The UMBC Library turns out to be the largest I have ever encountered, having the most new books, journals, and inter-library loan than any I have encountered. There are collaborative work spaces with computer rooms, work rooms with chalk boards, two "Absolutely Quiet" floors, and everything within the library is in good condition. The only library I had encountered in my academic career was the Nassau Community library. Farmingdale was three floors with old books, little available as far as resources and just in broken down condition. Same thing at Drexel. The oddity was Nassau Community College as it's library was on par with UMBC and was only a community school, but Nassau is a highly affluent county. Where I used to live the mean household income was over $100k, but also with this came astronomical property taxes that were crushing the community, especially Westbury/East Meadow. We had huge plots and institutions not paying taxes such as the Community Hospital, the Community Jail, the Community Park, the Holly Rood Cemetery, the abandoned Roosevelt Race Track, the defunct Mitchel Field Air Force Base, among others. The suburban homeowners bore the major burden of property taxes.

I was also able to obtain a Guest Pass for the library computers and went in to take a peak. The amount of information was huge. Nothing like the other universities I had attended. Also important was hours of availability. The UMBC library was open Monday through Thursday from 8 am to 12 midnight, Friday's from 8 am to 5 pm, Saturdays from 8 am to 5 pm and Sundays from 12 noon to 12 midnight. that was a great deal of availability. Drexel was severely limited to 8 am to 10 pm. This was a headache for a night student. Drexel turned out to be a very expensive ride to nowhere: $50k and no degree. But Drexel was always good for an argument.

Another part than needs to be checked out is the laboratories and access to the laboratories. Most of the laboratories for majors were open 24/7 and were modern in their facilities. there were many compute labs spread out across the campus, but these had limited availability except for the main computer lab in the Engineering Science Building which was open 24/7. There was no excuse for getting work done. UMBC was/is a genuine Research Institution.