Completed in 1964, Cooke Library houses a variety of resources and learning spaces for Academy students, including the Cooke Learning Commons. It also contains the Punahou Archives, Lum Hawaiiana Room, Kirsch Gallery – an exhibit area for creative arts, the Roy and Estelle L. Kelley Educational Technology Center including the Technology Service Center and classrooms.
As faculty schoolwide build on the successes of flexible and unprogrammed spaces, Cooke Library has undergone a number of experiments in its internal spaces since 2015, adding areas like a video makery, an “unfinished theater” in Morita-Sony Center, a peer-to-peer learning center, a café, a restorative studio for activities like meditation and yoga, and an exhibit space.
The Academy Learning Commons will eventually structurally repurpose Cooke Library and reconnect grades 9 – 12 to the center of campus by creating innovative new spaces for study and collaboration. The architectural transformation of Cooke Library into the Academy Learning Commons is still in the planning stage.