The Children's (CH) Library provides educational, recreational, and cultural resources for children ages 6 to 11. Its goal is to open a window to the world for Egyptian children; preparing our youngest generation to face the challenges imposed by the digital age. The objectives of the CH Library are to foster creativity and to develop children's reading, research, and critical thinking skills. To help meet these objectives, the CH Library offers many different programs and activities, and contains a collection of more than 15,000 volumes. This collection includes picture books, easy-to-read books, reference materials, and multimedia items. This collection is available in many languages, covering a wealth of different and intellectually stimulating subjects. A computer lab, monitored by the CH library's staff, offers a safe environment for children to explore the many exciting websites and to learn how to do research in a library.
The Young People's (YP) Library opens up a vast world of knowledge, entertainment, culture, and information for youth ages 12 to 16. The YP Library introduces young adults to modern information technology, develops their global awareness and knowledge, encourages social interaction in and out of the library, and develops their reading and research skills. YP librarians follow school curricula in order to insure the availability of the materials needed for students to complete their research assignments. The collection of books in the YP Library covers the same subject areas as the Main Library, but takes into consideration young adults' special needs and requirements. The YP Library offers access to digitized books, periodicals, multimedia and e-resources, with free access to the Student Resource Center database covering most subject areas.
The Taha Hussein (TH) Library for the blind offers a new concept in meeting the special needs of the visually impaired, enabling them to access all the resources of the library as well as selected web resources. The TH Library is equipped with special software, which will allow the blind and the visually impaired to access the Library's Online Public Access Catalog (OPAC) using Braille and sound software. Similar software will allow TH library users to access all of the electronic resources available through the main BA website. Scanners that use special software to transfer text into speech are also available that enable users to read any printed material.