In January 1988 the former New South Wales Institute of Technology (established 1964) became the University of Technology Sydney.
Anyway I had a fantastic and interesting time with the university librarian Mal Booth, with directors Sally and Belinda, with Information Services Manager Jemima, and with group leaders Helen, Ashley and Patrick from the teams working on research and learning/teaching support services.
First I got a tour of the library and as other university libraries in Australia, there are silent study zones on the top floor, quiet zones on the floor under and study spaces for group work and noisier studies on the lower floor(s). The library offers about 1600 study places and 400 fixed computers. These fixed computers are still very much in use, something I was surprised about. Also lots of print collections were removed in favour of study cells, sofas, group rooms etc. The library also has a games room.
One of the most interesting things is that the library employs so-called "roving students". These are students who walk around in the library and help students with their assignments. What a great idea and definitely one we can use in our libraries as well.
Afterwards I had a meeting with the university librarian and two directors. We mainly discussed their organisational structure, in particular since they are about to make some changes. I have a picture of the chart but it's not of good quality, so you better look it up here: http://www.lib.uts.edu.au/about-us/library-staff/organisational-chart
As I have already said, under the University Librarian there is a Director Education & Research Services Unit and a Director Library Resources Unit. In addition there is a Director Logistics and Planning.
IT, Collections Management (acquisitions, licensing and metadata), eResearch, Communications, Open Access/Institutional Repository services and UTS Press are part of the Library Resources Unit.
The library also has employed two data curators who are working with data archives (among others archives of indigenous issues). Also a copyright officer is employed at the library.
After lunch I gave my presentation about Norway, Norwegian academic libraries and the NTNU University Library. Again people liked it and I got many questions after my talk.
In the afternoon I met the Information Services Manager and her three team leaders, all in charge of research support services and learning/teaching support.
The library offers lots of classes and workshops, like for example:
- Starting your assignment
- Advanced database searching
- Find research data
- Find statistical data
- Referencing & avoiding plagiarism
- Introduction to Mendeley
- Research data Management 1: policies & planning tools
- Introduction to research metrics
- Where should I publish?
- Copyright for researchers
- Twitter for academics
The library also offers a range of online tutorials (http://www.lib.uts.edu.au/research/finding-and-managing-information).
If one cannot attend a workshop, one can book individual consultations (Book a Librarian).
The information services librarians work in close collaboration with academics to plan and deliver course-related information literacy programmes. They attend faculty meetings too.
The library has developed an online video-based course/tutorial called HeadsUp that consists of nine modules. I have just looked at and liked it very much. I think we could use many of the ideas there or develop similar videos for a new VIKO. Have a look yourself: http://www.lib.uts.edu.au/headsup
In addition, it is interesting that UTS Library has its own Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/UTSLibrary/videos
As soon as we have developed videos, we should also have our own Youtube channel.
And last not least, I got to know about the CRAP test. It is about evaluating information and CRAP stands for Currency, Reliability/Relevance, Accuracy, Purpose. Strange that I had never heard about it before. I think I will use it in my teaching in the future. There is also a great video about it.
More about learning support: http://www.lib.uts.edu.au/learning
Finally I loved that the university librarian writes a blog, the University Librarian Blog. if you want to have a look at it, you find it here: http://www.lib.uts.edu.au/blog/university-librarian
Thanks to colleagues from UTS Library for great discussions. I have learned so much again!
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