Its friday yeah!! Today I am divided between the two teams I work for. I have been inducted into both jobs so hopefully I can get my head down and do some work today.
9am My first half of the day is spent with Academic services and I spend half an hour in the morning carrying on with the Reading List Audit I started yesterday its a History reading list at least so mildly interesting to a former History student.
9:30-10:30am Meeting with the customer services manager/graduate trainee mentor. Myself and Adam the other trainee have a meeting with our mentor. She asks us how we are finding our new roles and if we are settling in to them ok. We then look back at our visits in the first term and how useful they were (we visited various libraries in Wales including National Library of Wales, the Public Library, Record Office, Carmarthen University, Lampeter University, Celtic Studies centre and the School Library). She asked us about any future trips we might like and Adam suggested the British Library, I have visited there before but would like a behind the scenes tour if possible.
After our catch up we turn to the real reason for the meeting, planning events and activities for World Book Day and World Book Night. Myself and Adam had applied for books for WBN, both of us chose Bill Brysons Tales from a Small Island, as we felt it would be good for those in Aberystwyth to read about the outside world as it is a bit of a bubble in Aberystwyth. Plus it is a very good book from an accessible author.
Here are our thoughts/Plans for the WBN after the meeting:
World Book Night is on Monday April 23. Current plans are to:
- Give out 20 books as part of world book night http://www.worldbooknight.org/ (Patrick and Adam registered as givers and should hear soon whether they have been successful in “receiving” 20 copies of Bill Bryson’s Notes from a small island)
- Go to non-library locations across campus such as laundrettes (with residential services approval), Student Union, gym (with sports centre approval) etc and hand out a book plus a bag of goodies to lucky individuals.
- give each person a postcard saying “if you enjoyed this book – borrow a book from our contemporary fiction collection … consider an ebook for your assignment … weigh up a journal article” – something along those lines.
- an invitation to join a prize draw for an amazon voucher by giving title of book that is important to me and why (to be drawn after world book night and results to be analysed and made available on a webpage and circulated via weekly email and on display in HOL, showing which “important” books are in stock, depending on results)
- evaluate exercise via a report analysing responses received
For World Book Day here are our thoughts/plans
World Book Day is on Thursday 1 March. Current plans are to:
- have a display on Level D, Hugh Owen Library encouraging passers-by to engage
- promotional material from Welsh books council for WBD
- possibly consider some type of DVD/movie tie in (Oscars previous week) focussing on our DVD and fiction collections
- promote book swop (will be replenished and possibly displayed in a more attractive way by then),
- give out cake
- give each person a postcard saying “if you enjoyed this book – borrow a book from our contemporary fiction collection … consider an ebook for your assignment … weigh up a journal article” – something along those lines.
- an invitation to join a prize draw for an amazon voucher by giving title of book that is important to me and why (to be drawn after world book night and results to be analysed and made available on a webpage and circulated via weekly email and on display in HOL, showing which “important” books are in stock, depending on results)
- evaluate exercise via a report analysing responses received
Now its up to myself and Adam to plan and carry these ideas out.
11am After a quick break I get set the task of authoring a FAQ on the IS website. My question I am authoring is about renewing books. So I break it down as simply as possible and add some nice pictures. The FAQ’s are a vital part of the IS website and we have many useful ones on there, mainly authored by the IT staff but there are some done by Library staff particularly by Academic services.
12pm Lunchtime
1pm I am now transfered to Collections management. With it being Friday its very quiet up in this section of the office. I have been given the task of working through some donations. It is up to me to check the catalogue to see if we hold these particular books. I fill in a slip and put it in the books then it is up to the Subject Librarian (academic services) to decide if it is worth having given the information I have provided. They are mainlt science texts.
4:30pm Home time!
