Day One
Day Two
Day Three
Day Four
Day Five
Sunday 31 January 2010
Library Day in the Life: DAY THREE
Ah Wednesdays, historically the most fun of all (week)days. If something fun happens on a regular basis, in my life anyway, it's usually a Wednesday.
In the case of this job it's the graduate trainee sessions which are (most) Wednesday afternoons during term-time and far more fun to talk about than my other Wednesday activities (hour on the desk/emails/post/bit of processing).
Ordinarily we have our training sessions out in Osney, which is nice for me as it's about a five minute walk from my house. This week though, we had a field trip. Exciting!
After a somewhat (okay complete) failure to meet and make the journey with other people in the area, Alice and I set off alone with only the vaguest of ideas of where we were going (took me three attempts to find the right bus stop). Ofcourse in the end, the bus stopped right outside the campus and even I couldn't get lost crossing the road (though Alice will attest that I did try!) Ultimately the hardest part was finding Jess (EFL trainee) who we were supposed to be meeting for lunch.
Brookes campus was....different. Obviously from Oxford, but Jess was quite happy because Brookes was a 'real' university (Campus based, newish, the kind us ex-poly girls are used to). I was less enthused - I found it a bit...depressing, like a cross between a school and a shopping centre (but depressing ones). However as I am considering going to UEA, my opinion probably can't be trusted (definite candidate for the ugliest university ever built.)
The library however, definitely made me feel more at home. Despite working in one of the largest libraries in the Oxford system, it was nice to be back in an actually *big*library (and by *big* what I really mean is 'not subject specific'). Though I paid particular attention to the social science area whilst on the tour, it was great to see books on photography, biology, catering etc.
As well as the tour we had a couple of talks, one about their special collections and one about the work of a subject consultant. The latter was especially interesting for me, because as far as academic libraries go, that's the job I would most like to do. Last term Alice and I collared the RSC subject librarian to ask about her job, what it involves and how she got there etc, and whilst that was great, she said she had quite an unusal way for ending up here, and not one that could be easily replicated. It was good to have these differences outlined, though it turns out they're alot more similar than I'd thought.
The special collections/archiving talk was also interesting but from less of a career view for me. Though everyone keeps saying how wonderful archiving is, how hard an area it is to get into because everyone wants to do it, etc etc, I can't say the thought of being stuck in a darkened room cataloguing day-in-day-out appeals to me that much. Obviously there is more too it, and showing readers the collections seems like a great thing to do - but, to me, the downsides definitely outweigh the good.
Brookes library houses a number of different collections: the national brewing library, the man booker collection for example but the ones I most enjoyed hearing about were the personal ones (mainly catering/food+drink related ones) because I liked the nitty gritty of having to fit to the original donator's preferences (such as the refusal for duplicated books to be disposed of.)
It also got me in the mood for next week's training session, which is special collections in the Bod: I'm really hoping they'll mention the Wilfred Owen archive (even if that is Jess's area) and Alan Bennett's recent donation. *NB: As I am typing this up a week after it was written, I am free to say they mentioned neither. Which is rubbish in one way, but also gives me an excuse to go visit Jess for an afternoon so it's not all lose!
The session ended with a q&a session, during which a question about short (4hr) loans came up - from a trainee who was under the impression that this was something Oxford didn't do which gave me and Alice a chance to show off our 'trailblazing' [;)] library's core course collection (2hr loans which can be booked in advance).
Then it was bus home (during which we had an interesting conversations about guy-brarians and one of the Oxford Alumni trainee's mentioned how weird it was to have so many subjects in one library - which had the rest of us amused) and cheap cocktails for one of the trainee's birthdays.
In the case of this job it's the graduate trainee sessions which are (most) Wednesday afternoons during term-time and far more fun to talk about than my other Wednesday activities (hour on the desk/emails/post/bit of processing).
Ordinarily we have our training sessions out in Osney, which is nice for me as it's about a five minute walk from my house. This week though, we had a field trip. Exciting!
After a somewhat (okay complete) failure to meet and make the journey with other people in the area, Alice and I set off alone with only the vaguest of ideas of where we were going (took me three attempts to find the right bus stop). Ofcourse in the end, the bus stopped right outside the campus and even I couldn't get lost crossing the road (though Alice will attest that I did try!) Ultimately the hardest part was finding Jess (EFL trainee) who we were supposed to be meeting for lunch.
Brookes campus was....different. Obviously from Oxford, but Jess was quite happy because Brookes was a 'real' university (Campus based, newish, the kind us ex-poly girls are used to). I was less enthused - I found it a bit...depressing, like a cross between a school and a shopping centre (but depressing ones). However as I am considering going to UEA, my opinion probably can't be trusted (definite candidate for the ugliest university ever built.)
The library however, definitely made me feel more at home. Despite working in one of the largest libraries in the Oxford system, it was nice to be back in an actually *big*library (and by *big* what I really mean is 'not subject specific'). Though I paid particular attention to the social science area whilst on the tour, it was great to see books on photography, biology, catering etc.
As well as the tour we had a couple of talks, one about their special collections and one about the work of a subject consultant. The latter was especially interesting for me, because as far as academic libraries go, that's the job I would most like to do. Last term Alice and I collared the RSC subject librarian to ask about her job, what it involves and how she got there etc, and whilst that was great, she said she had quite an unusal way for ending up here, and not one that could be easily replicated. It was good to have these differences outlined, though it turns out they're alot more similar than I'd thought.
The special collections/archiving talk was also interesting but from less of a career view for me. Though everyone keeps saying how wonderful archiving is, how hard an area it is to get into because everyone wants to do it, etc etc, I can't say the thought of being stuck in a darkened room cataloguing day-in-day-out appeals to me that much. Obviously there is more too it, and showing readers the collections seems like a great thing to do - but, to me, the downsides definitely outweigh the good.
Brookes library houses a number of different collections: the national brewing library, the man booker collection for example but the ones I most enjoyed hearing about were the personal ones (mainly catering/food+drink related ones) because I liked the nitty gritty of having to fit to the original donator's preferences (such as the refusal for duplicated books to be disposed of.)
It also got me in the mood for next week's training session, which is special collections in the Bod: I'm really hoping they'll mention the Wilfred Owen archive (even if that is Jess's area) and Alan Bennett's recent donation. *NB: As I am typing this up a week after it was written, I am free to say they mentioned neither. Which is rubbish in one way, but also gives me an excuse to go visit Jess for an afternoon so it's not all lose!
The session ended with a q&a session, during which a question about short (4hr) loans came up - from a trainee who was under the impression that this was something Oxford didn't do which gave me and Alice a chance to show off our 'trailblazing' [;)] library's core course collection (2hr loans which can be booked in advance).
Then it was bus home (during which we had an interesting conversations about guy-brarians and one of the Oxford Alumni trainee's mentioned how weird it was to have so many subjects in one library - which had the rest of us amused) and cheap cocktails for one of the trainee's birthdays.
Wednesday 27 January 2010
Library Day in the Life: DAY ONE
As if I haven't updated enough for one day already, I wanted to (library) Day in the Life this week. Since today is the first time I've been able to stop long enough to make my blog, I've been handwriting my entries and am a bit behind but oh well - better late I suppose.
During term time, Mondays tend to be my late shift, so I get to start at the lovely and sociable 9.45 instead of 9.00. For my first hour I am on the desk.
Alice (other SSL trainee) and I are usually on the issue desk around two /two and a half hours a day, though that is obviously dependant on whether its term time or not. 'Health and Safety' states we should not be on for more than an hour at a time, though sometimes it's hard to get away if there is a long queue of readers.
Luckily for me, early on a Monday is not too busy a time so I spend most of my shift ordering the shelving trolleys.
Someone requested a room booking while I was on the desk, so that's the first thing I do when I get back to my desk.
The SSL has 3 rooms available for booking: 2 discussion rooms and the IT Training Room. They can be booked by anyone belonging to a social science department, from Undergraduate to Academics and they're incredibly popular.
After that it's processing, trying to keep on top of the Dawsons shelf.
Then it's lunch, which today is split so we* can attend a '24hr building access' induction. Though we are never in the building past half six, we have 24hr swipe access to the building to cover our early shifts which start at 8:45: technically out of hours, if only just (and I've never had to swipe in yet!)
The talk is pretty standard Health and Safety (fire, first aid, security and personal safety) - pretty much common sense. Luckily our building manager (George) has a number of more interesting anecdotes to spice it up: some funny, such as the image of a woman in her pyjamas chasing two burly blokes up St Cross Rd, and some sobering, such as muggers on the Marston footpath threatening people with guns and putting one student in hospital.
Back from lunch, I make time to steal a crafty (but delicious) blondie, courtesy of Alice's excellent baking skills before heading back to the desk. This time only for half an hour, which is a good thing as I barely stop during that time. 12.30-2.30 is usually our busiest time, and there is usually an extra person on the desk to cover, but there is always some crossover into the 2.30-3.00 slot.
Off the desk and next on the agenda is book repairs.
Since vacation loans finished last Tuesday our repair workload has gone insane, so expect this to be a running theme of the week. This is one of the jobs Alice and I take full responsibility for and, as it's fairly time consuming, we normally prioritise processing over it.
On this occasion I am called away by our Head Librarian, who makes a desperate plea to the whole office for shelving. Again, this is always a problem in the aftermath of vacation loans but we've been down at least one shelver since Friday so this is a particularly critical situation.
Finally my day ends where it started: on the desk.
*This is not the royal 'we': Alice and I tend to work together on most things and by extension take breaks etc together.
During term time, Mondays tend to be my late shift, so I get to start at the lovely and sociable 9.45 instead of 9.00. For my first hour I am on the desk.
Alice (other SSL trainee) and I are usually on the issue desk around two /two and a half hours a day, though that is obviously dependant on whether its term time or not. 'Health and Safety' states we should not be on for more than an hour at a time, though sometimes it's hard to get away if there is a long queue of readers.
Luckily for me, early on a Monday is not too busy a time so I spend most of my shift ordering the shelving trolleys.
Someone requested a room booking while I was on the desk, so that's the first thing I do when I get back to my desk.
The SSL has 3 rooms available for booking: 2 discussion rooms and the IT Training Room. They can be booked by anyone belonging to a social science department, from Undergraduate to Academics and they're incredibly popular.
After that it's processing, trying to keep on top of the Dawsons shelf.
Then it's lunch, which today is split so we* can attend a '24hr building access' induction. Though we are never in the building past half six, we have 24hr swipe access to the building to cover our early shifts which start at 8:45: technically out of hours, if only just (and I've never had to swipe in yet!)
The talk is pretty standard Health and Safety (fire, first aid, security and personal safety) - pretty much common sense. Luckily our building manager (George) has a number of more interesting anecdotes to spice it up: some funny, such as the image of a woman in her pyjamas chasing two burly blokes up St Cross Rd, and some sobering, such as muggers on the Marston footpath threatening people with guns and putting one student in hospital.
Back from lunch, I make time to steal a crafty (but delicious) blondie, courtesy of Alice's excellent baking skills before heading back to the desk. This time only for half an hour, which is a good thing as I barely stop during that time. 12.30-2.30 is usually our busiest time, and there is usually an extra person on the desk to cover, but there is always some crossover into the 2.30-3.00 slot.
Off the desk and next on the agenda is book repairs.
Since vacation loans finished last Tuesday our repair workload has gone insane, so expect this to be a running theme of the week. This is one of the jobs Alice and I take full responsibility for and, as it's fairly time consuming, we normally prioritise processing over it.
On this occasion I am called away by our Head Librarian, who makes a desperate plea to the whole office for shelving. Again, this is always a problem in the aftermath of vacation loans but we've been down at least one shelver since Friday so this is a particularly critical situation.
Finally my day ends where it started: on the desk.
*This is not the royal 'we': Alice and I tend to work together on most things and by extension take breaks etc together.
Library Day in the Life: DAY TWO
Most days, the first job of the day is 'communications'. Post, which is pretty self-explanatory, then email which is dealt with (week days) exclusively by the SSL trainee's. Though it appears quite tedious (and sometimes is) its quite a helpful thing to do. As the frontline for a whole barrage of questions about renewing loans (a:you can't by email) promotional bits (forwarded to our subject consultant) and room bookings (see yesterday) it's a quick and intense way to familiarising a range of library policies.
Occasionally we get some more interesting questions: before Christmas we had an architecture student from Bath University ask about the design of the Manor Road building, about which we knew very little (other than it is pretty awful!) A quick google search returned little in the way of helpful information - we did find a picture of the foyer of the building, labelled 'Manor Road is one of Norman Foster's less impressive buildings.' which gave us (and the other members of staff intrigued by our giggling) a laugh but that was about it. In the end it was a case of offering the little we knew (date of opening etc) and asking for specific questions we could forward onto someone more in the know (though we weren't 100% sure who that would be!)
Another morning job that is almost daily, is posting the printed final reminder notices - pretty simple - and the invoices for readers who have ignored even those.
This is equally simple, but is probably one of the most tedious jobs we have. There are three steps to the invoice - first is to check the books haven't been returned by checking the readers record but also by checking the shelves - the longest and most tedious part. Then we have to find prices for the books, and write them on the invoice, and finally add a block to the reader's record to say the reader has been invoiced. It can be a incredibly long process for someone with 10 or more books, and during vacation we had some insane ones: a reader earned over £900 worth of fines from 20 books and we have another at £500 for only 5 or so.
Blissfully, there was only one today, which meant I had time to unwrap my repaired books for Monday, before our project meeting.
Anyone who knows about the OULS trainee scheme will be aware that we are encouraged to complete a project during our year, something which will enhance the library experience available. For our project, Alice and I have agreed to reclassify the SSL thesis section because it is, currently, a bit of mess because the collection has outgrown the original shelfmark system (the SSL absorbs other departmental libraries almost yearly, and each one brings its own collection - not to mention that more are written every year!)
In the meeting was, obviously me and Alice, then the SSL Librarian in Charge, Reader Services Librarian, Senior Cataloguer and Senior Technical Services Assistant. So it was quite a busy meeting, but also really interesting. Whilst I'd been aware how much work would go into something like this, a 'pep' talk from our LiC opened my eyes to a)how much *variation* of work would be needed and b)just how much responsibility would be on our shoulders.
It was also suggested that we might like to look into the policy aspect of the thesis collection as well - such as why certain thesis' are deposited with us when others aren't and how the Bod handles its thesis collection. This appealed to me because I do love a bit of research, and I think it will make a nice (and different) counterpoint to the more repetitive processing that we will be a substantial part of the project.
So all round, despite having little in the way of concrete decisions made, it was an informative and successful hour or so. Then, there a quick half an hour processing and another on the desk and it was time for lunch.
Our afternoon was to be spent in OUCS for training, which made lunch a quickie before walking round to Banbury Road (detouring on the way to pick up some macaroons from Maison Blanc on the way, because I've been craving them for too long.)
In previous years trainees have been given a free ECDL course but that hasn't happened this year (which is good for me as I already have a basic ECDL qualification and found most of it pretty boring the first time round!) Instead we are allowed to attend 3 training courses and we decided on an InDesign course for our first (with the intention of using it to make guides to compliment our new thesis shelving system.)
The course, like all OUCS run, was informative, interesting and (most importantly) well-paced. One of the things I like about OUCS courses is that they give you a coursebook to work through at your own pace, as well as the step by step demonstrations.
Then after a brief stop off at the public library to renew my Simon Armitage auto, it was home for me.
Occasionally we get some more interesting questions: before Christmas we had an architecture student from Bath University ask about the design of the Manor Road building, about which we knew very little (other than it is pretty awful!) A quick google search returned little in the way of helpful information - we did find a picture of the foyer of the building, labelled 'Manor Road is one of Norman Foster's less impressive buildings.' which gave us (and the other members of staff intrigued by our giggling) a laugh but that was about it. In the end it was a case of offering the little we knew (date of opening etc) and asking for specific questions we could forward onto someone more in the know (though we weren't 100% sure who that would be!)
Another morning job that is almost daily, is posting the printed final reminder notices - pretty simple - and the invoices for readers who have ignored even those.
This is equally simple, but is probably one of the most tedious jobs we have. There are three steps to the invoice - first is to check the books haven't been returned by checking the readers record but also by checking the shelves - the longest and most tedious part. Then we have to find prices for the books, and write them on the invoice, and finally add a block to the reader's record to say the reader has been invoiced. It can be a incredibly long process for someone with 10 or more books, and during vacation we had some insane ones: a reader earned over £900 worth of fines from 20 books and we have another at £500 for only 5 or so.
Blissfully, there was only one today, which meant I had time to unwrap my repaired books for Monday, before our project meeting.
Anyone who knows about the OULS trainee scheme will be aware that we are encouraged to complete a project during our year, something which will enhance the library experience available. For our project, Alice and I have agreed to reclassify the SSL thesis section because it is, currently, a bit of mess because the collection has outgrown the original shelfmark system (the SSL absorbs other departmental libraries almost yearly, and each one brings its own collection - not to mention that more are written every year!)
In the meeting was, obviously me and Alice, then the SSL Librarian in Charge, Reader Services Librarian, Senior Cataloguer and Senior Technical Services Assistant. So it was quite a busy meeting, but also really interesting. Whilst I'd been aware how much work would go into something like this, a 'pep' talk from our LiC opened my eyes to a)how much *variation* of work would be needed and b)just how much responsibility would be on our shoulders.
It was also suggested that we might like to look into the policy aspect of the thesis collection as well - such as why certain thesis' are deposited with us when others aren't and how the Bod handles its thesis collection. This appealed to me because I do love a bit of research, and I think it will make a nice (and different) counterpoint to the more repetitive processing that we will be a substantial part of the project.
So all round, despite having little in the way of concrete decisions made, it was an informative and successful hour or so. Then, there a quick half an hour processing and another on the desk and it was time for lunch.
Our afternoon was to be spent in OUCS for training, which made lunch a quickie before walking round to Banbury Road (detouring on the way to pick up some macaroons from Maison Blanc on the way, because I've been craving them for too long.)
In previous years trainees have been given a free ECDL course but that hasn't happened this year (which is good for me as I already have a basic ECDL qualification and found most of it pretty boring the first time round!) Instead we are allowed to attend 3 training courses and we decided on an InDesign course for our first (with the intention of using it to make guides to compliment our new thesis shelving system.)
The course, like all OUCS run, was informative, interesting and (most importantly) well-paced. One of the things I like about OUCS courses is that they give you a coursebook to work through at your own pace, as well as the step by step demonstrations.
Then after a brief stop off at the public library to renew my Simon Armitage auto, it was home for me.
Oh dear...
Have nosed around a couple of other people's 23 Things blogs, and my posts are about 3x the length...Alice will be ashamed when she sees :(
iGoogle
As I mentioned, briefly, in my first post, my 23 Things is already worth it, purely because of my iGoogle page.
Because I am never one to do things by halves, I have set up two tabs in my page - one for work and one for home (the one pictured is my home tab, because that's the one I've set a background for). The main difference on them is what's featured in the bookmark gadgets and the to do lists.
My favourite gadget so far, I must admit, serves no purpose other than making me childishly happy - there's something mesmerising about watching the penguins chasing the mouse - but this is because inside I am still six.
The most useful gadets are the links boxes. In order to find out which is best I have enchanced bookmarks on my home-tab and the offical google bookmarks on my work tab. So far, both are pretty even on the pros and cons: 'enhanced' has some nifty icons but not all of them work and has an immediate option to open in a new tab, 'google bookmarks' is a more basic list which actually looks more tidy without the 'default' icons of enhanced, but has to be right-clicked and selected to open in a new tab, which is something I always forget to do.
I don't want to talk about googlereader now, incase it leaves me with nothing for next week, and the to-do lists are pretty obvious. On my home tab, I've modified one to be my reading list, with an option for 'To Read' and another for 'Currently Reading'. If I manage to keep on top of that it will make yearly round-ups alot easier.
23 Things
So, this is my new 23 things blog. I could make lofty promises about keeping it updated for longer, but as I struggle to keep my personal one active, they would be very empty.
Actually, one of the reasons I've decided to do 23 Things is to give me an imperative to keep on top of the many 2.0 activities I already do. Twitter, for example, which I never update despite having tweetdeck on my home computer - I am determined to break my habit of being an online lurker.
Ofcourse my other reason is to learn about the many applications out there that I'm either not aware of, or just not using for whatever reason. And already it's been worth it: my iGoogle page is proving invaluable as a place to store links/gadgets that I need to transfer between work and home. Plus, because I am impatient and ran on ahead as per, I'm really enjoying the googlereader gadget and the freedom it gives me to keep up with all the blogs I read in one place.
Being a 'young person' (well, youngish) I am already all over social networking (myspace, twitter, facebook) and, though this is my first blogspot blog, I've been on livejournal since the good ol' days of invite only (about 2001) so I'm relatively experience with blogging. Thanks to Livejournal, I've also been using de.lic.ious for years (and have resigned myself to the fact I will never be able to spell it right.)
And, looking at the summary I'm also comfortable with podcasts (Now Show, yeay!) and youtube and have a (very old) photobucket account for holding LJ layouts, so should take to flickr like a duck...
But I'm looking forward to learning more about RSS feeds in the coming weeks, as well as exploring googledocs which I've not actually used before.
Actually, one of the reasons I've decided to do 23 Things is to give me an imperative to keep on top of the many 2.0 activities I already do. Twitter, for example, which I never update despite having tweetdeck on my home computer - I am determined to break my habit of being an online lurker.
Ofcourse my other reason is to learn about the many applications out there that I'm either not aware of, or just not using for whatever reason. And already it's been worth it: my iGoogle page is proving invaluable as a place to store links/gadgets that I need to transfer between work and home. Plus, because I am impatient and ran on ahead as per, I'm really enjoying the googlereader gadget and the freedom it gives me to keep up with all the blogs I read in one place.
Being a 'young person' (well, youngish) I am already all over social networking (myspace, twitter, facebook) and, though this is my first blogspot blog, I've been on livejournal since the good ol' days of invite only (about 2001) so I'm relatively experience with blogging. Thanks to Livejournal, I've also been using de.lic.ious for years (and have resigned myself to the fact I will never be able to spell it right.)
And, looking at the summary I'm also comfortable with podcasts (Now Show, yeay!) and youtube and have a (very old) photobucket account for holding LJ layouts, so should take to flickr like a duck...
But I'm looking forward to learning more about RSS feeds in the coming weeks, as well as exploring googledocs which I've not actually used before.
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