ISC 27/06-07
UNIVERSITY OF KENT
INFORMATION SERVICES COMMITTEE
MARCH 2007
REPORT FROM DIRECTOR OF INFORMATION SERVICES
MARCH 2007 – MAY 2007
A
Services
A.1
The period since the last ISC report has been characterised by continued
heavy use of facilities and services and general high availability of on-line
services, with Templeman continuing to be the most popular location for
student access to computing and other electronic services.
A.2
The Library Service offered extended opening hours again this year during
the final essay submission and examination period amounting to 11 weeks in
total. Although the usage figures have yet to be analysed the extended hours
have been well received by students. The proposal to extend opening until
midnight on weekdays and weekend mornings throughout the year is still
subject to financial negotiation but we expect to be able to offer this service
from the start of the next academic year.
A.3
System performance overall has been good with desktop services coping
well. Once again the service most often affected by scheduled and
unscheduled downtime has been the KentMail service, although with the
exception of one outage over the bank holiday weekend in May, service
outages have been of short duration. Generally service outages have been
detected early and resolved quickly.
B
Projects and service developments
B.1
The central machine room in Cornwallis is scheduled to be upgraded during
the summer with HEFCE and IS funding. It is now expected that the room will
be completely cleared to allow for easier refurbishment with less likelihood of
accidental service interruptions. Much of the equipment in the room will need
to be decanted to Medway and temporary accommodation elsewhere on the
Canterbury campus. This will necessitate all services to be interrupted at
some stage, with the most significant outages probably occurring when widearea network cables are relocated and services reconnected to the network
infrastructure. Individual services are likely to experience downtime of up to a
day when service-specific hardware is moved, particularly where this involves
a move to Medway.
B.2
The withdrawal of the MARVIN interface to UCAS and the introduction of the
HERCULES replacement has required a rewrite of the University’s
admissions systems interface to UCAS. HECULES data is already being
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exchanged successfully and work is scheduled to complete in time for the
next UCAS round.
B.3
A Pilot Student Portal has been developed as a proof of concept and is
currently undergoing tests with English and Computing Science students.
Feedback from the trial will inform the full-scale University Student Portal
project, the plan for which is currently being drafted.
B.4
The selection of a Content Management System (CMS) for management of
web content has started. The preparation of tender documentation is almost
complete and the selection process is expected to start in July, subject to
funding being secured.
B.5
A Reading List Management Review has been launched in response to
student concerns about the availability and accessibility of core texts. The
review will include a consideration of the methodology for obtaining and
receiving readings lists within the library, the identification of core texts and
the possible increase of electronic access to these materials wherever
possible. To support this review the current policy of buying e-books in
bundled collections will be re-considered with a view to purchasing single
titles that will extend the availability of core texts.
B.6
The Value for Money review of the Collection Resource Management Service
identified classification and stock acquisition as areas where VfM could be
improved. With the re-classification of stock, currently subject to a nonstandard local variation, to the main Library of Congress schedules used
elsewhere in the library the service should be able to achieve more cost
effective purchasing of ‘shelf-ready’ materials. The project is currently being
scoped and departments consulted on the potential impact of changes.
B.7
The library service is currently considering moving hard-copy journals for
which electronic access is available to an on-campus store. This would allow
items to be retrieved if required but would also enable stock congestion in the
main library to be reduced by moving less active stock to the basement of the
Templeman building.
C
Medway
C.1
Recent staff vacancies in the joint Drill Hall Library team is allowing a review
of the staffing structure. It is anticipated that a new structure will allow us to
implement an integrated Help and Enquiry service and improve the
management of the joint Drill Hall IT infrastructure. It is hoped that new
appointments will be made in time for the start of the 2007/8 session.
C.2
The setting of next year’s joint budget is in train. It is expected that the
main revenue budget will roll forward with cost of living increases and
provision for staff pay increases, although the University of Greenwich has not
yet implemented its job evaluation process and the full cost of its
implementation is not yet known. A separate look at possible service
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extensions will consider extending operating hours during the week and into
the weekend with Sunday opening being specifically considered.
C.3
The Drill Hall Library has recently carried out a Student Satisfaction Survey.
Responses from UoK students increased for 43 last year to 77 in the current
year with the overall total rising from 189 to 384. Highlights from the survey
include 90.7% of students ‘satisfied’ or ‘very satisfied’ by the quality of service
from loan desk staff and 86.2% make use of the online renewal system.
Issues for consideration include the availability of materials on the open
shelves where 33.5% expressed dissatisfaction, the polarisation of views on
acceptable noise levels in the building with 41% seeing this as a problem
area, and the high levels (c.50%) of students claiming no experience of either
Computing Skills or Library Skills training.
The analysis of responses has have not yet been broken down by institution.
D
D.1
E
Wye
Templeman and Wye library staff have set up regular meetings to progress
service delivery for Kent Business School students. A Service Level
Agreement has been established against which Imperial College will deliver
library services.
Planning, initiatives and opportunities
E.1
Information Services had its initial budget meeting in May at which the bids
presented at the last meeting of the IS committee were discussed. Indications
are that our high priority bids will receive some funding in this coming year,
with discussions over the level of funding not yet concluded.
E.2
The outcome of budget negotiations has allowed us to progress our
Operational Plan for the 07/08 academic year which is now nearing
completion. A more detailed planning process will be put in place over the
summer.
E.3
Three of the four IS User Surveys have reported during the period under
review. Two appear later on this agenda. The third survey relates to our
service to study bedrooms and received an excellent response rate. Ninety
four percent of respondents rated the service highly with a continued
improvement in the numbers of students experiencing problems with viruses
and spyware. Some students expressed concern that IPTV, although a
welcomed initiative, had produced a negative effect on network performance;
consequently bandwidth has now been considerably increased.
F
F.1
Future Priorities
Priorities for next year are set out in our draft operational plan which will be
finalised in July. Immediate priorities include: budget round; addressing
accommodation issues; taking forward new JISC funded projects; supporting
key University initiatives such as Website development and new logo;
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Machine room refurbishment; Research support strategy; system integration
planning including planning for admissions and CRM procurement; taking
forward findings of NSS Library service review; e-learning strategy support,
Medway planning
John Sotillo
Director of Information Services
May 2007
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