As part of the UCL-IOE merger, last year UCL Library Services carried out a benchmarking exercise investigating loan limits at UCL, Institute of Education and other UK universities. The outcome of this resulted in recommendations to increase our student limits.

From the week beginning Monday 18^th April 2016, the new loan limits for students will be:

Undergraduates: 15 books (was previously 10 books)

Taught postgraduates: 15 books (was previously 10 books)

Research postgraduates: 25 books (was previously 20 books)

Please note that:

1. The number of issue desk loan items that can be borrowed at any one time has not changed – this remains at 3 books/teaching collections to ensure fair access to our most pressured resources.
2. Postgraduate and Research Postgraduate students will also still benefit from an extra 5 loans during the summer vacation.

A system outage will take place between Monday 11^th and Wednesday 13^th April next week, which will cause disruption to a number of Library services. Details on the attached poster and given below.

It will not be possible to:

• Make or cancel reservations
• Place inter-library loan requests
• Book a study room
• Renew loans
• View your library card information
• See current item availability
• Pay fines

Self service machines will be unavailable, but we will be able to issue and return items for you through our off-line circulation system.

Apologies, but we will not be able to see any details of your account off-line, so cannot answer questions about the books you have on loan, etc.

Some holdings information (but not including current availability) can be obtained through COPAC

Special loan arrangements:

NO books will be due for return or renewal while this outage is taking place

3 hour loans: from Friday 8^th April at 4.00 p.m. until 10. 00 a.m. Thursday  14^th April

Overnight loans: from Friday 8^th April at 10.00 a.m. until 10. 00 a.m. Thursday  14^th April

2 day loans: from Friday 8^th April until 10.00 a.m. Friday 15^th April

All libraries will be open as usual and staff will be on hand to help with queries and locating books.

Apologies in advance for any inconvenience caused.

Just to remind everyone that the IOA Library will be closing at 5.00 p.m. tomorrow (24th March), along with the rest of the IOA building. We will re-open on Thursday 31st March at 9.30 a.m.

The Main, Science and Cruciform libraries will remain open for 24 hour study through the period of college closure, as will the Roof Garden Student Hub. See web pages for more details.

The Spring 2016 edition of the Library Newsletter is now available.

In this issue we have news on smart spaces, service excellence, self-service and special collections, as well as pamphlets, films, bibliometrics and matters bibliographic.

The brand new Research Grid, providing graduate students with improved learning facilities, is now open. Refurbishment of old office space on the 4th floor of the Science Library has provided a contemporary 74-seat space for graduate students to study either collaboratively or in private.

Today would have been the last day of the ancient Roman festival of Saturnalia which was dedicated to the Roman god Saturn. However our holidays are just beginning and for all the details of our opening times over the festive period please see here.

Institute of Archaeology Library Team wishes you a Happy Christmas!

May your hearts be filled with love, your souls with kindness and your shelves with lots of books!

Please have a look at our Institute of Archaeology Library Team by clicking the link below.

https://www.pinterest.com/ioalibrary/ioa-doppelgangers

Our mascot Angus is also very happy!