Library (Wednes)Day in the Life

Attended my summer task & finish group on promotional materials in the morning. It was held at one of our other sites and it was nice walking over there in the sunshine! After a discussion on the four things we are tasked with finishing by the end of August, I offered to take the lead on a calendar of promotional activity, the idea being that we target key messages at appropriate times through the academic year.

I updated both of my subject blogs with details of new ebooks we've added in the last few days. Hope somebody reads them!

Library (Tues)Day in the Life

I spent most of the day with e-reading renewals and withdrawing items from behind the counter - not the most exciting tasks but necessary ones! Not sure why some of the things behind the counter hadn't been thrown away years ago - many old VHS tapes and items that hadn't been issued this millennium. Guess they were kept because we've had the space but this is soon to disappear when we get our new library counter next month. The new counter will give us minimal storage space, giving over more of the library entrance space to users, which can only be a good thing.

After work, I went to a meeting with my chartership mentee. This is the first time I've mentored and I really enjoy it. My mentee is from a different sector to me and it's interesting to hear about her work and the challenges that arise. We're approaching the final stages of the process now and she's hoping to submit towards the end of this year. If you're chartered, I'd definitely recommend training to be a CILIP mentor.

Library (Mon)Day in the Life

Thanks to Twitter, this morning I found out about Library Day in the Life. Somehow I have managed to miss the first four rounds of this - must have been when I was living in a cave! (quite at apt description of my time working at CILT, the National Centre for Languages). Anyway, now I've finally cottoned on to it, I am going to tweet and blog away for the next five days. This will hopefully act as a good development opportunity, as well as providing some insight to anyone thinking about entering into the library world.

I started the week off with a 'love your libraries' tour. This is an initiative taking place at Westminster and involves going round the four site libraries (Regent, Marylebone, Harrow and Cavendish), critically assessing the space and considering how it can be improved. Today it was Cavendish's turn. This requires quite a bit of imagination as it's currently having a extra floor built. We therefore had to don a hard hat and fluorescent jacket (height of librarian fashion!) and head into the building site. It was quite nice to see what has been achieved from all the drilling and hammering that we've had to deal with throughout this year!

I then checked some postgraduate reading lists to see what needs ordering when the new budget for 2010/11 becomes available next month. I also sorted out some e-reading renewals and researched possible organisations a lecturer can donate his maths/engineering books to. Found Education Aid and the London Mathematical Society. Hope one of them can help him!