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BIALL, CLSIG and SLA Europe Open Day 2013 part 2

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Hello, Francesca here, Academic Services trainee at the Bodleian Law Library. Following on from Kat’s post, here’s a little of what I took away from the BIALL, CLSIG, and SLA Europe Open Day (acronyms helpfully explained by Kat below!) which we were lucky enough to attend at the CILIP head offices in London on Wednesday.

After a nice rush hour battle with the tube, I soon settled in to the talk by the first of the day’s nine speakers, each of whom gave a fascinating insight into their career paths to date. What I learnt immediately from Jacky Berry’s presentation was that there are a lot more sectors into which a professional qualification in Librarianship and Information can lead that I had imagined! Jacky’s experiences and suggestions for sectors to look in included Building and Architecture, MI5 and charities. The number of different job titles associated with the information profession is also never-ending, and it was interesting to learn of Jacky’s management of the recent redevelopment of the British Medical Association Library. It was an excellent eye-opener to the types of roles to look out for.

IALS Library
IALS Library. Image from Twitter.

I had however, gone into the day hoping to learn more about the Legal sector, whether as a law librarian in an academic institutiton, or as a researcher for a law firm. Working for the Bodleian Law Library has certainly inspired me to consider specialising withing the legal sector when I finish my traineeship, and gain my professional qualification.  Six of the day’s nine speakers either work or have worked as a law librarian or for a law firm, and we were given an insightful tour of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies Library. Needless to say, I wasn’t disappointed with the amount of information given. (A little overwhelmed maybe, but now is the time to go away and process it!)

Two of the speakers were recent graduates, both recipients of the SLA Early Career Conference Award. Both now work as Information Officers for London law firms. It was interesting to hear from people not long ago in my position on how they got to where they are, and allowed me to see that it is something realistic for me to pursue, given my experience in the Bodleian Law Library, and my enrollment on the MScEcon Information and Library Studies at Aberystwyth University. Their talks gave extremely useful tips on how to make yourself stand out. Indeed, I am a little behind the times, and yet to open a Twitter account or a LinkedIn account. Marie Cannon’s talk reminded and persuaded me of the importance of these tools (when used sensibly!) in keeping up to date with developments in the sector, keeping in touch and making new connections with professionals, and in job hunting in all areas of librarianship. I shall be going home to create these this weekend! Sam Wiggins highlighted the usefulness of joining professional bodies, particularly for those in corporate sectors such as law, and trying your luck at applying for awards and bursaries such as the ECCA . ‘If you don’t ask (apply), you don’t get’!

There were also two talks from established Librarians, one from Emily Allbon, Law Librarian at City University Library, and one from Sandra Smythe, Senior Information Officer at a London law firm. It was extremely interesting (and again a little overwhelming!) to learn of the huge variety of tasks that Emily undertakes as City’s Law Librarian, from teaching and managing budgets to her work on creating Lawbore, a fanatastic directory for students of links to law resources on the web. I am still very much drawn towards attempting to stay working in an academic environment, as I thoroughly enjoy the interaction with students. However, like Kat, the idea of undertaking legal research is an inviting (if daunting!) challenge. Sandra discussed her past and current roles working for London law firms. The process of research has always been something I thoroughly enjoy, and whilst in an academic situation the students research for themselves, a role at a law firm would be a great opportunity to continue researching myself (albeit under quite demanding and time-pressured circumstances!)

As you can see, then, the open day has given me a lot of food for thought! I too would like to thank everyone involved, particularly those who spoke – the talks were thought-provoking and extremely useful at this point in my deciding what opportunities to seek, whether they end up being in the legal sector, or somewhere else. I also learnt that planning a path in the Information sector doesn’t always work, so we shall see! As mentioned by Kat, the presentations can be found on the CLSIG event pages.

BIALL, CLSIG, SLA Europe Open Day 2013 part 1

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Kat Steiner here again, one of the graduate trainees at the Bodleian Law Library. On Wednesday, Frankie Marsden and I headed down to London for the BIALL, CLSIG, SLA Europe Open Day, a day of presentations and tours based at the CILIP headquarters near Russell Square. We thought we’d give you a few of our thoughts on the day, especially on what we individually will take away from it.

A few acronym explanations before we start. BIALL is the British and Irish Association of Law Librarians, CILIP is the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, CLSIG is a special interest group within CILIP standing for Commercial, Legal and Scientific Information Group, and SLA Europe is the European and UK division of the Special Libraries Association. Still with me? Just the names alone were a lot to take in!

Copyright Wellcome Library
The Wellcome Library

Over the day, we heard 9 speakers, whose places of work included London law firms, the Law library of City University, the Wellcome Library, the British Medical Association, the Inner Temple, Linex (a company offering current awareness tools and aggregation for subscribers), and the British Library. It was fascinating to hear the stories of how they had reached their current jobs (often by a combination of luck, enthusiasm and perseverance), and their varied positions. It particularly stood out to me how many people mentioned TFPL, a recruitment agency, as being invaluable in helping them find jobs. I hadn’t heard of them, but I will definitely be looking into them now!

There was also the opportunity to go on a tour of either the Wiener Library, a collection for the study of the holocaust & genocide, the library of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, or the library of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies. As Law Bod trainees, Frankie and I both chose the IALS, and enjoyed a detailed tour and talk by David Gee, the Deputy Librarian. As the library takes three graduate trainees every year, he had a lot of insight and suggestions for what to do afterwards if you are thinking of going into law librarianship.

Several speakers were also from law firm libraries, or law librarians in other institutions, and it was very interesting to hear about their jobs in detail. I hadn’t personally thought much about specialising, or moving away from academic librarianship (I’m hoping to stay at the Bodleian while I do my library school masters), but there definitely seemed to be a lot to recommend ‘special libraries’. The chance to do real legal research was very attractive to me as an academic challenge (at the Law Bod, students are expected to do their own research, although there are lots of classes to help them learn how to do it). However, I’m not sure I could cope with the increased pressure, longer hours and difficult deadlines that come along with it. The rather better pay might sweeten the pill, though.

Copyright Inner Temple Library
The Inner Temple Library

The talk that really stood out for me was from Simon Barron, a Project Analyst at the British Library. He focused on the concept of  ‘digital librarians’, and the way that technology is transforming the information profession and will continue to do so. In the days of ‘big data‘ (a current buzzword that I’m still not hugely clear on – in my understanding, it can mean data sets so large that they allow statistical programs to crunch through them and draw remarkably accurate conclusions without any attempt at explaining how the causation between the conclusions and the data works), librarians who can code, use technology, and be willing to learn new technological skills will be more and more in demand. He described his current project with the British Library and the Qatar Foundation to create a digital National Library of Qatar. This is an ambitious project, involving huge numbers of documents to be digitised, including 14th- and 15th-century Arabic manuscripts. Simon’s job seemed to involve a lot of technological problem-solving, for example ‘how do we get this data out of this piece of software and into this other piece of software without losing it, or having to do it by hand’. He explained that his coding knowledge was entirely self-taught through Codecademy and that, although he didn’t consider it his crowning achievement, his colleagues were still very impressed when he made a spreadsheet where the boxes change colour depending on the data you enter.

Simon’s talk made a big impression on me, and really confirmed my feeling that the MSc in Information Science is for me. I have some basic experience with coding good practice (a 10-week internship at a software company, writing code in Perl), and the main thing I took away is that it’s really not that hard or scary, it just requires logic, perseverance (read: stubbornness even when it doesn’t work), and the willingness to have a go even if you’re not sure what you’re doing. I believe anyone who really wants to can learn to use technology, but they may not see the point. Simon emphasised the use of technology to automate what would be fairly simple human processes. This is a great point – if you can automate a simple action on a computer (for example, removing formatting from a text file, or averaging each row in a spreadsheet), you not only save time, you make the process scaleable to much larger sets of data, which would take humans far too long to deal with, and you reduce the possibility of human error, as long as your code actually works!

Anyway, you can see that this made quite an impression. Another thing I will take away is how many things are worth joining to get more involved in the information profession. You can join CILIP for £38 a year if you’re a student or graduate trainee, definitely worth doing! You can join SLA (of which SLA Europe is a chapter) for $40 a year if you’re a student (even part-time, but I’m not sure about graduate trainees). You can join BIALL for £17 a year if you are a full-time student. You might want to consider registering with TFPL. SLA Europe offers an Early Career Conference Award, which three of the speakers had won, allowing them to go to amazing conferences in San Diego, Chicago and Philadelphia. BIALL also offers an award for the best library school dissertation on a legal topic. And, finally, Information Architect is a job title it might be worth looking out for.

That’s pretty much all I have to say for this post (I’ve waffled for more than long enough). Frankie will be talking about the aspects of the day that she really liked, and I’m sure they will be very different! I just want to thank everyone who helped organise the conference – it gave me loads to think about, allowed me to meet plenty of other graduate trainees, and generally have a great time. For anyone who wants a more general idea of the day – the slides from the presentations that everyone gave can be found on the CLSIG website.

RBSCG Conference on Speaking Truth to Power: Making Special Collections Work in Times of Recession, September 2012

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Over two months ago now, I attended a CILIP-organised Rare Books and Special Collections Group (RBSCG) Conference at Lady Margaret Hall in Oxford, and at last I am writing a blog post about it!

The conference was entitled Speaking Truth to Power: Making Special Collections Work in Times of Recession; I attended the third and final day, when the focus was on what special collections can contribute to communities.  Perhaps the main attraction for me was the second talk of the morning, given by Judy Faraday, Partnership Archivist, John Lewis.  (To all John Lewis lovers, I am sure it will be obvious why!)  Whilst she was approaching the importance of special collections from a very specific, corporate point of view, Faraday’s understanding of her own role within John Lewis was so relevant to libraries and the contemporary issues they are facing.  She described how she needs to justify her existence to the John Lewis Partnership, by demonstrating that her work can and does have an impact, as well as being relevant to the company’s overarching agenda.  For us, then, as future librarians, the key to making special collections – or indeed the regular library catalogue – work in times of recession is simply to find ways to make them work.  We must be able, and willing, to either see possibilities for the books and spaces over which we have guardianship, or create possibilities so that we can always justify their and our existence.  The answer won’t always be the same in every situation, and perhaps this is where the true variety and enjoyment of librarianship lies.

Neil MacInnes, Head of Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Library, began the morning’s talks, explaining to us the work being done in Manchester to reassert the city’s Central Library as a valuable space and resource for the community.  He spoke of special collections touring the local libraries nearby in order to expose them to new audiences; café tabletops onto which images of special collections will be projected; displays and exhibitions on local history, which people will hopefully want to engage with.  For more details see:

http://www.manchester.gov.uk/info/500211/town_hall_complex_transformation/4824/central_library_refurbishment

As well as making special collections seem more relevant, I think that this focus on visitor experience, which it is often suggested has been undervalued in the past, will potentially help visitors to feel more relevant to the library and the things it has to offer.  This is of course the key to community living – understanding the nature and importance of our relationship to the spaces in which we move, and in which we encounter others.

Christopher Parkin, Lead Education Officer, Museum of the History of Science, Oxford, provided a third insight into the importance of special collections to the community, focusing on the relevance of the Museum’s antiquarian science books.  Parkin’s was a unique insight, since the objectivity of the book offers scope for discussions on the science of materiality and construction.  The book itself, as well as what it has to say, is thus relevant to the aims and purposes of the Museum; its calls to be viewed, touched and utilised are all the louder for it.  This, along with the fact that the Museum accommodates visits from many school children, for whom interactions with actual objects and not just ideas can really bring the history of science to life, reminds us just how problematic a special collection’s relevance can be.  Its ‘special’, individual quality is both the reason it should be protected and cared for, and the reason for utilising it.  I think that this dichotomy of utility and preservation will prove particularly prevalent within the public library sector in the future, for two reasons.  Firstly, it must surely be the case that public libraries are custodians of special collections on behalf of the communities that they serve; the public therefore has a right to access and enjoy the collections.  Secondly, as Neil MacInnes highlighted, librarians’ plans for their libraries must tap into Councils’ agendas; anything that contributes something positive and enticing to a public space, and which is made relevant to people of all ages and backgrounds, will almost certainly do the trick.

What with justifying ourselves and our libraries, making our collections interesting to those whom we serve, and taking responsibility for the preservation of special collections, it seems to me that there’s plenty to keep the library and information profession, and its professionals, relevant for a good while yet.

Digital Preservation: What I Wish I Knew Before I Started

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Last week I attended a student conference on digital preservation, hosted by the Digital Preservation Coalition. The event was called ‘What I Wish I Knew Before I Started’, and several digital preservationists gave some very interesting insights into the skills and challenges of digital preservation. The basic message was that digital preservation is a big task which requires urgent action, but that archivists already have many of the skills needed to carry it out. I’ve posted about it at the futureArch blog, if anyone is interested in finding out more.

CILIP Career Development Group New Professionals Conference 2011

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On Monday, June 20th, I attended the CILIP Career Development Group’s New Professionals Conference at the University of Manchester, along with Kirsty Braithwaite, Anna Smith and Sonja Kujansuu from the Bodleian Law Library. I initially found out about this conference through Twitter (#npc2011), in addition to the CILIP CDG website, and thought that it might be very useful to attend, given that the conference theme was “Activism and Professionalism at a Time of Downturn”, and, as graduate trainees soon about to embark on our journey towards becoming information professionals, this topic is extremely relevant.

The conference consisted of a two series of presentations with two workshops.

The morning programme opened with three presentations:

Helen Murphy presented the CPD23, 23 Things for Continuing Professional Development. Her presentation and links to the CPD23 programme can be found here.  Given that training budgets are often reduced, information professionals must continue to develop their skills and take charge of their own career development. The CPD23 programme is available for anyone to join, allowing work at one’s own pace. It is inclusive, informal and cost-free. Like the 23 Things programme, the CPD23 programme explores emerging technology which impact on the information profession, but differs from the 23 Things programme in that it examines and focuses on devlopment of professional skills (such as social networking for career development, personal branding and on-line presence). The CPD23 programme enables information professionals to share expertise and learn from others, thereby forming strong networks, and also encourages one to grow in confidence as goals are achieved.

The next presentation, given by Rachel Bickley, discussed how new professionals can establish a dialogue with experienced professionals for career development. Again, this presentation stressed the importance of establishing networks. New professionals can benefit from the expertise of experienced professionals, but are often perceived as lacking in skills and “cliquey” with their on-line communities. New professionals must be ready to think outside the box and take advantage of transferrable skills whilst demonstrating a willingness to learn and forge strong networks.

Sam Wiggins and Laura Williams then presented “What makes an Information ‘Professional‘”. This talk was very well-researched, and I was impressed with the depth and scope of the work. I found this talk particularly relevant given the debate over obtaining professional qualifications (postgraduate degrees and chartership) versus on-the-job experience, particularly as the definition of an “information professional” is evolving and changing.

I was fortunate to attend a workshop facilitated by Simon Barron and Alice Halsley on activism for new professionals. Simon and Alice are members of a library activism group, Voices for the Library, which has been very active in campaigning against library closures and funding cuts to public library services. I found this workshop inspring and engaging. Activism is not only marching in demonstrations, but can also take the form of everyday actions such as telling friends and family to visit their local public libraries. Activism can be used to boost your professional profile, as it can add to your toolkit of professional skills, thereby filling gaps in your CV. Finally, activism for libraries is in itself a worthwhile pursuit, as new professionals should be advocates of their profession, contributing to both short-term and long-term change for the better.

Following a light lunch, I attended the second workshop facilitated by Sue Hornby and Bob Glass: “Raising your Professional Profile”. This workshop enabled the participants to explore and become aware of potentially overlooked professional skills and transferrable skills such as communication, networking and time and resource management.

The afternoon session also consisted of three presentations:

Ka-Ming Pang and Joseph Norwood gave a beautifully-illustrated talk on LIS student activism and why it is important for LIS students to become engaged and involved with their profession.

Megan Wiley then presented on the need to develop professionalism in a careers information team.

Finally, the award-winning presentation of the day was given by Katie Birkwood and Naomi Herbert,  special collections librarians at St. John’s College, Cambridge. Their presentation examined outreach as a means of raising the public profile both of the library and its collections and librarianship as a profession. Their projects focussed on specific items within the library’s collections, in this case, the archives of the astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle, and  a 15th Century text on magic tricks, Hocus Pocus Junior (1638). The Hoyle project involved making your own astrolabe. You can even give it a go yourself!

In all, the CILIP New Professionals Conference was an engaging and inspiring look at what the profession will mean to new information professionals, and a practical examination at what we can do to further our own career development, thereby affecting the future of the profession as a whole.

3D: digitize, deliver, discover

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On Monday I went to the University of Manchester to attend a conference on digitization. The theme for the conference was “3D: digitize, deliver, discover”. Targeted at a wide audience, this event aimed to cover all aspects of digitization, both of special collections and of core texts and teaching materials.

The conference featured presentations from digitization experts from across the higher education and heritage sectors, including representatives from JISC and the University of Oxford. Topics covered included the processes involved in producing digital content, the challenges of preserving it, and the experiences of the end-users: academics and students. There was also the opportunity to learn about particular digitization projects, including the impressive heritage digitization work currently ongoing at the John Rylands University Library in Manchester.

One of the key messages of the conference was that institutions need to consider the impact of their digital collections. Daniel Szechi, Professor of Early Modern History at Manchester, described the ways in which digital content can enhance learning and teaching, and called on libraries to expand their digital offerings. Michael Stocking, Managing Director of Armadillo Systems (a company which develops websites and apps for libraries), argued that user-experience is fundamental to the successful ‘surfacing’ of digital library collections.

Attending the conference was a really valuable learning experience. I came away with a much better understanding of the progress that has been made so far with digitization and the challenges which will need to be overcome in the future.

Further information about the event, including the programme and list of speakers, can be found on the John Rylands University Library website.

British Library Study Day: Engaging through the Online World

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On Thursday 17th February, we attended a study day at the British Library, along with other Bodleian staff in the social science division and representatives from LSE and the British Library. The objective was to discuss prospects and problems for social science librarians and researchers regarding engaging through the online world.

After a nice cup of tea, but sadly no biscuits, Jude England, Head of Social Sciences, gave an introduction to the day and recent developments in the BL. This included their fittingly named ‘2020 Vision’, which will see, among many others, mass participation, crowd sourcing, and supporting research for economic and social benefit.

This introduction was then followed by a talk from guest speaker Karen Phillips, the Editorial Director from Sage Publications. She began by giving a brief outline of the picture of research around the world today, highlighting a growth of investment, a changing geographical and disciplinary spread as well as a move towards new models of publishing as technology changes, including open access and multi-media websites. To illustrate these, she offered the examples of SAGE Open and SAGE Research Methods Online. Overall her talk provided a unique insight into the relationship between publishers and libraries, at times inspiring almost heated debate. It was certainly interesting to see a publisher fend off a room full of librarians!

A little later than scheduled, presentations showcasing Online Developments at the British Library began with Linda Arnold-Stratford, Lead for Management and Business Studies, introducing the new Management and Business Studies Portal, which offers remote access to the BL’s business collections.

Following this, Gill Ridgley, Lead for Sport, Sociology and Cultural Studies, gave an overview of the new site Sport and Society: examining the Summer Olympics and Paralympics through the lens of Social Science. This site, divided into subject, showcases the BL’s collections on sport and Olympics. It includes contributions from academics, publishers, archivists, politicians and BL colleagues. The site also offers links and gateways to a range of related resources.

Next Luke McKernan, Lead for Moving Image, presented Video Server, part of the current Growing Knowledge exhibition. The moving image collection works with outside providers to create a comprehensive collection of news programmes, recorded selectively across 18 channels. These video clips are searchable by subtitle text, making television as searchable as a newspaper. Video Server will become a reading room service from September 2011, though unfortunately will not be made available for remote access due to copyright issues.

To round off the BL’s presentations of their online developments, Jonnie Robinson, Lead for Sociolinguistics and Education, gave an introduction to the popular BL exhibition Evolving English: one language, many voices. Including archival sound recordings, for example of accents and dialects or children’s playground games, this page is the most visited on the BL website, with 15,000 visits or plays per month, and figures suggest Evolving English will be the most visited BL exhibition ever. The exhibition demonstrates the social, cultural and historical influences on the English language through a collection of material, such as slang dictionaries and medieval manuscripts, as well as copious sound recordings. You can even leave your own recording at one of the ‘voice banks’, either by reading a chosen passage from Mr Tickle, or a list of six words. The website also offers the chance to ‘map your voice’, and listen to those who have already contributed. For both of us, this was definitely the highlight of the day.

After lunch, Matthew Shaw, Lead Curator of North American History, reflected on the Growing Knowledge exhibition, which showcases a variety of innovative research tools. The public are invited to try out these 25 different tools, with the most popular including Mendeley, the UK Web Archive, and joVE.

The day rounded off with a workshop session, discussing prospects and problems for researchers and librarians in an online world, as well as collaborative ideas for the coalition in the future. Although this was a rather terrifying experience, it was really interesting to hear discussion on such important topics in the information profession from people who have experienced these issues first hand.

As an optional extra, we were then given a tour of the Evolving English exhibition, a lovely way to round off the day despite having to make a dash for the train. We definitely recommend a visit!

Ruth and Lauren

Archive Trainees Group

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On Thursday I attended the first ever meeting of the Archive Trainees Group, along with Emma and Nicky, at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew.

After a slightly awkward start, with lots of people sitting on leaf-shaped chairs trying not to make eye-contact with each other, things relaxed a bit and I got to do some Networking. I immediately found myself in the odd situation of recognising somebody from their blog – Holly Fairhall of the controversial ‘My Archiving Hell’. After my assurances that I was not one of the haters, she agreed to give me a shout-out on her Twitter feed.

The first formal part of the meeting consisted of two presentations, from Elizabeth Shepherd at UCL and Caroline Brown at Dundee, discussing the nature of their Archives and Records Managment courses. This wasn’t all new information for me as I have already done a bit of research about the courses available and applied for one. However, it was useful to pick up some interview tips, learn that I should forget about receiving funding and that I probably won’t get a job when I qualify.

After more chatting, coffee and unexpectedly high quality biscuits (thanks ARA!), we listened to three trainees give presentations about their jobs.

First up was Sarah Cox of the Royal Botanic Garden, Kew. It was reassuring to see that her role was not all that different to mine, and that we even work on similar material given Magdalen’s historical links with the Botanic Garden in Oxford. She has already started on a distance learning Master’s course, which was not something I had previously given much consideration, but might have to think about.

Second was Sharon Messenger of the Wellcome Library. Working as a student at the Wellcome Library was what got me interested in archives/special collections in the first place, so it was interesting to hear from somebody coming from a similar background. The most notable difference between the Wellcome Library and anywhere I have worked is their highly proactive acquisitions policy, so it was interesting to hear about her trips around Britain picking up people’s papers – I may need to learn how to drive after all.

Last up was our own Emma Hancox of the FutureARCH project – I had been lucky enough to get a tour of her workplace the day before, but it was nice to have it explained again in a more formal presentation. Emma’s work is quite different from that experienced by most trainees, and definitely seemed to generate the most interest around the room.

All in all it was a good experience, and it was valuable to compare notes with others at the same stage of their career- this can be rather difficult as archivists often work in small teams or by themselves.  The group will continue meeting every few months for the rest of the year,  and hopefully beyond.