening college libraries, where language can support the indexing of staff to enrollment. Indeed, such a demand was unsuccessfully proposed in 2024 by the College Faculty Bargaining Team. Specifically, the demand that every college should employ at least 2 full-time librarians per 4,000 students would significantly stabilize the precarious model of Librarian staffing at college libraries while enabling a greater degree of Librarian support and availability for students.

Ontario’s college system trains frontline, essential workers for a strong economy and healthy communities. Building a future-ready Ontario necessitates an investment in the college system and the student experience. In providing essential academic, material and social support, properly funded and staffed libraries have a major role to play in that vision.

References

Alhmidi, M. (2025, July 9). Cuts at Ontario colleges leading to nearly 10,000 job losses, union says. CBC News. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-college-layoffs-1.7581037

Benoit, M. (2025, September 11). St. Lawrence College support staff join picket lines as strike hits 24 Ontario colleges. Cornwall Standard-Freeholder. https://www.standard-freeholder.com/news/st-lawrence-college-support-staff-strike-kingston-cornwall-brockville

Chaudhary, K. (2025, September 9). Ontario’s Post-Secondary Education Crisis in Five Figures. The Local. https://thelocal.to/ontario-post-secondary-education-funding-crisis/

Fatmawati, E., Udasmoro, W., & Noviani, R. (2018). Functional shift of library: The third space; production. Digital Press Social Sciences and Humanities, 1, 00003. https://doi.org/10.29037/digitalpress.41237

Government of Ontario. (2026, February 12). Ontario Investing $6.4 Billion to Support Postsecondary Sector’s Long-Term Success and Sustainability. Ontario Newsroom. https://news.ontario.ca/en/release/1007034/ontario-investing-64-billion-to-support-postsecondary-sectors-long-term-success-and-sustainability

Kaur, H. (2025, October 6). EDITORIAL: Lakeshore library reduced to a vending machine. Humber Et Cetera. https://www.humberetc.ca/opinions/editorials/editorial-lakeshore-library-reduced-to-a-vending-machine-8941

Tranjan, R., & Romard, R. (2026, February 12). Ontario government shows up late and brings little to post-secondary education crisis. Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. https://www.policyalternatives.ca/news-research/ontario-government-shows-up-late-and-brings-little-to-post-secondary-education-crisis/

Ontario Public Service Employees Union. (2024, October 28). Union Offer of Settlement (Document U-21). https://opseu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/U21-Comprehensive-Offer-of-Settlement.pdf

Ontario Public Service Employees Union. (2024, October 7). Union Response and Revised Proposals re: U5 and M3 (Document U-20). https://opseu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/U-20-Article-2-27-28-Response.pdf

Postsecondary Education Quality Assessment Board. (2026). Manuals & Guidelines. PEQAB. https://peqab.ca/en/manuals-guidelines/

Williams, R. (2025, December 18). Conestoga lays off 181 employees; Tibbits says ‘we no longer require’ same staffing levels. The Record. https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-region/conestoga-lays-off-181-employees-tibbits-says-we-no-longer-require-same-staffing-levels/article_1b144daf-fdb3-5ed4-be45-2721c3b8bd06.html

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Usman Malik is a Liaison Librarian at Humber and University of Guelph-Humber Library. He is currently serving as the Vice President of the Ontario College and University Library Association.