13 Gippsland Library
Following the move of staff and collections into the new wing of the Library in
November 1997, the refurbishment of the ground floor of the "old"
library commenced. This area has become new offices/work area for staff,
hands-on teaching facility, conference room and staff room, with access to the
new wing. The move of Library staff into the refurbished area took place on 24
February. This went smoothly with most staff being relocated by early afternoon
and the telephones and faxes were generally operational by the end of that week.
The Library remained open, as reference/liaison staff were busy with orientation
tours for new students on that day and the following day.
The final major move of Library materials occurred over 2.5 days during the
week of 20 April. This involved shifting part of the serial collection to the
refurbished ground floor and re-arranging the remainder of the collection into
the smaller area remaining to the Library upstairs. Because of the unanticipated
loss of space on the second level of the "old" Library, part of the
serials collection is also housed in the refurbished lower level in an area
originally designated for the Curriculum Collection, a collection of teaching
materials used mostly by students of the Faculty of Education.
The new facility is providing a more pleasant environment for both users and
Library staff, and many favourable comments have been received.
Weekend schools for distance education students, although reduced to three per
semester, continue to be well attended. Training sessions run by Library staff
in the use of the catalogue and CD-ROM networks are well received.
The number of patrons coming into the Library has increased by 28% and
reference statistics are up by 22% over 1997 figures. This may be due to the
more welcoming environment of the new building (including windows,
air-conditioning, more spacious arrangement of resources, more study spaces),
and an improved roster which places two staff on the information desk at busy
times of the day, so that more queries are being responded to. Statistics also
showed greatly increased use of networked databases (up 54%), scanned exam
papers, and Internet access (up 200%) over 1997 figures.
The change to a faculty-based model of information services delivery has
resulted in increased liaison with academic staff on such matters as budgets,
acquisitions policy, Library impact statements etc., and the change has
generally been favourably received.
The Curriculum Collection was stored in boxes after December 1997 due to the
building program and was unavailable to patrons. However, after an undertaking
to weed the collection was given by staff of the Faculty of Education, Gippsland
Campus, the Library purchased additional shelving in order to provide a home for
the collection. Those items to be retained will be moved onto the new shelving
early in 1999, and are expected to be available in time for the first teaching
round of 1999.
With the impending changeover to a new library system in early 1999, Library
staff were involved in working parties assessing possible replacements for the
present (PALS) system. Since the selection of a new system, most Library staff
have been involved in training sessions, commencing late November. The scheduled
"live" date is 1 February 1999.
Due to the large decrease in the value of the Australian dollar, as well as
inflationary increases in the price of serial subscriptions, a major review of
serial subscriptions within the Monash University Library was held. Gippsland
liaison and serial staff were heavily involved during June and July. At the
beginning of August, final lists of proposed cancellations were advised to
academic staff. In all, 100 Gippsland subscriptions were cancelled, with a 1998
value of approximately $22,000.
With the retirement of Sir John Yocklunn, the Associate University Librarian
assumed overall responsibility for the Gippsland Library. Two senior managers
were appointed in March - the Customer Services Manager (Gippsland) to manage
the services, collections and facilities of the Gippsland Library and the
Flexible Library Services Unit Manager with responsibility for providing library
services to all Monash distance education and mixed mode study students across
all campuses. As a result of the transfer of the Technical Services functions to
Clayton, and as part of the ongoing staff training requirements which resulted,
a session on `Living and Working with Change' was held on 26 February 1998. This
was facilitated by Sue Brown and Sally Trembath-Hastings, and was attended by
all Library staff. Staff in the Serials and Lending Services sections requested
follow up sessions, and these were held on 30 September.
All staff attended training sessions for the Monash Messaging System, which
is replacing P-mail. Other courses attended by staff during the year included
Basic HTML, Leading a Team and Effective Telephone Techniques. Staff members
also attended the VALA conference in Melbourne, the ALIA biennial conference in
Adelaide and the CAVAL Disaster Recovery workshop in Melbourne.
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