The second SMT Surgery will be taking place on Wednesday 11th September.  SMT members Rozz Evans (Head of Collection Strategy) and Karen Jeger (Head of Collection Services) will be available between 2.00 and 3.30 in Rooms 102 and 103 in the Roberts Building.

Please email lib-smt@ucl.ac.uk to book a particular time-slot.  Alternatively you can just turn up on the day (although you may have to wait a short while if SMT members are already speaking with colleagues). We can also arrange Skype but please let us know in advance so we can ensure we have the necessary set-up to.  You can come on your own or as part of a small group, and can specify that you would like to see a particular member of SMT (from those available) if you prefer.  In the first surgery, a colleague attended bringing a number of questions and issues on behalf of their team which was a very useful and productive conversation so that might be something worth considering.

This is a pilot and will be running until December, so if you are unable to attend on the 11th September, future agreed dates are:

4^th  November (11.00 – 1.00 pm)

10^th  December (5.00 – 7.00 pm)

We welcome feedback throughout the process from those who attend and those who don’t!  During the pilot, the surgeries are being run by a small group of SMT (myself, Karen Jeger, Peter Dennison, Andy Pow and June Hedges).  If it proves to be something that is useful and becomes an ongoing thing, on the full SMT will take turns to run the surgeries. In the meantime, if there are particular SMT members you would like to meet with, please let us know.  Notes from previous SMT meetings are available on LibNet too.

Further to my previous blog post from July (and June Hedges’ lightning talk at the Library Staff Conference) we are delighted to announce that the first SMT Surgery will be taking place on Friday 16^th August.  SMT members Rozz Evans (Head of Collection Strategy), Karen Jeger (Head of Collection Services) and Peter Dennison (Head of Customer Service) will be available between 10.00 and 12.00 in Room 770 at the Institute of Education.

Colleagues are able to book a slot by emailing lib-smt@ucl.ac.uk or are welcome to drop-in on the day (although you may have to wait a short while if SMT members are already speaking with colleagues).  You can come on you own or as part of a small group, and can specify that you would like to see a particular member of SMT  (from those available) if you prefer.

Apologies that this is rather short notice, but don’t worry if you can’t attend this one.  The pilot will be running until December and the following future dates have now been agreed:

11^th September (2.00 – 4.00 pm)

4^th  November (11.00 – 1.00 pm)

10^th  December (5.00 – 7.00 pm)

These sessions will be advertised a minimum of two weeks in advance of the date via the LibNet blog and will include the location and names of SMT who will be present.

As this is a pilot, we are planning to refine the process as we go along so we will be seeking feedback from colleagues.

We look forward to seeing some of you soon!

There will be several projects being carried out during this summer, the details are below, if you have any queries please do not hesitate to contact the Facilities and Projects team james.woodhouse@ucl.ac.uk, phil.watson@ucl.ac.uk or c.lawrence@ucl.ac.uk:

Senate House Hub : Work to refurbish the Senate House Hub will be starting on 12th August 2019. During this time Senate House Hub will be closed, the work will take about 4 weeks to complete and will be re-opening in early September 2019. When the space re-opens it will be a dedicated Post Graduate Research (PGR) and Centre for Doctorial Training (CDT) space. There will be new training room fitted, an increase of study spaces and additional comfortable study spaces.

Graduate Hub: Work will be starting on 12th August 2019 , the work will take about 4 weeks to complete, during this time this space will be closed for the duration of the works, and re-opening early September 2019. This is work is taking place to increase the number of study spaces, have more study focused furniture and a refurbished kitchen and main study rooms.

IOE Entrance:Work is taking place with effect from 12th August 2019, users of the Library will be redirected by additional signage and assistance from Library staff and Security. The project will install new turnstiles with accessible lanes in and out, a new single combined service desk with Library and ISD in one place, Smart Shelves return system and a new self-issue kiosk. This work is due to be completed by early September 2019.

Changing Places Accessibility Toilet – Science Library: work for this will be starting on the 12th August 2019. This will create the first nationally listed Changing Places Toilet at UCL.  The work will take about 7 weeks to complete.

Electrical Infrastructure on Central Campus: Noisy works will be associated with the drilling etc. with installation of cabling containment.  We are not expecting this to generate any vibration issues.

The works are the replacement of the two Transformers associated with the T2 Substation, located at the Ground floor level of Petrie Museum.  All works will be confined to within the substation rooms, but will generate noise during the working week, and will – on the weekend of Transformer delivery – impact the Malet Place road way usage.

Outline programme:

• 22^nd July – 2^nd August – Cable / Containment and associated builders works:
• 3^rd/4^th August – Transformer # 1 replacement (Load management)
• 5^th August – 6^th September – Remaining preparation / modification works:
• 7^th/8^th September – Transformer # 2 replacement
• 9^th – 13^th September – Final snagging and making good.
• 13^th September – Work completed

Science Library Windows: There will be contractors surveying the windows at various times throughout the Science Library, this is in preparation for work to start in the summer of 2020 to replace them.

The Library’s Senior Management Team (SMT) has been considering feedback from colleagues concerning the perceived lack of visibility of the team and a desire for a greater understanding of what the SMT does. We are aware that it would be helpful for colleagues to engage directly with by meeting and talking with SMT colleagues in order to raise issues of concern or suggest ideas for improvement.

As a first step we have refreshed the SMT information on LibNet and added more information about individual responsibilities as well as including photos and contact details. Feedback on the revised information on LibNet is welcome.  We have made sure that the last three months of minutes from SMT’s monthly meetings are available and will continue to ensure these are up-to-date.  Notes from earlier meetings are available on request from Noel Caliste, who is Paul’s Executive Assistant (n.caliste@ucl.ac.uk).

SMT have also decided to set up a series of Surgeries, modelled on those offered by MPs to give individuals and small groups the opportunity to meet members of the SMT face-to-face and raise issues of concern.  At least two members of SMT will be present at each surgery. This will be a pilot, and we will be asking for feedback from colleagues throughout the pilot so that we can see if this is something that is useful, or whether there is a better way to improve two-way communication.

Where possible, Surgeries will be held in non-library spaces.  They are going to be held on different days and times of the week to enable as many colleagues as possible to attend.  They will be timed to occur in-between SMT meetings, and issues and feedback raised by staff at the Surgeries will be discussed at the next SMT so that staff can be assured that issues will be followed-up.

While the pilot Surgeries are all located in Bloomsbury, there will be the option to Skype or phone in.  If the pilot is successful, we will ensure that they are offered outside the Bloomsbury campus if there is demand.

The dates and times for the Surgeries will be publicised on LibNet as soon as they are available, along with information for booking.

Building Team blog – Summer Projects 2019

If you have any queries regarding projects please contact Jay james.woodhouse@ucl.ac.uk

The Library has secured funding for four projects from the Central Estates Strategy Board (CESB) for this summer. These are:

Science Library – To create a new accessible toilet to be installed on the ground floor. This will include with a hoist and changing facilities. To be undertaken as soon as possible at the start of the summer, the project is likely to take fourteen weeks.

Graduate Hub, South Wing – Refurbish the main room and kitchenette. This area will become more study focused with individual study spaces, rather than sofas. The Kitchenette and Main room will be redecorated, new floor covering and all new furniture. In the computer room the chairs will be replaced. The duration of this project will be ten weeks.

Senate House Hub – This will repurpose the Senate House hub into a Post Graduate Research (PGR) only space. The front half of the space will be for PGR, while the rear area will be for funded Centre for Doctorial Training (CDT). Some of the existing furniture will be relocated within the space, with some new furniture and an additional card controlled door. The duration of this project will be ten weeks.

Institute of Education – The entrance will be refurbished with new turnstiles and a combined Library/ISD service desk, similar to the Science Library Learning Lab Help point installed last year. Smart Shelves will be installed, this is an alternative to an auto sorter. The duration of the project six weeks towards the end of the summer.

This year marked the fifth year that Springer Nature has hosted the annual Better Science through Better Data conference. The proceedings this year were held at the Natural History Museum – an appropriate venue for discussion about open science considering the museum employs around 300 scientists. The talk was kick-started with a welcome from the Head of Data Publishing at Springer Nature – Iain Hrynaszkiewicz – who introduced the key themes for the conference on ‘making data useable’ and creating ‘accessible and reproducible research’. This was swiftly followed by a presentation from Rebecca Boyles advocating the role of the data generalist through a potted life history of her professional journey into science. Data is becoming such a highly valuable resource that it is now even overtaking oil as the world’s most valuable resource. For Boyles, the rise of the data generalist clearly signals a catalyst for change in the sector. Next Maria Teperek from TU Delft turned the discussion towards FAIR data principles and the challenges involved in managing research data.  At TU Delft, part of these challenges are being addressed by the creation of designated data stewards who provide subject-specific support in research data management across the university. Teperek, however, was keen to remind the audience that data stewards are consultants and not police as their main role is to help improve the culture of research. Publishers too have a role to play in helping achieve FAIR principles by enabling researchers to share their data. But still the main obstacle to data management and sharing, at least for Teperek, remain cultural rather than technological.

A series of lightning talks dominated the latter part of the conference. Sophie Adler from UCL gave a talk on how sharing protocols have facilitated the detection of epilepsy lesions. Others highlighted themes such as achieving FAIR data in practice through the development of a web platform (Aliaksandr Yakutovich), the difficulties of gaining consent for data archiving (Jane Seymour) and the pitfalls of achieving open science when the very idea of openness can be called into dispute (Alastair Rae). The lightning talks were followed by further keynote talks from the perspective of those working in publishing and journalism. Magdalena Skipper, Editor-in-Chief of Nature, emphasised the role that publishers play in helping researchers to share their data by pointing to the fact that 60% of Springer Nature journals have now adopted a research data policy. John Burn-Murdoch from the Financial Times turned the audience’s attention towards the visualisation of data by providing some useful tips on how to get the most out of reporting statistical research. For Burn-Murdoch, data visualisation is first and foremost about communication and that perhaps most importantly we should always try to aim for meaningful visualisation. The panel discussion that followed gathered together speakers from different roles across the domain of scientific research including funders, research fellows and professors to discuss the pros and cons of reproducible research. The discussion was facilitated by additional questions from the audience who had the opportunity to post questions as well as to vote for other audience member’s questions online. The panellists ended the day by providing a lively debate about reproducibility by raising questions as to whether all studies need to be reproduced and who gets the glory for it but also what reproducibility actually means.

The slides from the conference will shortly be made available online.

As part of the New Student Centre works, MACE need to remove access via the Emergency Vehicle Road from Gordon Street to South Quadrangle for a temporary period from THURSDAY 20^th SEPTEMBER 2018 for 3 weeks.  This means that we cannot provide any fire brigade or ambulance vehicle access during this sensitive period to buildings off the South Quadrangle.

What does this mean – during this period it is recommended that staff / Fire Evacuation Marshals (FEMs) remain extra vigilant to the potential of fire breaking out.

Please find attached a briefing note issued by The UCL Fire Officer.

UCL Estates and the Principal Contractors apologies for any inconvenience that these restrictions may cause your departments but this work is essential for the New Student Centre to progress.  Your cooperation and assistance in all matters of safety is greatly appreciated.

051-NSC-FireSafetyBrifingNote-20Sep18

On Monday (3^rd of September), I attended the Harnessing FAIR Data conference held at Queen Mary in conjunction with UCL and the Science and Engineering South consortium. The event launched with an opening talk from Prof. Pam Thomas – the Pro Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Warwick. Prof. Thomas spoke of her involvement in leading a task force on Open Research Data which will eventually culminate in a final report in early 2018. Whilst the details of the report are yet to be finalised, the talk raised pertinent questions about what will happen to the increasing amounts of openly available research data that the UK universities seek to generate. As one audience member pointed out, there is still a need for specialist software to process this data otherwise it will remain unusable to other researchers in the future. Questions are currently abound as to whether researchers’ data will form part of the REF submission but for the meantime, it will remain more of a gold standard. David Hartland followed by giving an overview of the Jisc funded FAIR data report and confirmed what many in the audience already largely suspected – the difficulties of what adherence to FAIR data principles means in practice.

Another lively talk was given by Dr. Peter Murray-Rust who provided a rallying cry to all researchers to get behind their readers. The fact remains that a vast amount of research can only be accessed via a pay wall. Murray-Rust made the point that closed access data kills especially in countries which do not readily have access to the latest scientific research. Plus, researchers face further problems trying to extract data from articles which continue to be blocked by publishers as a result of access restrictions. Other talks centred more on the individual projects that researchers ranging from doctoral to early career and established are undertaking. Prof. Paul Longley from UCL’s Consumer Data Research Centre provided another interesting discussion about big data analytics. Just think about how much data companies take from our loyalty cards as a way to understand our shopping habits and movements. But how can this be harnessed for the social good? Well, according to Prof. Longley, we might want to use this data to look at people’s mobility around the country. This was later followed by a wide range of researcher lightning talks about their uses of open data. Some disciplines like biology pose more difficulties than others, as Dr. Yannick Wurm from Queen Mary argued, because they are still considered a young data science.

The conference ended with a panel discussion chaired by Robert Kiley of the Wellcome Trust. The panel was interspersed by anecdotes from Dr. Paul Ayris and Prof. Henry Rzepa about their personal experiences of sharing data. Dr. Ayris felt very much that historians continue to be resistant to sharing data. Prof. Henry Rzepa also spoke of his work as a research chemist and how his research later become subject to scrutiny only to discover that there were two ways his results could be interpreted.

All in all, the conference provided enough food for thought about the opportunities and difficulties that lie ahead for making use of researchers’ data in both a FAIR and open way.

Dear Colleagues,

with the move to Drupal our  the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health webpage has changed URL, so if you are linking to us please update your links. This is our new page:

 https://www.ucl.ac.uk/child-health/support-services/library

I have redesigned it and I am aware there are still problems with some linked PDFs as they disappeared with the move to drupal due to new ICH naming conventions and  problems few pages. I will sort them out as soon as possible, but I am also helping with the general ICH website and I have been asked to prioritise other pages first.

I just wanted to notify the URL change

Kind Regards

Grazia

Science Library Basement – Staff Lockers

Due to refurbishment taking place, staff lockers located in the basement will need to be emptied by Friday 10^th August 2018. If you do not have access to the basement via the staff lift, a member of the buildings team will be at the ground floor staff lift at 10.00am  throughout next week to allow access. The contractors will be moving the lockers and relocating them to the short-loans area in the Science Library Café.

Science Library Entrance

As you may be aware, work has started on the refurbishment of the Science Library entrance, new security gates and security area are being installed. A new desk area and swing gates are being installed by the membership desk. On Thursday 9^th August 2018 the current Service Desk will be relocated to make way for preparation works for the delivery and install of the new desk. On Thursday 9^th August 2018 there will be no Membership or Enquires service available while the desk is being relocated.

LaSS Library

Refurbishment has started in the reception area and new window installation, with new power to desks in the reading room.

Archaeology Library

New sustainable lighting is being installed throughout the library and reading area, using energy efficient LED lamps throughout.

If you have any queries please contact Phil and Ricky, phil.watson@ucl.ac.uk, r.estwick@ucl.ac.uk