Wishing Dennis a speedy recovery

Please remember to keep Dennis "Gary" Samuels in your thoughts and prayers. Dennis was involved in a serious accident over the Easter Holidays. Thankfully he received no major injuries and is recuperating at home. We wish him a speedy recovery and hope that he will be back in action soon.

Meet our Night Librarian

Meet our night librarian Mrs. Kareen Bourne. We see her perhaps only once per week just before we depart our 2-10 shift. Kareen along with her able team of staff and students has been holding the forte, ensuring that everthing is running smoothly from Monday to Friday, while we are all asleep in bed. Who is the couragous young librarian who boldly goes where few have gone before?

Kareen worked at the Northern Caribbean University as Technical Services and Audio Visual Librarian in August 2004 and graduated from the MLIS programme in November 2004. She left NCU and began working with the International University of the Caribbean, South Middlesex Region as Centre Administrator/Deputy Librarian in October 2005. She managed the business operations of the Region as well as oversight for the library at that location. In September 2006, she was promoted to Director, Library and Media Services and began working from IUC’s head office in Kingston. After a year at the Head office her post was further upgraded to Senior Director Library and Media Services. While at IUC she received two plaques from IUC for outstanding services rendered.

Kareen has been married for nearly fifteen years and has three children.

Just a few changes

Post Graduate reading room
Most of you probably know by now that the post graduate reading room is now located where the Academic Staff room used to be and the Academic staff room has been relocated to the old Post Graduate Reading Room.

Post graduate reading room keys
These are now being issued from the periodicals section. Two things we need to remember -
a) On the 2 - 10 shift, the periodicals staff member should take this box of keys down to the circulation desk when he/she goes to supper, and collect them when they return.

b) Before issuing the keys please ask the students and faculty if they know of the changes and advise them. Some students still do not know and are going to the wrong room!

Z collection
'Z' books are now located in Reading Room 2 on the second floor. These books relate to the discipline of library and information studies and used to be filed across from the old academic staff room.

Laptop Bags
Clear laptop bags are now available for loan at the circulation desk. They are located in the cupboard in Mrs. Pearce's office. Please also pass on this information to our users.

Cheryl

Student indebtedness and the Saturday late shift

Please be informed that the library will no longer be overriding blocks against those students who come in to pay their fines on the Saturday Late shift (4pm – 12midnight). We know that some staff members have been giving the students a “bligh” out of sympathy, especially when they claim they did not know that they could not pay fines after 4pm and they come with money in their hand. It has been brought to our attention however, that some students are taking advantage of this and deliberately come in every Saturday to pay fines after 4pm, hoping that they may be given the override. The end result is that the fine never gets paid since many students have discovered that they are no longer blocked from sitting exams or getting their exam results because of overdue fines. Thanks to your keen observation, we have caught on to the ‘scam’.

We are therefore requesting all clerical staff who work this shift, not to override the fines block. Students have several other days in the week in which to settle their financial debts and must do so during these times. This policy has been approved by the Campus Librarian.

Student workers and RBC borrowing

It was brought to our attention at a recent staff meeting that some staff members were issuing RBC items to student assistants inside the work room. We are asking all clerical staff to desist from this practice. Student assistants are only allowed to borrow RBC material at the end of their shift and they must collect it with all other students on the other side of the RBC window. Some staff members are trying to comply with this regulation, but when their own colleagues do not comply, it makes them seem unreasonable. Furthermore, it encourages the students to flout the rules by asking only those members of staff with whom they may be friendly and who will break the rules for them.

Please remember that the reason that student assistants are not allowed to borrow RBC items on the inside is to ensure the security of the collection. They are also not allowed to take books (personal or library) into the Section. I am appealing to all staff members who work both day and night shifts to ensure that student assistants follow the rules.

Issuing items manually

This is just a reminder to you all that we do not issue items manually at the circulation desk as a rule. Books that are not yet barcoded are still not issued manually since there is a procedure for bar-coding items in Aleph. Once the item is barcoded it is issued on the system. For those staff members who are not familiar with this process, kindly let me know so that we can arrange the necessary training for you. Since the start of the semester, I have counted approximately 23 items that have been issued manually. None of these seem to be warranted and some of the issue forms were not even stamped with the due date! If a faculty member or student is new and has not yet been issued an ID then he or she cannot get the book to take out of the library. They may be reading previlages but they will not be allowed to borrow items to take out of the library.
The only conditions under which an item may be issued manually are :-

1) If there is a power failure or if the Circulation system goes down. If you can see to read the issue form, then the item barcode and the patron ID no. must be written correctly on the form. This information will be transferred to the system at a later time.

2) When special permission is granted from the librarians in Loans and Reference (and this happens very rarely).

I am imploring all staff members to observe the zero tolerance approach to manual issues as it causes a lot of follow up problems for both students and staff.

Cheryl

Welcome

Hi everyone !
Welcome to the circulation blog of the loan and reference section. We have decided to use this medium to keep you informed of the latest happenings in the section particularly as it relates to circulation of material. It is important that all our staff be kept up to date with changes in policy or procedures in circulations especially our colleagues who work on the night and week-end shifts. We intend to make the content relevant to all categories of staff so please 'check in' as often as you can!
Cheryl