ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 578 / C &RL News The future of referen ce service A panel discussion held at the University o f Texas at Austin, Spring 1988. A program on the future of reference work was held at the University of Texas at Austin General Libraries during the Spring of 1988. The promo­ tional material for the program posed the follow­ ing questions: W ill there be any reference librari­ ans in the future? Can a person’s information needs be met by a computer program? Is the reference desk essential to providing reference services? Should there be m ultiple reference desks and should reference users be screened through various levels of reference staff before they are referred to or given an appointment with the appropriate ref­ erence specialist? The program was sponsored by the Library’s Reference and Information Services Committee. The attendees included academic and special li­ brarians from the central Texas area, library school faculty and students, paraprofessionals, and gen­ eral faculty. The keynote address was given by Barbara Ford, the associate director of the Trinity University L i­ brary. Her talk was followed by responses from Goldia Hester, reference librarian, and Larayne Dallas, engineering reference librarian, both from the University of Texas at Austin. Their presenta­ tions were then followed by a lively discussion both among members of the audience and between the audience members and the panel. Their addresses and a summary of the audience comment by D en­ nis Dillon are presented here. Reference service: Past, present, and future By B a r b a r a J . F o rd A ssociate L ibrary D irector Trinity University History and background In 1876 Samuel Green, a public librarian, stated in A m erican L ibrary Jou rnal that “personal inter­ course and relations between librarians and read­ ers are useful in all libraries.”1 This was the first ex­ plicit proposal for a program of personal assistance 1 Samuel S. Green, “Personal Relations between Librarians and Readers,” A m erican L ibrary Jo u r­ nal 1 (November 30, 1876): 79. to readers. Initially, personal assistance was re­ garded as primarily useful to create a better im­ pression on the library’s users.2 Objections to per- 2The volume by Samuel Rothstein, T he D evel- opîĩient o f R eferen ce Services through A cad em ic Traditions, Public L ibrary Practice an d Special Li- brarianship (Chicago: ALA/Association of College & Research Libraries, 1955), ACRL Monographs, no. 14, was the basis for much of the information in this paper on the origin and development of refer­ ence services.