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Archive for the 'Widening Participation & Public Engagement' Category

Performance Lab: eleven experiments in science and the arts

By Benjamin Meunier, on 3 April 2019

[shared on behalf of UCL Culture]

Experience UCL’s cutting-edge research, brought to life by artists, dancers, opera singers and stand-up comedians onstage at the Bloomsbury Theatre and in the unique surroundings of the Grant Museum of Zoology at UCL.

Commissioned by UCL Culture, PERFORMANCE LAB brings a radical and bold theatrical season of ground-breaking discoveries to the stage. The first Performance Lab season includes symposiums, live performance, discussions and full theatre and musical performances from Monday 29 April 2019 – Thursday 20 June 2019.

£5 tickets are available for UCL staff and students, and some events are free. See the full programme at ucl.ac.uk/culture/performancelab

Locus developed by Amanda Simo Rodriguez and Anthos Venizelos with dancer Saloni Saraf. Bloomsbury Theatre 2019 © Belinda Lawley

BEIS launches Knowledge Quarter Science and Innovation Audit

By Benjamin Meunier, on 15 March 2019

The Knowledge Quarter network is celebrating the release of a Science and Innovation Audit of the area, on behalf of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. The report, which UCL was a lead partner in developing, identifies the area’s nationally leading strengths in AI, life sciences and cultural and scientific collections and publishing, and recommends opportunities for investment and further developing the area to enhance its potential. A key recommendation is the development of a spatial plan for the area that better enables the next generation of scientific and knowledge-led enterprises to locate in the area. The report is London’s only SIA, demonstrating its unique nature within London’s economy. More here.

 

How does this relate to UCL Library Services? We have a key place in London, and in the Knowledge Quarter in particular, and this is reflected in the full report. The report mentions our 18 libraries, “covering a wide range of specialist subjects ranging from bio-medicine and science to arts, architecture and archaeology”. The report also highlights UCL’s leading role in promoting “innovation in Open Science, including starting UCL Press, the UK’s first completely open access university press.” UCL Press and the launch of the megajournal are referenced in Table 5-5: Open Access Publishers started by universities and scientific bodies within the Knowledge Quarter.

In addition, Box 5-4 illustrates how UCL Special Collections’ Outreach programme is delivering meaningful experiences for non-academic audiences to access, learn about and enjoy our Special Collections. Key projects listed include:

• Time Capsule with Edith Neville Primary School: a whole-school project developed around the building of a new school and the demolition of the old. In collaboration with Museum of London Archaeology, the children explored the concept of keeping things for the future as well as the importance of objects from the past. As part of this, pupils were taught about archives and each class has begun to create a class archive.

• Making East London: with funding from HLF and a UCL Beacon Bursary, this touring exhibition was a collaboration with Newham Libraries and Archives (East) to bring together both organisation’s collections to explore East London’s past, inspired by the Main Library exhibition East Side Stories. The exhibition was a centrepiece around which workshops for community groups were run. The workshops were also opportunities for the recording of local peoples’ stories, experiences and memories of east London; student volunteers from UCL have worked to, and continue to, record oral histories as part of a new digital archive.

 

Provost’s Public Engagement Awards 2019

By Benjamin Meunier, on 3 December 2018

Nominations are now open for the Provost’s Awards for Public Engagement 2019. 2018 marks the tenth anniversary of the establishment of UCL’s Public Engagement team and the opening of our conversation around our Top Ten Targets for Public Engagement by 2028 and how we can further embed a culture in which staff, students and departments are supported to engage with communities.

We would particularly encourage you to see this as an opportunity to recognise the work of Library Services colleagues who may be eligible for the Professional Services Staff category of the Awards and indeed of the community partners they collaborate with in relation to the Community Award. And do remember that community partners themselves may wish to nominate UCL Professional Services staff with whom they have worked. The awards celebrate the fantastic work that UCL’s staff and students, and their community partners, are doing to open up research and teaching at UCL to the wider world through collaborative engagement. Tell us who deserves to be recognised for their work with communities – and your nominations will help us build a rich and detailed picture of all the publicly engaged research and teaching happening at UCL this year.  

Please read the guidance notes and nominations form here.
The deadline for nominations is 5pm on Monday 28 January 2019 so you have plenty of time to get your nominations in.

Call for proposals – It’s All Academic Festival 2018

By Benjamin Meunier, on 14 June 2018


UCL will open its doors on Saturday 15 September for the second It’s All Academic Festival, showcasing the range and impact of what we do to UCL’s London alumni community as well as supporters, staff, public, students and families.

Last year’s Festival brought together over 100 partners from across UCL to deliver a range of talks, tours, workshops and hands on activities for all ages and interests. UCL Library Services was well represented with colleagues from the UCL Institute of Archaeology Library, UCL Press, Special Collections and the Main Library. Library tours were a great success, as were the talks and events on the day.

The 2018 festival will showcase the best of UCL and we are looking again for content that is interactive and accessible. Submission forms (BLANK_2018 IAA Campaign Festival submission form) are due by Friday 29th June. You can complete the PDF version by downloading it and using the “Fill and Sign” feature, or I can provide Word versions of the submission form.

Please share your ideas! If you have a suggestion for the Festival, first seek approval from your line manager and complete the form. You can email the OVPD team directly, cc-ed to me. If you have any queries, feel free to contact me (benjamin.meunier@ucl.ac.uk) for advice.

“Global popularity proves Open Access is the future” says UCL Press as it hits one million book downloads milestone

By Alison Fox, on 23 May 2018

UCL Press, the UK’s first fully Open Access University Press, has announced that one million copies of its books have been downloaded around the world.

The announcement comes as the publisher celebrates its third anniversary since launching in 2015.

Its academic books – which feature monographs, edited collections and textbooks – have reached readers in 222 of a possible 223 countries and territories, giving readers in nations as far afield as North Korea and Haiti access to important academic research.

While traditionally published scholarly monographs sell an average of 250 copies per title, UCL Press’s Open Access monographs are downloaded free-of-charge approximately 12,500 times per title. This provides unequivocal evidence that publishing academic content via Open Access is the most effective way to reach a wider, more diverse and global audience.

The most popular title in the UCL Press list to date is How the World Changed Social Media by UCL Professor of Anthropology Daniel Miller and a collective of eight other esteemed global anthropologists.

The first title in the hugely popular 11-book Why We Post series has been downloaded an astonishing 227,336 times since it was published by UCL Press in early 2016.

Professor Margot Finn, Chair in Modern British History at UCL, and published UCL Press author, commented: “Our East India Company at Home volume was co-produced by academics, museum and heritage professionals and independent historians, and making the book open-access is essential to our dissemination plans. It’s a delight in this context to see that the book has already been downloaded in Algeria, Argentina and Azerbaijan as well as China, India and Japan.”

UCL Press’s pioneering publishing programme spans many of the major academic disciplines, from history to philosophy and the sciences to anthropology.

It has published 80 titles and launched eight journals since its inception, doubling its year-on-year output of scholarly monographs with the introduction of 31 new titles last year and expanding its staff head count to six.

Paul Ayris, Pro-Vice-Provost at UCL Library Services, said: “Institutional Open Access publishing is transformative, being a completely new model of how universities engage with readers and with Society. In the fifteenth century, the invention of moveable type printing in the West transformed Europe. In the twenty-first century, Open Access publishing can do the same.”

Lara Speicher, Publishing Manager at UCL Press, stated: “We are delighted to have reached one million downloads and this achievement is testament to the vision and support of UCL’s senior management, the hard work and commitment of the UCL Press team, and above all to the authors who have chosen to publish their wonderful books with us. This milestone shows the power and potential of Open Access publishing and the global popularity of our books proves OA is the future.”

Knowledge Quarter Community Champions launch

By Benjamin Meunier, on 1 May 2018

On Monday 30/04, I attended the launch of the Knowledge Quarter Community Champions scheme. The Knowledge Quarter is a partnership of over 85 academic, cultural, scientific and media organisations located in a 1-mile radius around King’s Cross and Bloomsbury. Partners include the British Museum, University of the Arts London, Google, the British Library and UCL.
For more information on the Knowledge Quarter (KQ), see www.knowledgequarter.London

The Community Champions project is a series of events designed to bring KQ partners together with local charities and community groups, in order to encourage KQ partners to develop collaborative projects around the themes of youth, employability, environment and wellbeing.

Jodie Eastwood (Chief Executive, Knowledge Quarter) emphasised the number and importance of libraries in the Knowledge Quarter. One of the major objectives of the KQ is to facilitate more sharing of our resources and collections with the local community. Dr Grace Sims (Outreach Development Manager, Royal Veterinary College and Chair of the Knowledge Quarter Community Engagement Sub Group) outlined the details of these aspirations, to increase the participation of communities with KQ partners like UCL. The scheme is about sharing knowledge of existing programmes between partners, and identifying potential areas for collaboration. The Library Leadership Team are currently collating stories that show how our teams make a contribution to the UCL London Strategy – how UCL Library Services makes “a tangible difference to London’s people, economy, communities and culture”. I have already received some great examples of work with schools and communities in Camden and hope to share this more widely once we the various activities underway have been fed back in the coming week.

Based on the main areas where programmes are already happening, KQ has identified 4 categories: Youth (which covers work with secondary, primary, early years, family), Wellbeing (physical and mental), Employability, Environment.

One of the presentations of early “success stories” was a collaboration between the Recovery College, part of Camden & Islington NHS Trust, and Kings Place Music Foundation. The Recovery College provides courses designed to contribute towards wellbeing and recovery, allowing students to share their experience of mental health or physical health challenges and teach on the courses, with the intention of inspiring hope and embodying the principles of recovery. The speakers emphasised how being able to hold events at Kings Place allowed students to socialise and normalise mental health experiences in a welcoming non-clinical space. This has proven very beneficial to the students of the Recovery College. Wellbeing courses at the Recovery College are open to all, including staff in the KQ partners. For further details see: https://www.candi.nhs.uk/services/recovery-college

Presentations also illustrated how the Royal Veterinary College (RVC) set up a homework club with the Bengali Workers Association (BWA), supporting pupils aged 6-16 (mainly 9-10). This has proven hugely popular with the BWA. The RVC initially offered vet-related activity sessions (e.g. specimen handling in lab coats) but transitioned to support for Maths, English, Science in line with parents’ expectations and demands. The homework club still has a link to the RVC, for instance, narrating the stories of animals or counting different types of animals or bones…

 

The slides and delegate information pack from the launch event have been uploaded to the Knowledge Quarter website here. If you would like to find out more or get involved in the Knowledge Quarter activities, you can:

  • sign up for the newsletter to be kept informed about the latest Knowledge Quarter news and events. You can sign up on the KQ website.
  • sign up to the Knowledge Bank, where KQ are trying to encourage people to connect with one another based on skills they want to share or want to learn about.
  • attend future events, subject to line manager approval. KQ have a great line up planned for 2018 including private views at the British Library (May 9) and the British Museum (May 18). All of these events are run for free with the aim of encouraging mutual trust and understanding between KQ institutions.

International Women’s Day events at UCL

By Kate Cheney, on 8 March 2018

Today is International Women’s Day – see below for a free programme of events supported by the UCL Institute for Women’s Health.

In 2018 we are also marking 100 years since the Representation of the People Act, 1918 first saw certain women winning the right to vote. The new exhibition in the Main Library, Dangers and Delusions’? Perspectives on the women’s suffrage movement is part of the UCL Vote 100 celebrations taking place throughout the year.

Pro-Vice-Provost’s View

By Paul Ayris, on 22 February 2018

The National Archives at 40

Yesterday,  I attended an evening reception at The National Archives (TNA) in Kew to celebrate the 40th anniversary of its new building. In addition, the CEO Jeff James noted that 2018 marks the 180th anniversary of the foundation of a precursor organisation, the Public Record Office, by Sir Henry Cole. Henry Cole also initiated the practice of sending commercial Christmas cards by post, so he has a lot to answer for. Cole was quite an innovator and clearly his day job gave him plenty of time to pursue other ideas and activities, as his entry in Wikipedia, which can be found here, makes clear.

As with all cultural organisations, the TNA is re-inventing its role in terms of how its spaces are configured and how it engages with the general public. Redevelopment of the TNA spaces, with bookable conference facilities, are already in evidence. I was reminded by TNA staff that the UCL Cruciform Hub has had quite an impact on the thinking of the TNA in how to configure public spaces. The TNA are extremely impressed by the UCL model for learning spaces, which is being implemented across the UCL family of libraries.

The formal part of the evening consisted of a number of short talks in the new Conference facility. Those of you with long memories (including me) will remember when Blue Peter on BBC1 was compulsive viewing for children and, surprisingly, a Blue Peter video formed the centrepiece of the presentations.

The video showed two of the Blue Peter presenters (those with long memories will recognise the main presenter) summoning up papers about the history of Halifax. I must have seen this programme when I was much younger, but I cannot remember it. Amazing to see how times have changed… The presenter in question arrived at the TNA and was told by Security at the desk, ‘Do you have a pencil?’. On being told ‘No’, the Security Officer  said, ‘Well you can’t come in without a pencil. Look, we can sell you one’ – 11d, I think, was the unit cost of TNA pencils. To emphasise the fact that times have now changed, the TNA demonstrated a 3D printer (unit cost £3,000) which was printing 3D replicas of seals which are attached to medieval and early modern TNA documents.

UCL of course currently has part of its Special Collections stored at the TNA, and we have our own dedicated Reading Room there. The TNA are good friends and we value our partnership with them whilst we plan exciting futures for our own Special Collections.

Paul Ayris

Pro-Vice-Provost

UCL Library Services

Doing Outreach: ‘Telling Tales of Independence’ at the Bloomsbury Festival

By utnvsap, on 23 January 2018

Photography: Christian Fisher, Bloomsbury Festival 2017

To some ‘Doing Outreach’ might sound more like a points-winner in Strictly Come Dancing than a legitimate pursuit for an academic institution, yet it is not only legitimate but essential to what we do. Outreach is the means by which we share with our community and the wider world what we teach, what we research and, of particular relevance to us in UCL Library Services, the treasures we care for.  It is relevant to everyone, regardless of their role in the university, as it not only demonstrates our value but also gives us the opportunity to bring together people who previously shared nothing but curiosity, but might go on to solve problems and create new knowledge.

So for anyone who has ever considered putting a toe in the Outreach water but has yet to go further, here is a brief insider view of a recent event.

The Bloomsbury Festival is an annual enterprise:

“a five-day celebration of the area’s pioneering creativity. Presenting an inspiring programme of arts, science, literature, performance, discussion and reflection, each October the Festival shines a light on the radical imaginations, institutions, and 11,000 residents that shape contemporary Bloomsbury.”

UCL has supported the Festival since it began in 2006, and for the second time was the Saturday Hub, bringing together most of the festival events for that day on the main UCL campus. The stalls were a mixture of UCL research-focused presentations and outside businesses, with street food, music and dance provided by the Festival organisers. Traditionally the Festival has a theme – a broad concept such as ‘Light’ or ‘Language’ or (for this year) ‘Independence’. This gives a useful focus for planning an event, but is sufficiently flexible to encompass many interpretations.

Like many outreach projects, our event (Telling Tales of Independence) developed somewhat organically and we finally focused on aspects of the personal independence made possible through reading, creativity and performance. Sam Duncan, IOE Senior Lecturer in Adult Education and Literacies, discussed her Reading Aloud in Britain Today research with visitors, and invited them to contribute to her data collection by completing surveys or signing up for interviews. Theo Bryer, (Lecturer in IOE’s Culture, Communication and Media Department) and Rebecca Wilson (IOE ICT Teaching Support Analyst), both recently returned from introducing ‘agile film making’ with iPads in a variety of schools in India, presented some of the films and a poster explaining the project.  For younger visitors, performer Laura Mitchison (of community interest company On the Record) read aloud from story books from the IOE Curriculum Resources Collection, and children (and in more than a few cases grownups) were able to explore their creativity by making puppets and designing for them superpowers or award-winning talents.

The weather, a crucial factor in outreach endeavours such as the Bloomsbury Festival, was not kind and led to last minute changes in the positioning of stalls and performances. Even so 3790 visitors came through the Gower Street gates of the UCL campus, and another 1242 came to the Institute of Making. There were 30 stalls set up in and around the North and South Cloisters, and 26 performances took place during the day.

So what did we learn about Doing Outreach from our Telling Tales of Independence experience? Here are a few of the many lessons:

  1. Prepare to be flexible. One of the excitements (and challenges) of one-off outreach events such as Telling Tales of Independence is the unknown. You have to be prepared to throw your best-laid plans to the wind, and do what works when circumstances dictate. Our planned story times, for example became ‘stories on demand’ when we realized that arrangement was more suited to the flow of visitors.
  2. Being part of a large mixed event rather than an individual one might take you out of your comfort zone if you like familiar surroundings and control over arrangements, but it will bring in more visitors, have wider reach, and enable you to meet fellow ‘outreachers’.
  3. 11am to 5pm feels a lot more than 6 hours when you are presenting an outreach event. Arrange for reinforcements for the later part of the day if possible.

And what did we feel we achieved? Well based on the conversations held, the surveys completed, the puppets created and the stories enjoyed, it seemed visitors appreciated and engaged. We hope they left with a better understanding of what UCL is about and enthusiasm for the possibilities presented. Introductions were made – with UCL colleagues, with visitors, with perhaps potential students – that might one day lead to something that would not have happened if we had not ‘outreached’. So on reflection, a worthwhile day’s work.

History Day

By Kieron L Jones, on 25 October 2017

Spooky and one hopes eminently informative goings-on will be taking place at History Day on Halloween this year.  Starting at 10:00 and finishing at 16:00 on Tuesday 31st October, the event is based at Senate House.  Along with research clinics and panel sessions on digital history, public history and discovery in libraries and archives, we will have an expanded open history fair showcasing a veritable plethora of libraries, archives and organisations.  Naturally, UCL Library Services will be represented, with colleagues from Special Collections, the Institute of Education, Huguenot and SSEES libraries staffing our stands, with the latter certainly getting into the swing of celebrating “all that is scary, eerie and magical in libraries and archives”.

Please alert anyone you feel may benefit from attending.  The intended audience is really postgraduate students and early career researchers, however, undergraduates and many others with a general interest in history should certainly find the day illuminating and may make some useful contacts.  Registration is necessary via book my free ticket.

Participating organisations: Archives Hub, Jisc; Archives Portal Europe; Black Cultural Archives; US History collections at the Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford; British Library; British Records Association; Brunel University Special Collections; Business Archives Council; CILIP Library & Information History Group; CILIP Local Studies Group; Caird Library and Archive, National Maritime Museum; Conway Hall; Dana Research Centre and Library, Science Museum; Engineering Institutions’ Librarians Group; The Feminist Library; FLA: the Feminist and Women’s Libraries and Archives Network; Geological Society Library; German Historical Institute Library; Gladstone’s Library; Goldsmiths University of London (Special Collections); Guildhall Library; Heinz Archive and Library, National Portrait Gallery; Historic England Archive & Library; History of Parliament; History UK; Institute of Historical Research Library; King’s College London Library Services; The King’s Fund, Information & Knowledge Services; Lambeth Palace Library; Library of the Society of Friends; Lindley Library, Royal Horticultural Society; The Linnean Society of London; London Metropolitan Archives; LSE Library; The National Archives; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography; Royal Astronomical Society Library & Archives; Royal College of Nursing Library and Archives; Royal College of Physicians Library and Archives; Royal Holloway, University of London; The Royal Society, Collections; Senate House Library; SOAS Library; Society of Antiquaries Library and Collections; St Peter’s House Library, University of Brighton; The Stationers’ Company Archive; TUC Library Collections at London Metropolitan University; UCL Library Services; UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES) Library; University of Cambridge Museums (UCM) – Archive Collections; University of Westminster Archives; The Warburg Institute Library; Wellcome Library