The mission of the Charles P. Stevenson Jr. Library is to be an active partner in the intellectual work of Bard's students, faculty, and staff; to develop collections and services that help all users become more resourceful, more independent and more original scholars; and to take a campus leadership role in thoughtfully applying emerging media to the task of turning information into knowledge.
The resources of the Stevenson Library and the "satellite" libraries in the Levy Economics Institute, Center for Curatorial Studies, and Bard Graduate Center for Studies in the Decorative Arts, Design, and Culture include 280,000 volumes and more than four thousand journals available in print or online. In addition, online databases central to all the disciplines in Bard's curriculum provide access to indexes and abstracts. Users may consult these and online newspapers, texts, encyclopedias, and dictionaries from the library's more than 50 computer stations, any public lab, most dormitory rooms, and off campus anywhere in the world. A writing and instruction lab funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation makes available both PC and Macintosh computers equipped with Microsoft Office Suite and other applications.
The Bard Graduate Center for Decorative Arts, Design, and Culture library, which houses over 40,000 volumes and subscribes to over 200 periodicals.