Many things have been happening since the start of this year that is worth reporting about!
We started the New Year off with a brand new printing, photocopying and scanning system for staff and students. The TuksPrint system was implemented during the end of 2015 and was in full operation at the start of 2016.
Several library training and orientation sessions have been offered since the beginning of the year and until now we have had approximately 450 students attending approximately ten sessions.
The new OCLC WorldShare Management System replaced our Millenium Integrated Library System and went live on 4 April. The system was officially launched on 18 April. A lot of training and preparation preceded these dates and by now we feel comfortable to say that we’ve passed the biggest hurdle and are now getting to know the finer detail of the new system. You can read more about the launch of the system in a news post of the University of Pretoria.
During May we participated in celebrating the 10 year existence of the library’s repository UPSpace. UPSpace, which was once again ranked as the number 1 repository in Africa and amongst the first 100 repositories worldwide, was upgraded to a new version and also received a brand new landing page. The latest ranking web of repositories for Africa can be viewed here.
With the implementation of a new library management system, we had to start thinking about changing our library web pages to accommodate the new system. With the help of the library’s web master, Christelle Steyn, the new Jotello F Soga library landing page was finalised by Antoinette Lourens during April.
A less delightful task that we have to embark on during the year, is evaluating our current database, paper and e-journal and e-book subscriptions in order to recommend a sufficient number of cancellations to meet future unavoidable budget cuts. This will have to be done with great caution to cause the minimum inconvenience for our clients.
