We are delighted to announce the publication of 9 new open access books and 5 open access journal issues from UCL Press. Additionally, we are also delighted to provide information about a brand new student journal, Interscript, hosted on UCL’s student publishing platform.

New Books (April-June)

• A Connected Curriculum for Higher Education (June 7)
• Sri Lanka at the Crossroads of History (June 7)
• Memorandoms by James Martin (June 7)
• The Correspondence of Jeremy Bentham (vol. 1) (June 7)
• The Correspondence of Jeremy Bentham (vol. 2)  (June 7)
• The Correspondence of Jeremy Bentham (vol. 3) (June 7)
• The Correspondence of Jeremy Bentham (vol. 4)  (June 7)
• The Correspondence of Jeremy Bentham (vol. 5)  (June 7)
• Fabricate 2017 (21 April)

New Journals (April-June)

• Europe and the World: A Law Review (issue 1, vol. 1 launches on 19th June)
• Jewish Historical Studies (vol 48)
• The Journal of the Sylvia Townsend Warner Society (issue 1, vol. 2016)
• Architecture_MPS (issue 5, vol. 11 / issue 4, vol. 11)

Student Journals Hosted by UCL Press (April-June)

• Interscript: UCL Journal of Publishing (vol 1, issue 1). This journal is run by students of the MA publishing course, and hosted on UCL’s OJS platform. The students have also published an online magazine.

Please don’t hesitate to contact the UCL Press team with any questions or queries about UCL press or any of our titles.

UCL Library Services staff were centre-stage this week at the UCL Professional Services conference. And rightly so.

On Tuesday 2nd February 2016, UCL President and Provost, Professor Michael Arthur, presented the 2016 UCL Professional Services Values Awards. Rex Knight, as Vice-Provost (Operations) read out the nominations for each award. The categories mirror Professional Services’ values:

• Mutual respect
• Excellent service
• Collaboration
• Empowered
• Innovation

One value which resonates particularly strongly with the mission of Library Services is:

Excellent service…putting UCL’s goals and customer needs first by working in partnership

This award category was highly competitive with around 20 entries from across UCL contending. I was delighted that the winners were the Main and Science daytime and Evening/Saturday teams, led by Breege Whiten. A number of award-winning colleagues received the award in person from the Provost.

The 2016 Professional Services “Excellent Service” Award winners, with UCL President and Provost Professor Michael Arthur (far left)

It was my privilege to highlight some of the team’s achievements in this area. Since the introduction of self-service in the UCL Main and Science Libraries, the front-line teams have transformed their services to deliver a wider range of support, placing customer satisfaction at the heart of what they do. The quality of service has remained consistently excellent through a period of tremendous organisational change. This award is highly-deserved recognition for Breege and the entire team’s dedication to providing service with a smile.

We will be working through 2016 towards gaining Customer Service Excellence accreditation for UCL Library Services, as part of our work towards delivering the User Experience goals set in the Library Strategy and UCL 2034. It is immensely encouraging to start the year with such an accolade from the Provost. I would like to end with a quote from a student, which I read out in the citation for the award:

“The staff ‘have been incredibly friendly and gone far beyond their required services to help me. I don’t think my studies would be half as successful without their support and enthusiasm.’”

Well done to the winners of the 2016 UCL Professional Services “Excellent service” Award!