Swinburne Library News

Swinburne library in 2008

The first half of 2008 has seen renovations starting for the Croydon Library extension, Swinburne researchers and library staff attending the launch of Swinburne Research Bank, access to the Request TV database offering recorded TV programs and more.

Swinburne Research Bank launches

Early in May, the Library launched Swinburne Research Bank, an open access collection of research authored by Swinburne researchers. It is part of a suite of services developed by the Library with the aim of helping to manage, publish and increase access to research material produced at Swinburne.

Swinburne Research Bank is designed to showcase Swinburne research and help maximise its impact, both in Australia and overseas, through increased exposure online. Swinburne Research Bank records are indexed by Google and other search engines, and harvested by international indexing services and the National Library of Australia. Where copyright permits, a version of the full text is made available to help the work reach an audience beyond those in the Swinburne network with access to the Library's subscription services.

The event was held in conjunction with the launch of the new Swinburne Research website, and over 80 researchers attended from across all disciplines. It was a great chance for the Library to show how we can work with other areas of the University to assist with a broad range of corporate needs. The Library's Online Services and Strategies staff look forward to working closely with researchers in the future to help develop a complete picture of research created at Swinburne.

Extended opening hours at Hawthorn

This semester, the library at Hawthorn campus has been trialling extended opening of library space. From early May to the end of the higher education exam period, most spaces within the library at Hawthorn are open for an additional 5 hours beyond the currently advertised closing time. While numbers drop off as the evening wears on, occupancy surveys during extended opening have counted hundreds of users taking advantage of the extended opening. The weekend opening is particularly popular, with over 440 people in the library last Sunday evening after the standard closing time. Reaction from users has been very positive ranging from "It's very helpful for students" to "awesome!"

The library will analyse usage data and review the lessons from the trial. The current plan is to continue with further extended opening hours in semester 2.

Croydon Library extension and refurbishment

Scott Jennings, Freeform Architects, has been appointed as the architect for the redevelopment and refurbishment of the Croydon Library. Scott won against 3 other architectural companies.

On the 6th of March Clare Carlsson, Information Services Manager, met with Scott and Juan Smith from Facilities to plan out the initial timeline:

1. Sign off on design - 17th March
2. Design and Development Phase - completed 9th April. This included
   • engineers advice,
   • detailed design of Service desk and staff areas, and
   • finished design sent to Quantity Surveyor for pricing.
3. Contract Documentation - 12th May to 6th June
4. Tender issue - 9th June
5. Tender close - 4th July
6. Tender Review - 7th to 11th July
7. Builder's start up period and Construction Phase - 14th July to 28th November
8. Completion - 5th December

The building process spans 2 terms. We have discussed a range of options regarding the staging of the works, but I think we need to accept that work of this scale will cause disruptions to normal library business. We will need to be adaptable and creative when it comes to helping staff and students at the Croydon campus and we have a large box of earplugs on hand. Detailed plans will be available for everyone to view on the Facilities website.

Wii at Croydon

The Croydon library has endeavoured to connect with the student population by bribing them with videogames. What initially seemed like a navel-gazing flight of fancy actually came into fruition this week when a Nintendo Wii was set up in the library.

In an exciting role-reversal, the students have effectively become the experts while the library staff flounder about in the grip of neophytic terror. This is exactly the way it should be. By purchasing this brick of plastic we're highlighting the continued emphasis on the recreational aspect of the library experience. Many of the Croydon students have an image of the library as solemnity embodied. After speaking to several of the students personally, the videogame bribe is causing them to think again – until the novelty wears off at least.

The rules are very simple. As long as no one else wants to use it, they can keep playing. As long as they respect others, they can keep playing. We're basically working on the common sense approach and so far there haven't been any inklings of a problem.

So, feel sympathy for the staff who are being forced to learn how to play video games. If this trial succeeds, you may have to learn how to play them too. There's even the possibility that you may enjoy yourself.

Ipods containing lectures at Lilydale

Students can put their lectures on to one of four portable music players and take them home for two days. Lilydale Campus Library has purchased four Ipod Nanos to offer this unique service.

Our target audience are students who may have slow internet access at home. They can download lecturers in the library and listen to them when and where they want. They can now join the legions of public transport users plugged into music players.

Ipods are the ubiquitous portable music players of choice for many students and the library is excited that we can put them to use as an educational tool. The Library surveyed Lilydale library users in 2007 to determine whether they would like to borrow an ipod from the library:

1. 54% said yes and,
2. 24% said that they already had one.

Lilydale has a dedicated Imac computer where students can download their lectures. Many students are still intimated by the Macs but the recorded lectures are a good way of encouraging students to have a go.

The Library is also investigating the use of audio tours for library self-paced orientation sessions similar to those offered art galleries.

Web Of Science access extended

The library has just purchased an additional 10 years backfile for Web of Science, so you can now search Web of Science back to 1982. This is a significant purchase.

Web of Science provides access to current and retrospective multidisciplinary information from approximately 8,700 of the most prestigious, high impact research journals in the world. You can search most disciplines and time spans back to 1982 to uncover information relevant to your research.

Web of Science also provides a unique search method: cited reference searching. Navigate backward in time using cited references to uncover the research that influenced an author's work, and navigate forward in time using Times Cited to discover the impact a paper or other published item has had on current research. Click the SFX links to connect to the full text of primary literature.

Contact your liaison librarian to find out how the expanded Web of Science can help with your research.

Recorded TV on request

Request TV is a new database you can use to search or browse all programs on free to air television from October 2007 onwards. Request TV includes programs from the ABC, SBS, and the Seven, Nine and Ten networks. You can search for a specific program if you know the title, or you can search or browse to see what is available by topic.

Request TV shows program details and a detailed abstract describing each program. A link in the record allows you to request a DVD copy for the library collection. Just click the link and fill in your personal details to send your request to the library. Because there are charges for ordering DVDs, the library might not be able to order all the titles that are requested but we'll let you know whether your request is successful.

Because every program on every free to air channel is being recorded 24 hours a day from October 2007 onwards, you won't need to worry again about missing the recording of a program.

DVDs of programs requested through Request TV are provided under the Screenrights licence. They can only be used for educational purposes at Swinburne.

Closing remarks

It has been an exciting semester – traffic (people coming in the door) is up 47% for January to April and up 62% at Hawthorn. This follows a big increase in 2007 too. And loans are up 13% so far this year. I guess the word "exciting" doesn't fully capture the crowded and hectic late semester feeling of the place, but it is good to be popular.

To try and cope, we have begun opening the Hawthorn campus library an extra five hours per day – closing at 3am on weekdays, earlier on weekends. To cater for the needs of the very rapidly growing number of students with their own computers, we have doubled the number of power points in the library. And for the others, we will have tripled the number of laptops available for loan by mid-year.

We have also run the Insync survey again, in April-May. We run this every year or two, and it provides a huge amount of information about how our users feel about the service and the facilities. The survey is benchmarked with other Australian universities, and provides high quality information.

Best wishes,

Derek Whitehead
Director, Information Resources