About Hostos Library: Home

Library resources and services during COVID-19 crisis

The physical spaces of Hostos Community College Library are closed — except for limited hours during Spring 2021 finals.
We also have services and resources online.
As our situation changes, we will post updates here.

In-person study hall May 10-20, 2021:

Hostos Library is providing a study hall space for two weeks during the Spring 2021 finals period, to provide a quiet study space for you to prepare for your exams. See full details here, and make a required seat reservation here.

Online resources available 24/7:

E-Books and online reference and research journal (peer-reviewed) articles through OneSearch, which searches multiple databases at once, and through individual library databases.
Live chat to answer questions during our active hours which we will update as necessary.
Online guides on a variety of topics, including Research 101, with information and advice.

Need additional one-on-one help with your research?

Email us at reflibrarian@hostos.cuny.edu. A librarian will return your email during working hours.
Schedule a 30-minute appointment with a librarian. We can use Zoom or have a phone meeting, depending on your needs and the librarian's availability. Find available times here: http://hostos.libcal.com/appointments

Need a laptop or WiFi hostpot?

(Last update 8/25.) The college's "Ready Checklist: Students" webpage has links related to all of students' technology questions and more! This includes links to request a laptop or WiFi hotspot.

Need a textbook or other required reading?

Our regular system of reserves (textbooks handled and photocopiers touched by many people throughout the day, people crowded into an enclosed space) is not safe to reopen. Because we know you need your required texts, we've reached out to your professors to ask them to help us enable them to upload readings into Blackboard. Ask your professor if they've already contacted us to arrange for the scanning of readings so that they can include them in Blackboard.

If you want to search for other options (other libraries, or less expensive textbook vendors), please see our textbook-hunting advice page.

Do you have a book borrowed from the library?

There will be no overdue fines for any item checked out since March 2020, and all loans have been automatically renewed. (Any fines that existed before March 2020 will be handled on a case by case basis — please contact circ@hostos.cuny.edu if this applies to you.)

However, if you would like to return your book, as of Nov. 23, 2020 you can do so (by appointment only) — click here for details.

Faculty! Please click here.

Last updated May 3, 2021.

Contact us

Circulation desk: (718) 518-4222

Reference desk: (718) 518-4215

Library liaisons for departmental faculty (click on name to send email)

About Us

Our mission

Our vision of the Hostos Library is that of a centralized empowerment zone focused on a student-centered, active learning environment. At the heart of our mission is our duty and role to provide students with critical skills in order for them to be successful in their academic and life pursuits, and all of our programming, collection development and instructional activities are founded on this belief.

As an academic department, the Hostos Community College Library functions as a dynamic center of teaching and learning. The Library provides information literacy tools that enhance the pursuit of knowledge by teaching our college community to retrieve, critically evaluate and synthesize information for academic, professional and personal pursuits.

In this thriving urban environment, we partner with each academic department to broaden and contextualize all areas of study, selecting and using the necessary instructional materials, related equipment and services that will assist the college in meeting its educational, cultural and social obligations.

All students should graduate from Hostos Community College with the ability to formulate a research question or problem, to determine its information requirements, to locate and retrieve the relevant information, to organize, analyze, evaluate, treat critically and synthesize the information and to communicate and present that information in a cohesive and logical fashion.

Moreover, every student should graduate from Hostos understanding the ethical, legal and socio-political issues surrounding information and knowledge and how it is produced. The students here attending college in the South Bronx must be afforded an equal opportunity to acquire these skills if they are to participate as equal members of society in the 21st century.

The library faculty supports an environment of free and critical thought to realize the goals of a bilingual, metropolitan and multicultural community college.

[statements excerpted from our mission statement and statement as a recipient of the Association for College and Research Libraries 2007 Excellence in Libraries award.]