Graduate Trainee Events 2008-2009

Back to current graduate trainee events.

Library visits:

• Visit to University Library
• Visit to Classics and Divinity libraries
• Visit to Norwich Millennium and Norwich Cathedral Libraries
• Visit to Scott Polar Research Institute
• Visit to Anglia Ruskin Library
• Visit to the National Art Library
• Visit to the Institute of Chartered Accountants Library

Other visits and events:

• CILIP Open Day
• Session on Library School applications

Training Opportunities

• Introduction to MARC21
• Introduction to electronic resources
• Subject resources
• Rare book cataloguing
• Various html/computing courses, available through the University Computing Service
• AACR2 training

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Visit Reports

Visit to University Library

One cloudy day in November we met outside the rather imposing Cambridge University Library. Our visit began with a talk given by Colin Clarkson on the history of the Library and its collections. As a legal deposit library, the UL is entitled to a copy of every book, paper or document copyrighted in the UK - a daunting prospect, even though many eighteenth-century books were considered not to be academic enough, and were sold off to be replaced by more worthy tomes. The scale of the task facing Library staff in receiving, cataloguing, classifying and preserving such a number of books became apparent when we were taken into a very long room full of rolling stacks and informed that this was only part of the cataloguing backlog.

After being guided through innumerable bookstacks (half-expecting to find a skeleton or two), offices, reading rooms and the rare books and maps room, we enjoyed a well-earned cup of tea in the infamous tearoom. The highlight of our visit was a trip up the Tower. As well as a fascinating collection of nineteenth-century literature, the Tower hosts an unparalleled view of Cambridge.

At the end of the tour we had a much better understanding of how the University Library works, and a much larger appreciation of the work involved in keeping such an institution running.

Laura Steel, 19 December 2008

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Visit to Classics and Divinity libraries

A valuable session on applying to library school was sandwiched between tours of two faculty libraries on the Sidgwick site. Our first visit was to the Divinity library, where we were greeted by Alice Hinkins, the Senior Library Assistant there. Alice gave us a brief tour of the library and explained some of its main features. As a theology graduate myself, I was interested to note that, as at my alma mater, the faculty is dominated by Christian theology but is striving to develop its collection of material concerning other religions and faiths. The design and layout of the library is intended to introduce as much light as possible, and the library certainly appeared to be a very attractive and modern place to study.

Later in the afternoon, Catrin took over as our guide and gave us a tour of the library in the Classics faculty, indicating its impressive collection of books and periodicals about the classical world. Catrin told us about the different kinds of material the library possesses and the plans underfoot to expand the library in the near future. Coming from a College library, I wanted to compare the different needs of readers and the different atmosphere in the library. One of the more memorable features of the library is its assortment of statues — and those of us who expressed an interest in these were unaware of the treat we had in store when Lyn Bailey, the Librarian of the Classics library, led us on a tour of the Museum of Classical Archaeology. It houses a magnificent collection of over four hundred plaster casts of Greek and Roman sculpture and served as a fitting end to an interesting afternoon.

Our thanks to Alice, Catrin and Lyn for their hospitality and for sharing their expertise!

Helen Murphy, 10 December 2008

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Visit to Norwich Millennium and Norwich Cathedral Libraries

Both libraries are housed in buildings which are part of the Norwich 12: a collection of outstanding heritage buildings spanning the Norman, medieval, Georgian, Victorian and modern eras. The Norwich Millennium Library is housed in The Forum, a £65 million project with a stunning glass façade that forms the entrance, built to mark the millennium in the East of England. The forum is on the site of the old Norwich Central Library, destroyed by fire in 1994. Norwich Cathedral Library is part of the Norman Cathedral, where medieval architectural wall fragments have been completed and re-roofed to provide a reading room and reception area. The library also occupies part of the upper east range of the Cathedral Cloisters.

We started our visit at The Millennium Library which was opened in 2001 and is now the busiest public library in the UK with 30,000 visitors a week. The library is spread across three floors: on the ground floor there is the Express section, which includes books, DVDs CDs and computer games and is laid out in 'a book shop style'. Also on the ground floor is the children's library which issues more books than the busiest branch library, and the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library which houses a collection of materials about American culture and the Second World War. The rest of the library is spread out across the first and second floors. The second floor provides a quieter working area within the heritage centre, and the business library. The IT services are integrated throughout the library. The library organises many community events to reach out to all ages and it is not difficult to see why it is the busiest public library in the UK. Our thanks to Catherine Wymer for not only taking the time to show us round, but also giving us a clearer understanding of the many issues facing public libraries in the 21st Century.

After a pleasant lunch we visited Norwich Cathedral Library where we given a tour by Librarian Gudrun Warren. The library collections consist of a modern theology loan collection of around 20,000 volumes covering subjects such as biblical studies, pastoral theology, ethics, liturgy and church history; about twenty journals complement the book collection. The historic collection in the Dean and Chapter's Library has items dating from 1474 and includes theology, literature, music, history and architecture. The library also acts as a collection point for ephemera from the cathedral including music sheets, sermons and newsletters. Our thanks to Gudrun for showing us round this beautiful and unique library.

Sophie Fisher, 09 January 2009

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Visit to Scott Polar Research Institute

In February we visited the Scott Polar Research Institute, founded in 1920 as a memorial to Captain Robert Falcon Scott and his four companions who died returning from the South Pole in 1912. The Institute is one of the most important centres for polar research in the world, and the collections held here are of huge significance both historically and in terms of current research. We began with a look around the museum, which holds many interesting objects including clothes and tools as well as pictures, photographs, letters and maps. We were then given a tour of the library by Heather Lane, Librarian and Keeper of Collections at the Institute, whose knowledge and enthusiasm helped to make our visit a fascinating one. The library, which holds one of the world's best collections related to the Polar Regions, contains publications in more than seventy languages and links the history of polar exploration with modern environmental and social research. The library also houses historic photographs and paintings of the Polar Regions, some of which are exhibited in the Shackleton Memorial Library. A highlight of our visit was the cold room, where furs and other objects are placed to kill moths: it is kept at a temperature of –40°C and we all got to test just how cold it was.

After our visit, we were invited to have a cup of tea, summoned by the ringing of the bell rescued from the Terra Nova ship captained by Scott. As we were drinking our tea, and musing over our visit, it rather appropriately began to snow.

Laura Steel, 20 February 2009

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Anglia Ruskin Library

In February we were treated to a tour of the bustling main library at the Cambridge campus of Anglia Ruskin University. Our tour guides were Paul Stephens and Corinne Berry, both of whom are graduate trainees at ARU, Paul being based in Cambridge, and Corinne in Chelmsford. The library at ARU is large and busy, housing over 150,000 books at the Cambridge site, a vast number of print journals and an impressive collection of CDs, DVDs and music scores. The library is open both to students and members of the public, and boasts very high visitor numbers. Because the student body at ARU is diverse, with many students taking part-time courses, the library is designed to function in such a way as to meet a variety of different needs. An example of this is the innovative MyLibrary facility, which enables users to log in to their accounts and check borrowing records, renew books, view past loans and more from their own computers.

Our tour began in the main hub of the library, a large entrance foyer where the walls are decorated with inspiring quotations, and tables for group work, a small café and a number of open access computers are accommodated. That part of our tour must have coincided with a well-earned break from study for many of the students, as facebook seemed to be the webpage of choice for most! Our tour guides were excellent, demonstrating how the library caters for a range of working styles, from quiet study space to larger rooms which can be booked by students for group work. In addition, we were given a polished demonstration of the library catalogue and the collection of digital resources provided by the library.

The size and functions of the library determine the nature of graduate traineeships at ARU. I think those of us based in Cambridge college libraries were a little taken aback by the detailed timetables for library assistants, but understood the necessity of such a structured system to facilitate the smooth running of such a lively library. At the end of our tour we were pleased to meet Jenny Cefai, the Staff Learning and Development Manager, who is responsible for the graduate trainee programme at ARU. We enjoyed a brief Q&A session over tea and cakes and were able to discuss some of the differences between our graduate traineeships and those experienced by Paul and Corinne.

Many thanks to all involved in organising our visit, and particularly to Paul and Corinne for their time and for imparting their knowledge to us.

Helen Murphy, 2 March 2009

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National Art Library

Towards the end of March our Graduate Trainee group spent the day in London, visiting the National Art Library in the morning and the library of the Institute of Chartered Accountants after lunch. The juxtaposition of these libraries accentuated their differences, architectural, stylistic and functional, inevitably inviting comparison. We were inspired to think about spaces and administrative responsibility in libraries, especially in important areas such as funding, management and the function and purpose of libraries in Britain today.

The National Art Library is situated within the Victoria & Albert Museum building, and its outstanding collections of primary material and secondary criticism on Art's multiple sub-disciplines have long made it England's most comprehensive resource for Art researchers. The scope of this National Library's exceptionally vast collections, numbering over two million texts, almost half of which are books, is demonstrably international; its holdings offer an exhaustive resource for the scholar of any artistic style, medium or genre. The Library contains a comprehensive collection of critical material in numerous languages (around half of which are written in languages other than English) covering the production, diffusion, graphic presentation and social appropriation of Art throughout human history.

A charming librarian took us on a pleasantly meandering tour through the library's heavily-laden stacks and along labyrinthine corridors, offering an informative commentary as we proceeded. We had been eagerly anticipating the opportunity to be shown a selection of the library's significant holdings of medieval texts and early printed material, and so were disappointed that these texts were not available. Nevertheless we found our elevated tour through this inspirational library fascinating. Our guide led us high up onto the balconies of the library, from which we gained a privileged insight into the library's 'backstage' operational routines and manoeuvrings, before emerging on the upper floors and walkways. The tour concluded from these lofty vantage points, overlooking the V&A's newly-installed exhibition halls.

However, the perspective offered to us extended beyond the route and commentary of the tour itself and was to enduringly stimulate much discussion and debate within our group. The visit gave us cause to consider our thoughts on library spaces. We had discovered that the painful truth is that The National Art Library's collections are too large for the space available to them. Their rooms are overcrowded, there is insufficient shelving and the library's decoration requires renovation and restoration. We were especially affected by the discovery that the unobtrusive grandeur of the library's reading rooms, once handsome, with their leather desks and burnished brass metalwork, now look and feel tarnished. These high-ceilinged halls may retain a faded, undisturbed beauty, a contemplative stillness, as if the quiet of these rooms has been uninterrupted for years, and yet this is the central irony at the heart of the conundrum facing the National Art Library - the library's collections and spaces have been disturbed and disrupted repeatedly in the recent past by the V&A Museum, upon whom the library's depends for funding and accommodative space. These spatial limitations on accessibility for readers and staff alike within the National Art Library have serious consequences for the conservation, preservation and housing of its collections. We found these limitations raise serious questions regarding the library's collection management, ease of access and text retrieval for library staff in response to reader requests.

Nor are these recent problems. In recent years the V&A has imposed budgetary and spatial cutbacks upon the National Art Library, who, faced with such disruptive administrative interference, have been forced to sacrifice staff and physical space within the building, resulting in the library's reduced workforce and restricted facilities.

Space here really is now at a premium. The Library, whose collections have survived and expanded steadily over time, has been forced to undergo numerous major administrative upheavals from its inception in the early nineteenth century, until now, when the library has been left with insufficient shelf-space for its extensive collections. Books are stacked on every available surface, over-spilling from the stacks onto the tops of overburdened shelves. The library and the V&A have always experienced a difficult relationship, at times, turbulent and tempestuous, but now is the time to transcend grievances and act upon what is best for the library and the outstanding resources that it is able to offer to the public.

Our group was in complete agreement that this splendid library's potential is being constrained by mismanagement, inadequate space and by insufficient funding, and that its collections deserve a more comfortable and more appropriate home. The museum's imposed cutbacks, restrictions and limitations undervalue the Library's exceptional nature and collections, putting its staff at a disadvantage and endangering the library's ability to accommodate not only its textual material, but, crucially, jeopardizing reader access to those collections. We departed for the Institute of Chartered Accountants via lunch feeling dissatisfied and aggrieved - we had been extremely impressed by the quality, scope and size of the National Art Library's collections, but found the forced conditions of their maintenance and administration to be lamentable.

Alexander Devine, 31 July 2009

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The Institute of Chartered Accountants

On Monday 23rd March we headed to the Chartered Accountant's Hall in Moorgate for a tour of their library services. From the start it was clear that information professionals with accountancy qualifications are very efficient and organised people. During our short visit we were treated to presentations by the head of Collection Development, the head of the Cataloguing Department, the head web developer, the head of reader services, and the head librarian. All manner of issues were covered by the welcoming and highly organised team, from copyright to money laundering. It was very interesting to hear how the specific demands of the accountancy profession are catered for by their library services, and to realise just how much work goes on behind the scenes to keep such an organisation running smoothly. Despite much of the financial lingo going over our heads, it is fair to say we were all suitably impressed by their professionalism and expertise.

Lucy Campbell, 1 April 2009

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Events Reports

CILIP Open Day

The Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals runs many events throughout the year at their London headquarters. On October 3rd we attended the graduate open day which included presentations, discussion groups, a CV clinic from INFOmatch and speed networking. Most of us were reluctant to sign up for speed networking as it sounded too much like dating for the desperate, but Sophie bravely gave it a go and found it very informative and interesting. Hopefully future trainees won't be put off by the name!

Discussion topics included how to reflect on your career, and how librarians describe their work. One memorable description was 'I'm a taxi driver for the information super highway. I get you to where you want to go and I use the shortcuts to get you there faster.' I'll have to use that one if I'm ever in a taxi myself.

Three professional librarians also gave talks which highlighted the different paths your career can take. One provided useful tips on how to get published, while another made a persuasive argument for blogging as a means of promoting yourself and improving your career prospects.

The open day was a good way to familiarise ourselves with CILIP and meet others in the profession.

Lucy Campbell, 5 December 2008

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Session on Library School applications

The graduate trainees this year were treated to an excellent and informative session on applying to library school, ably organised by Alice Hinkins of the Divinity library. We were fortunate to welcome Claire Warwick, Senior Lecture at the School of Library, Archive and Information Studies at UCL and programme director of the MA degree in Electronic Communication and Publishing. The session was enriched by the fact that Alice herself was a graduate of the part-time MA in Library and Information Studies and by the presence of another speaker at the session, Naomi Herbert, previous graduate trainee and present Library Assistant at St John's, who is obtaining her qualification via the distance-learning programme at Aberystwyth. This meant that not only were we able to gain some insights about what programme directors might be looking for in their applicants, but Alice and Naomi provided us with first hand accounts of their experiences of studying at UCL and Aberystwyth.

Even though I am sure I am not alone in thinking that the traineeships have only just begun, some of the deadlines for degrees are approaching quickly and so the session was held at an opportune time, encouraging us to think seriously about our plans for the future. Our speakers ably indicated to us the variety of degrees available to qualify in librarianship and the diversity of means of doing so. We were directed to the CILIP website for more details on the courses accredited by CILIP. We were also advised about the advantages and disadvantages of studying full- and part-time and by distance learning, about recent changes in the way that funding is both applied for and allocated, and provided with a great deal of useful information about how the application process works, what information to include in a personal statement and what we might expect at an interview.

I'm sure I speak for all the trainees when I offer our thanks to Claire, Alice and Naomi for their patience and excellent advice, for providing detailed and useful answers to our questions and concerns and, of course, for the luxury tea and biscuits we were offered!

Helen Murphy, 10 December 2008

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