New developments in 2011

We are looking forward to an exciting 2011. With a new strategic plan in the making for the UP Library Services (UPLS) for the period 2011-2015 we as a faculty library need to re-evaluate and re-align our operational plans for 2011 accordingly.

As part of a UPLS peer-review exercise that started in 2010, a review panel will visit our library in February to ascertain the quality of our facilities and services. The review panel also has access to the library’s web site and a comprehensive report drawn up for the purpose of the peer-review. We believe that this will be a fruitful exercise and that it will contribute towards an even better service for our clients.

One of the most exciting events on our calendar this year will be a study visit to the USA by one of our staff members. Marguerite Nel who was one of the participants of the Research Libraries Consortium Academy sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and held during 2010 in Stellenbosch was selected as part of a group of nine academic librarians throughout South Africa who will be visiting the USA for a period of 10 weeks. The purpose of the visit is to develop the skills of academic and research librarians supporting researchers at their institutions. During her visit she will attend a development course at the Mortenson Center of the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, attend the National Conference of the Association of College and Research Librarians in Philadelphia and do an internship for six weeks at the research library of the University of California-Davis. We are looking forward to welcoming her back with new knowledge and skills that will help us enhance our service to our research clients.

Good news for some of our clients will be that the University has recently acquired a campus wide licence for Endnote, another software tool for managing references and bibliographies. Requests for the installation of the software on your computer can be done through the IT help desk.

The library has also subscribed to InCites, a Thomson Reuters product which is a powerful citation-based research evaluation tool that can be used to measure an institution’s research productivity and benchmark output against peers worldwide. Library staff will undergo training in this product during February and March.