Your favorite place to study on campus

Submitted by MadMonkey on

I was speaking to my friend's daughter, who recently completed her freshman year at Michigan, about her favorite place to study on campus.  Her answer was the Taubman medical library, partly because of the close proximity to her dorm.  She turned the question back to me and I responded with my three favorites:

  1. The Clements Library
  2. The law library reading room
  3. Grad library reading room

Clements was a great place to study.  Very few people used the library and it seems like the place was designed by central casting to be the model of what a college library was supposed to look like.  Incredibly comfortable chairs and thick oriental rugs.  I haven't been there in years and wonder if it is still the great place I remember.

Please feed my curiosity and comment about your favorite places to study (stacks, classrooms, bars, etc. . .) while at Michigan.  Sincerity and scarcasm are both welcome and appreciated.

EDIT:  Sorry for the rookie/newb mistake, didn't search enough for previous thread on this topic.  I will pay penance by self-imposing sanctions (to be announced May 24).

CleverMichigan…

May 20th, 2010 at 5:57 PM ^

I didn't contribute anything to the previous thread on this, but I like hiding out in a sunny corner of the League if I don't need CAEN computers or printing. It's quiet, there's wifi and snacks, and the chairs are comfy.

Moe Greene

May 20th, 2010 at 6:21 PM ^

Basement of law library - esp if you can figure out how to get past the guards.

Is that pizza that I left in Taubman in 1991 still in the desk?

el segundo

May 20th, 2010 at 7:06 PM ^

According to the rules, the underground section of the law library is open only to law students, practicing lawyers, and law school alumni.  During the Fall and Winter Terms, a guard is posted at the entrance after 6 pm on weekdays and after noon on weekends.  He or she checks IDs and only admits those authorized by the rules.  When the guard is not posted, anyone can walk in.

Guards are almost never posted during the summer, and the law library has the best air conditioning on campus, mostly because it is underground.  The coolest spot is on Sub-3, in the reading area behind the Law Review offices.  With the way the library is designed, cold air from the entire library settles there.  On a hot afternoon with a lot of work to do, there's nothing better.

UMWest22

May 20th, 2010 at 6:31 PM ^

know that you were able to study in Clements...I've kind of always wanted to go in there, but I never see anyone going in!  Maybe I should make a visit when fall comes around this year.

As response to the question, I really like the 6th floor of the grad, with how quiet it is up there, assuming you can actually find a place to sit.  There's SO many reserved/locked places in there, and they're rarely actually used (I've found, anyway).  And, if you get bored, there's awesome views throughout.  On the south side, you can see Michigan Stadium, and on the other side, you can see the whole diag.  Some of my favorite views on campus.

learmanj

May 20th, 2010 at 6:39 PM ^

What is this study thing you speak of?  I thought college was a 4 year period (or 8 years if you go to OSU and MSU) in which you simply drank alcohol and played video games, along with occasionally going to that class thing.

hackattack13

May 20th, 2010 at 6:51 PM ^

Ford School of Public Policy if you can get in to it before it closes to the public.  Nothing like studying under a portrait of an All-American and President

el segundo

May 20th, 2010 at 7:08 PM ^

The big reading rooms on the second floor were the best place for studying when I was at Michigan.  I was last in them 3 years ago, but I subsequently heard that they were closed.  Is that true?

UNCWolverine

May 20th, 2010 at 7:11 PM ^

I have to agree on #2 and #3. When I didn't have to meet my dbag group on the moon (north campus) I loved to get lost in my books in the grad reading room. I'm not sure if it's still this way, but there was always a nice "white noise" atmosphere there, almost like A/C units on up in the ceiling. I saved the law reading room for the nights before the big exams, only hitting that maybe 6-8 nights/semester.

el segundo

May 21st, 2010 at 12:58 PM ^

When I was writing my dissertation, most of my sources were found in the basement stacks.  I spent a lot of time there getting books, and I was almost always the only person around. 

Here's an example of how unused that area is.  One of the books I used had been published in the 1920s.  I checked it out in 1989, and I am sure that I was the first person to open it, much less check it out.  Some books are printed in a way that every two pages are fused and have to be cut to be opened.  On this book, the pages had never been cut. 

BiaBiakabutuka21

May 20th, 2010 at 7:29 PM ^

I got a lot of reading done there.  Its nice to sip a good IPA while reading.

I was an acting major so I gotta say the Frieze (rip) and Walgreen too.

 

There was a HUGE pats fan named Tom who worked in the Clements.  That place was really cool.  Definitely recommend it.

Honestly though, I didn't study much.

GoBlueInNYC

May 20th, 2010 at 7:51 PM ^

Second floor of Rendez Vous on South U.  Cheap but good coffee and you were allowed to smoke.  I spent many, many hours in that dirty, smoky heaven.

Bocheezu

May 20th, 2010 at 8:46 PM ^

On my bed in my apartment.  Seriously; no innuendo there.  The "white noise" of AC units that was a benefit for an above poster was an absolute annoyance for me, and it seemed like every library had it.  I liked the bed because I could sit Indian-style and spread all my papers, books, and notebooks out in front of me and still be comfortable (ie, my butt didn't hurt from sitting on the floor ).  Only time it sucked was when neighbors got noisy, which really only happened when the guys upstairs played Super Bomberman.

johnvand

May 20th, 2010 at 9:03 PM ^

The private rooms in the media were my favorite "back in my day."

I used to hold up in there for many many all nighters studying various EECS things.

MMB 82

May 20th, 2010 at 9:12 PM ^

6th floor, large carrel on the northeast corner. Awesome views, room to spread out, no traffic. I was in there so much when I was an undergrad they should have made me pay rent.

Special, unrelated bonus place: The courtyard at Pat O'Brien's in the French Quarter in New Orleans. Beautiful outdoor area with lots of tables, very quiet in the daytime with the fountain providing white noise, then later in the afternoon you put down your books and start drinking Hurricanes.....!

JimBobTressel-0

May 20th, 2010 at 9:44 PM ^

The Dude used to be a great place to study...before they opened the video game room a couple years ago.

Playstation 3 and 2, Xbox and Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, GameCube, Super Nintendo, Original Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Dreamcast, EVERTYHING right down to Atari. Effing Duck Hunt, if you want.

And the games. Rows upon freaking rows of games....sigh

MGoRobo

May 20th, 2010 at 10:12 PM ^

The Big House...nuff said.  Nothing like studying the workings of Michigan football.  And I wish I could study there when it was empty and it was warm out.

Steve Lorenz

May 20th, 2010 at 10:53 PM ^

Disappointed that nobody mentioned the Foster econ library. I worked there for three years and it was never busy.....even when I wasn't working it's where I went to study and it's probably the place I got most of my school work done.

blueheron

May 20th, 2010 at 11:13 PM ^

I liked everything about that library except the librarians, who were noisy all two/three times I tried it.  I might have just been unlucky.  It could also be that their particular type of noise would be filtered by most people.  Drove me crazy, though...

Steve Lorenz

May 20th, 2010 at 11:16 PM ^

My experience as far as that goes depended totally on what time you were there. The later, the quieter....a lot of the people that worked mornings when I was there were not students of the university (or students at all for that matter) and would kinda screw off a lot.

Monocle Smile

May 21st, 2010 at 12:11 AM ^

I hate the Ugli with a savage, undying passion. Mostly because every time I actually go there to do work, at midnight all of a sudden all the LSA kids pack up and leave while all the CAEN computers in the basement remain occupied. I'm a little bitter.

YakAttack

May 21st, 2010 at 12:48 AM ^

Can I be jealous of the places mentioned? I go to WCC and the only places are...

  1. Right outside the Subway
  2. In the Library (surrounded by ppl updating their Facebook)
  3. At home, with a nagging-ass fiance and her two cats
  4. The John......ahhh yes....The John

Bosch

May 21st, 2010 at 7:19 AM ^

I did a lot of studying in the Meijer cafeterias (on Carpenter and Saline).  With the free coffee and soda refills, it was ideal.  Unfortunately, Meijer put the kibosh on that and shut down the cafeteria for the late night hours.

Bocheezu

May 21st, 2010 at 10:06 AM ^

Sort of aside to the whole studying thread, but what an amazingly bad supermarket overall.  So many times we'd go there for simple things and the place would be absolutely and completely wiped out.  I remember we went there on a Friday night because we needed burger meat for a football cookout the next day and literally the entire meat section was empty.  No chuck, no round, no sirloin, no "ground beef" -- nothing.  It looked like a Russian supermarket after the Ruble crashed.   

st barth

May 21st, 2010 at 9:18 AM ^

I think Rackham was the kind of building that I would have liked to study in but it was reserved for "grad students" so I didn't really bother with it.  Probably spent more time in the basement of the Ugli than anywhere else...but truthfully, I didn't really study all that much.

hailtothevictors08

May 21st, 2010 at 9:49 PM ^

however when exams roll around ....

the 4th floor ugli or 2nd if its full ..... theres always someone you know there that you can talk to when ur so tired of reading the same thing over and over again

weill hall ..... so nice

room in mason ... its open 24/7

Finally for a paper ...

the fishbowl (not kidding), its big, open, you can set ur laptop up two run to computers at once, and there is enough noise that you wont start falling asleep