College of Science & Engineering
Library Committee
Minutes of the meeting held on 13th March 2012 at 2pm in the Hodgson Room, Weir
Building, King’s Buildings
Present:
Professor Simon Parsons
Mr Richard Battersby
Dr Anna Kenway
Mrs Carol Ward
Dr Gail Dursma
Dr Barry Dawson
Mr Murdo Gillanders
Mrs Sheila Cannell
Dr Victoria Martin
Dr David Williams
Dr Nick Colegrave
Mr Stuart Lewis
1.
Convenor
Head of IS College Consultancy Services (HCCS)
College Office, Head of Planning & Communications
(HPC)
Secretary (LCS)
School of Engineering (EngR)
School of Geosciences (GeoR)
College Academic Affairs Officer (AAEO)
Director of Library Collections (DLC)
School of Physics & Astronomy (PhyR)
College Head Academic Affairs (CHAA)
School of Biological Sciences (BioR)
Library & Collections, IS
Apologies:
Dr Eva Panagiotakopulu
(Dr Barry Dawson attending)
Not present:
Dr Iain Murray
Mr John Gales
Mr Ashley Cooke
Dr Tibor Antal
Prof. Colin Pulham
2.
School of Informatics
EUSA Student Rep
EUSA Student Rep
School of Mathematics
School of Chemistry
Minutes of the meeting held on 24 November 2011
The Minutes were approved as a true and accurate record of proceedings.
3.
Matters Arising
Item 10: the security of laptops and how to secure them was an issue that was still in
hand.
All other matters arising are covered in the Agenda.
4.
Convenor’s statements
The Convenor thanked Kate Farrow for her service to the Committee and wished her
well in her new role. The Committee welcomed Carol Ward as minute secretary for
this meeting.
The Committee were advised that Sheila Cannell would be retiring in July after 27
years of service and wished her well.
The Science & Engineering library materials budget was now in the red, but this
would be discussed fully in 9.1.
5.
KB Library Project
5.1
Paper B was circulated to the Committee and the full text will appear on the
Library webpages in due course.
Key points
 Handover is due in early June
 Fit-out will take place during June/July
 Opening to users should be end July-early August (to be confirmed).
5.2
Paper C
The paper detailed changes to the Darwin Library and re-branding as already
discussed above. With regard to bookable spaces, the Committee suggested
that communication with Schools was a problem and suggested that Teaching
Organisations be kept informed. The KB Library User Group has discussed
the need to promote all open access study space at KB in an integrated way
and steps are in hand to do this. A mechanism for input from Teaching
Organisations via Directors of Teaching was suggested. The Convenor said
that Simon Bates was a member of the User Group so that would be covered.
The Convenor was asked to clarify an issue relating to the lower floor of the
Darwin Library. The current issues of journals will all be shelved with the
bound volumes on the lower floor. Most print subscriptions had now been
cancelled in favour of online only and so only a small number of print issues
are now arriving anyway.
6.
Results from the Libqual+ 2011 Survey
Key points
 Libqual+ survey is run by IS every 2nd Year
 Survey ran in November 2011, with a random selection of staff and
students being invited to complete the web-based form
Summary of results
There was a larger number of respondents than in 2009. The full results are
available on the IS website:
http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/informationservices/about/organisation/library-and-collections/library-and-collectionsabout/libqual-survey
It was noted that there was general satisfaction and the scores were all up on
2009.
Desired Level of Services - the highest desired scores relate to the library’s
collections. Students and staff have very high expectations for the provision
of books and journals.
Service Adequacy – this is the difference between the minimum and perceived
scores.
The collections have once again been highlighted as an area of concern,
especially by academic staff. Many made specific comments such as:
 Restricted journal collections
 Availability of research materials
 The number of copies of books
IS is currently awaiting results of the breakdown to College level to see which
subject areas are giving lowest satisfaction.
The recent Collections Review has highlighted a deficit of £1 million in the
library materials budget, which will be discussed in Item 9.
It was noted that the breakdown of the results to School level would not be
constructive as the numbers in some schools may be too small to be valid.
Library space had been highlighted as an issue of concern in the 2003 survey,
but had shown significant improvements in 2007 and again in 2009. This was
directly tied up with the MLRP. However, it was noted in 2011 that this was
again becoming an issue, mainly because of the success of the MLRP and
rising students’ expectations.
The free-text comments in the survey essentially back-up the survey results,
especially with regard to space and environment issues in the Main Library,
and also the collections.
It was noted that the re-developed 4th floor in the Main Library had opened in
November and the building has since recorded its highest number of users.
8% of the student population were recorded as being in the Main Library.
10% of students are in a library at any given time. Next week a survey will be
undertaken in the Main Library to identify who is using it and why. It will be
interesting to note the number of Science and Engineering students using the
Main Library and to note if there is a change next year.
The IS Study Spaces Group is working on why students use particular study
space.
7. PURE
Stuart Lewis gave the Committee an update on PURE.
Issues:



Concern about randomness of co-author attribution
Problem for bulk upload of authorship date from most databases in
many cases not being picked up by PURE
Technological issue for all platforms/systems – a need for “barcoding” for all researchers (but not as part of PURE)
The Committee asked how does PURE handle LATEC and BIBLEC and how
will it display title e.g will it render equations in PURE? Depending on where
it is copying from, PURE is UTFA compatible and will cope with any
character set, but it depends where it is uploaded from.
VM/AK are to send specific examples direct to Stuart.
Action VM/AK
8.
Reading List Software Project
Stuart gave an update on this project. It is hoped to launch the service with a
small number of courses from September, including some from Biological
sciences. NC to consider some courses which could be used
Action NC
9.
Materials Budget Issues
9.1 This year has been particularly challenging, partly as a result of the late
arrival of invoices due to delays in the national agreements being concluded,
but also due to VAT increases and currency changes. The Science &
Engineering materials budget is £56,000 over committed at present. It was
noted that there have been no new journal subscriptions placed over the past 3
years.
9.2 £25,000 from the College Sustainability Fund: bids from Schools were
received and the Convenor, HCCS and EngR decided that all should be
supported and the items are now on order.
9.3. Collections Review
The report from the Review is due to be completed shortly. The final report
will go the IS Knowledge Strategy Committee. Sheila Cannell summarised the
likely main outcomes.
The headline is that an additional £1M is needed for the library materials
budget.
Other recommendations relate to:
 Introducing user driven e-books and monographs.
 Offering free inter-library loans
 Allowing direct student requests for text books
It was noted that there may be a need to consider journal cancellations
during summer 2012, depending on the outcome of the planning round and
whether extra funding is allocated to IS as a result of the Collections Review.
The difficulties of managing another journal cancellation exercise over the
Summer were discussed. The last one was in Summer 2010.
The Convenor and HCCS thanked Gail Dursma for attending two of
the meetings of the Review. The Convenor and HCCS attended the third and
final meeting.
10.
Student Issues and Concerns.
There were no students present at the meeting and the Secretary will contact
EUSA regarding non-attendance of reps. Several small group discussion
meetings with S&E students have recently been held and a range of issues are
now being addressed by library staff. The HCCS has recently raised an issue
over noise in the Darwin Library with the Director of Teaching in Biological
Sciences.
11.
AOB
There was no other business.
The date of the next meeting has been rescheduled to:
Thursday 7th June 2012 at 9.15am in the Hodgson Room, Weir Building, King’s
Buildings