User Advisory Group Minutes
Title:
User Advisory Group
Date of Meeting:
19 March 2013
Location:
The National Archives
Attendees:
Staff
Mary Gledhill, Chair (MG) – Commercial Director
Jeff James (JJ) – Director of Operations & Services
Julia Stocken (JS) – Head of Information Management and Practice
Emma Allen (EA) – Head of Web Team
James Lawson (JL) – Customer Intelligence Manager
Paul Lamey (PL) – Customer Research Manager
Guy Grannum (GG) – Discovery Product Manager
Corinne Harrison (CH) - Reader Adviser
Mark Jones (MJ) – Minutes
Delegates
Prof Anne Laurence (AL) – Academic users
Gillian Stevens (GS) – Onsite personal interest users
Graham Woolgar (GW) – Onsite personal interest users
Dr Julie Anderson (JA) – Diversity/inclusion
Professor Grace Ioppolo (GI) – Academic users
Bob O’Hara (BO’H) – Independent Researchers
Dr Nicola Phillips (NP) – Map Room Users
Susan Moore (SM) – Map Room Users
Dr Paul Dryburgh (PD) – County/external archives
Margaret O’Sullivan (MO’S) - County/external archives
Nell Darby (ND) - Student users
Apologies
Sarah Leggett (SL) – Marketing Manager
Emma Bayne (EB) – Head of Systems Development
Else Churchill (EC) - Family History Societies
Patrick Vernon (PV) - Diversity/inclusion
Andrew Chapman (AC) – Online users
Item
Action
1.
Minutes and Matters Arising
1.1
(Item 1.1 18/12) JL advised that the pictures of the new UAG Delegates in
attendance will be taken today and added to the webpage along with their
respective bios and contact details. The UAG Delegates webpage can be found
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JL
here: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/get-involved/uag-delegates.htm
1.2
(Item 1.4 18/12) GG advised that the possibility of providing video guidance on
how to use Discovery has been considered and is possible if someone is willing to
appear in the video.
1.3
(Item 1.10 18/12) GW advised that a meeting with Stuart Abraham (FOI Centre
Manager) took place on 31 January. However, the questions submitted on behalf
of a member of the onsite user community did not solely relate to the re-closure
policy and therefore could not all be answered by Stuart. JS agreed to answer the
questions relating to the Records Decision Panel and they will be included in the
minutes as a post meeting update. (Post meeting note: JS is working on a
response which will be circulated ASAP).
1.4
(Item 2.4 18/12) The revised draft proposal for accepting claims from UAG
members for travel expenses incurred in attending UAG meetings was circulated.
JL/JS
AL suggested the exception for Blue Badge Holders to submit claims for mileage
should be re-worded and not restricted to Blue Badge Holders only.
JJ agreed to take the point away for consideration.
JJ
PD expressed concerns over the proposed £50 cap per UAG meeting stipulated in
the first draft proposal.
JJ explained that this had now been revised and that there will be no cap.
However, he emphasised that there is a strict budget allocated for the payment of
the travel expenses. Claims made need to be for reasonable costs incurred and to
be made promptly.
GI suggested that the time of the UAG meeting may also affect the cost of travel.
JJ agreed to consider revising the timing of the meetings if this would assist UAG
members in keeping their travel expenses down. (Post meeting note: All
subsequent meetings have been moved to 12 noon).
The proposal will now be finalised and will become effective from the start of the
next financial year (1 April 2013). It will then be reviewed after six months.
1.5
(Item 3.7 18/12) MG explained that providing the information at the right time of the
year would be crucial in order for UAG delegates to make a worthwhile
contribution. The next UAG meeting in June would be too early but late
summer/early autumn would appear to be about right. JJ agreed that the UAG
meeting in September would probably be the ideal time to share the information
but added that the process would very much be driven by our own schedule of
meetings and requirements for getting the recommendations signed off by the
MOJ.
GW queried whether the UAG delegates could be provided with a timetable of
significant events relating to TNA’s business activities for the next financial year.
This information was provided in a previous UAG paper – see link below.
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/uag06091105-business-planningcover-sheet.pdf
1.6
(Item 3.9 18/12) GW asked if there had been any further development regarding
the suggestion that there should be public consultation on digitisation of records
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CH
prior to the surrounding parameters being finalised. He added that using TNA's
website would be an easy way to hold such consultations.
MG advised that we are still looking at ways to fit public consultation into the
process. She added that further work would be required to establish an approach
which is manageable in practice. The preferred method at present would be to
discuss the proposals with the UAG first and take it from there.
1.7
1.8
(Item 6.4 18/12) A User Advisory Group Meeting and User Forum Meeting have
now been scheduled to take place on the same day in order to give the UAG
delegates the opportunity to attend both. The meetings will take place on 17
December 2013.
(Item 6.5 18/12) We are awaiting feedback from PV regarding whether he has
further concerns.
1.9
The ARK Editorial team have provided the an update on the list of online records
which will have the ability for context driven search in Discovery e.g. family name,
given name, etc., which is included in the meeting papers.
2.
Plans for future Commemorative activities
2.1
MG gave a presentation on our plans for marking forthcoming major historical
anniversaries between 2014 and 2019. The anniversaries will include:
Magna Carta (1215)
Battle of Agincourt (1415)
Death of William Shakespeare (1616)
Jacobite Rebellion (1715)
Battle of Waterloo (1815)
Easter Rising (1916)
First World War (1914 - 1918)
MG explained that it is only the 100th anniversary of the start of the First Word War
that will fall within TNA’s current business plan. The other anniversaries will all
take place post April 2015 and will be factored into the next business plan. All the
commemoration plans are under development at this stage and we would
welcome suggestions from UAG as to how we should approach them.
2.2
In relation to the anniversary of the start of the First World War, BO’H queried how
the digitisation of the record series WO 95 (War Office: First World War and Army
of Occupation War Diaries) was going and expressed concern about there being
potential for a lack of quality control in the transcription process.
MG explained that the digitisation process of WO 95 is almost complete. The
transcription of the records is being undertaken by the organization Zooniverse
who are experts in crowdsourcing information. MG assured the UAG that
Zooniverse have expert moderators who oversee the transcription process and
techniques such as double or triple keying are used to maximise the accuracy of
the results.
3.
Community Update
3.1
PL provided an update on the Online Community now that it is fully open and
accessible to all users and circulated our draft Community Moderation document.
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MG
The UAG were invited to use the Community as a tool for delegates in seeking
feedback from user communities that they represent. Delegates can log in or
register at http://community.nationalarchives.gov.uk
3.2
GW asked how many moderators the Online Community currently has.
PL stated that we currently have six moderators internally at TNA.
3.3
BO’H suggested that a group set up within the Community for, say, 200 members
would require more moderation than smaller ones and felt that he would prefer
TNA to carry out the moderation.
PL explained that such a group would not necessarily require more moderation
and added that we have not had any significant moderation issues to date. We
would like members who use the facility regularly to moderate it in order to
encourage a healthy community. There is, however, no expectation that UAG
delegates will want to become moderators themselves.
3.4
GS queried whether it would be possible to moderate for a particular group only.
PL confirmed that we are currently looking into that possibility.
3.5
SM suggested that it would be good if members of the Community were emailed
about new content.
PL confirmed that this is also something we are currently looking into. We are
looking to introduce a weekly digest of new content which could then be sent out
by email to members of the Community.
3.6
GW asked if there were any projected numbers for members of the Community.
PL stated that the original hope was for 1000 members. A more optimistic view
would be to attract 2000-3000 members.
4.
Delegate submitted items
4.1
GI suggested that notifications from TNA of future Arts & Humanities Research
Council (AHRC) workshops should make it clear that you do not need to be a
postgraduate in History in order to take part.
CH agreed to look into this matter. (Post meeting update: James Ross says that:
“If people from other disciplines are interested in historical sources, then they are
more than welcome – but the focus will be on TNA sources, and the research skills
are those we think historians will need. We are looking at the possibility of running
these types of workshops in the future, though probably for a small fee from each
attendee”).
4.2
AL asked if it would be possible to include an agenda item at a future UAG
meeting which covers the processes involved in making a decision about the
suitability of an institution to receive a record.
JJ advised that other TNA bodies (i.e. Advisory Council) are responsible for
accessioning decisions, however, we may be able to provide further information
about the criteria for places of deposit:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/archives-sector/accreditation.htm
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CH
4.3
GW asked about the web page which gave details of reviews of records held by
Departments. Links to this can be found in the minutes of the February User
Forum and below:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/about/record-transfer-report.htm
4.4
GW asked if we could have a presentation of the charts provided by JS at the
October 2012 User Forum?
See http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/user-forum-informationmanagement-and-practice-october-2012.pdf
JJ acknowledged that for some time there has been an increasing level of interest
from some users in the ‘pre-TNA’ decision making processes around selection,
transfer and/or presentation; the amount of public involvement in such processes
and the degree of transparency. Despite several attempts to provide clarity on
what are often complicated issues JJ acknowledged that further clarification was
required and he agreed to speak with Carol Tullo, Director of Information Policy
around this and other issues that fall under Carol’s oversight and report back to the
UAG in due course.
5.
Discovery Service Update
5.1
EA advised the UAG of the changes we have made to the search function located
in the top right-hand corner of TNA’s website. It was explained that it is now
possible to either ‘search our website’ or ‘search our records’. We have introduced
this change in order to make it clearer to users exactly what it is they are
searching. It was added that ‘searching our records’ delivers the same result (in
relevance order) as searching in Discovery.
5.2
GG explained that we have given Discovery a new look and added two new
features: you can now sort results by catalogue reference and filter them by the
first letter of a government department. You can also sort results by their start date
in both ascending and descending order. We have also improved the layout for the
browsing screens and fixed some minor technical bugs. See our updates for more
details of what has changed.
GG explained that we are currently working on high priority issues 2 and 3 (‘quality
of search results’) detailed on the Discovery issue log which was shared with the
UAG delegates in December 2012.
5.3
GW suggested that the location of the ‘details’ link in the bottom right-hand corner
of a series description in ‘browse’ may need revising. He felt that this could be
confusing for users who might expect to enter the ‘details’ page by clicking on the
description itself or series header.
GG agreed to share this concern with the web team.
5.4
GW stated that he found the vertical scroll bar on the ‘browse’ page to be very
narrow and not very user friendly.
GG advised that this issue has been raised previously and it is currently of medium
priority on the Discovery issues log. Design proposals will be shared with the test
team once they are ready and we will then test to ensure that they are compatible
with the various different devices individuals may use to access Discovery.
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GG
5.5
SM suggested that when refining search results by date, results which fall on a
specified date should be returned first rather than those that fall within a more
general range of dates.
GG stated that there has been mixed feedback about this particular issue. For
example, we have been working to improve search returns for undated records by
inserting an estimated date and returning the result in a particular date range. This
has been widely accepted to be a helpful approach by users. GG agreed,
however, to take SM’s suggestion away for consideration.
5.6
GG
SM stated that the Equity Pleadings database was a very good resource and
asked for some assurance that Discovery will be as good.
JJ explained that following a project with the Advice and Records Knowledge
department to integrate data, all information that was previously available through
Equity Pleadings can now be found in Discovery. He added that our approach has
been incremental, which allows us to make changes more effectively, rather than
implementing big changes that then require yearly updates.
5.7
SM queried whether a date has now been set for the closure of the old catalogue.
JJ confirmed that no date will be set until all the high priority issues on the
Discovery issues log have been resolved. He added that a Governance Board will
be set up shortly to oversee the progress of issues raised with Discovery and this
will be chaired by Lee Oliver, Head of Public Services Development.
5.8
SM asked if it would be possible for someone to come and speak to the UAG
about what will be lost from A2A.
JJ stated that the timing would be important but we would take the suggestion
away for consideration.
Please send your feedback to discovery@nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk which
will be added to the issues log for investigation and consideration.
6.
Equality and Diversity Update
Public Services Update
Cataloguing Update
Digitisation Update
6.1
The group was directed to the paper updates which had been distributed in
advance and were invited to email any queries they had about them.
7.
Any other business
7.1
NP reported back to the UAG on her recent meeting with Juergen Vervoorst, Head
of Conservation, regarding the Keeper’s Gallery (formerly the Museum). She
shared her concerns with the group about the practice of directing visitors to
Wikipedia as a source of information through QR codes and suggested that a
mobile phone app could be developed instead for people to use as they go round
the Gallery.
JJ stated that poor mobile phone reception would be a difficult obstacle to
overcome in respect of developing a mobile phone app to use whilst going round
the Keeper’s Gallery. He assured the group that we are always careful to check
that the information we direct visitors to through QR codes and Wikipedia is
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JJ
authenticated.
AL agreed that she was not comfortable with TNA appearing to provide
endorsement for Wikipedia, particularly when she and fellow academics actively
discourage students from relying on the site as a reliable source of information.
She suggested that a BBC link would be far more respectable.
MG agreed to give the suggestion some consideration.
7.2
Next meeting 18 June 2013
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MG