New council for LAS & more

The Library Association of Singapore held it Annual General Meeting on 17 March 2007. Check out the report on our AGM and the new council for 2007-2009.

LAS announced its Overseas Library Conference Sponsorship for 2007. So if you are hankering for such an opportunity, do send in your applications soon as the deadline is 4 May 2007. LAS members can get a discount for the ILDS Conference coming up in October.

LAS members participated in the NTU Entrepreneur Seminar and LAS jointly hosted a talk on Australian university libraries.

The Singapore Polytechnic Library hosted workshops for its students on its premises.

The National Library has been very active; it set up a Web Archive Singapore, signed MOUs to preserve Singapore films and to provide financial information, and held a tea party for art librarians.

The Singapore Journal of Library & Information Management volume 34 (2005) was sent out to LAS members earlier. Our apologies for the error in the page footers inside the issue, which showed Volume 34 * 2006 when it should be Volume 34 * 2005. The correct volume and year was shown on the cover and title page. So dear cataloguers, please use the title page. I hope the error did not cause too much confusion.

From Yeo Pin Pin, SLB Editor

Challenges and opportunities in Australian university libraries

Andrew Wells, University Librarian of the University of New South Wales gave a talk on Australian university libraries: challenges and opportunities on 9 April 2007 at the UNSW Asia Library on Kay Siang Road. The talk was an event jointly organised by LAS and UNSW Asia Library.

Professor Greg Whittred, UNSW Asia President, welcomed all 63 participants and outlined the reasons for the event which were to contribute to professional development for librarians, to mark the birth of the newest university library in Singapore (in operation for 4 weeks since 12 March) and to thank the library community for its help and support. Professor Bruce Milthorpe, UNSW Asia Deputy President-Academic, introduced Mr Andrew Wells.

Andrew started with an overview of Australian academic libraries. In 2005, there were 38 universities with 230 libraries employing over 4,000 staff with a total budget of A$520m. There were over 300,000 inter-library loans and over 200,000 documents delivered which showed a strong level of inter-dependence and cooperation between libraries as interlibrary lending is voluntary.

It was highlighted that there was no magic formula for library funding. University libraries are jointly funded by state or territory governments and by the federal government, together with individual university self-funding sources.

Advocacy is important and is lead by groups such as Universities Australia, the Group of Eight (go8) and the Australian Technology Network. Collaboration is lead by the Council of Australian University Librarians (CAUL) which seeks to provide a common voice and representation for all university libraries and to promote common interests.

CAUL also provides surveys of salaries, annual library statistics and instruments for performance management. It makes submissions for amendments to the Copyright Act. It employs a dedicated lawyer who focuses on lobbying copyright issues.

As part of CAUL, the CAUL Electronic Information Resources Committee (CEIRC) has worked to improve access to electronic resources for Australian university libraries in a cost-effective manner. CEIRC negotiates with vendors to have licenses to which include appropriate clauses for areas like document delivery and course packs which are needed by university libraries. CEIRC takes a unified approach to electronic resources purchasing and has helped university libraries to save money when they opt in to the consortia pricing available. CEIRC achieved consortia pricing for 147 products from 98 vendors.

Challenges that Australian university libraries face could be grouped into the following categories:

Finance

University libraries face price increases without increases in their budget and allowances for currency inflation. They also have problems raising capital for buildings and for storage of collections. Andrew commented that many Australian libraries look “a little tired”. Universities are money-hungry places and libraries seldom get funding for refurbishment. He recommended the University of Queensland Library as one that had been successfully refurbished and worth a visit.

Organization

University administrators were not sure where to put libraries and they have been converged with IT, with learning and teaching, or separate but under resources or the academic section. Andrew personally felt that libraries belong under the academic section.

Libraries have also been wrestling with internal restructuring which became necessary as the environment they operate in has changed. For example, libraries needed to respond to the effects of the Internet which led to people not visiting libraries as much.  

Value

Libraries were being asked to show how they added value and to demonstrate their contribution by their hard-headed bosses. The data currently available does not clearly show the contribution of libraries. It is becoming increasingly important to show that investment in libraries pay off in terms of research and academic outcomes.

Research

Although the idea that libraries were necessary to support research is well established, there are still areas to build on. They were institutional repositories and the Research Quality Framework. With the Australasian Digital Theses Program, access to over 12,000 theses online is provided. Some of which are locally hosted or available via vendor sites. In response to the government’s call to promote access to Australian research, ARROW was started. It makes research literature which is not peer-reviewed available to the world. It uses VITAL and Fedora to manage the repositories created. These were projects led by university libraries.

The second area is the Research Quality Framework which aims to have a better assessment of the quality and impact of publicly funded research. Libraries could work to make the research accessible online but there are copyright issues involved.

Restructuring in UNSW Library

In UNSW Library, there had been a shift to online resources and the visibility of librarians was much reduced. They have looked at ways to respond to the changes but implementing the changes has been hard. One of the changes was to restructure the Information Services Department from a model of special libraries to teams focused on various stages of the service cycle with more librarians doing outreach.

They are also looking at the ways they report on the performance measures of the library. Most of the current statistics focus on areas that were important in the past but were not reflecting the library as it is currently. Online access to resources is growing but not reported, and loans of the print collection is not growing but is reported. Hence the need for more current performance measures for the library which is a project that they are starting on.

Andrew emphasized that we should not lose our traditions but we need to embrace new ones to help libraries and librarians remain relevant to their users.

Isabella Trahn, Director, UNSW Asia Library thanked Andrew Wells for giving the talk. She was grateful for his support of UNSW Asia Library. She also thanked DA for helping UNSW Asia Library to bring the collection together and sponsoring the refreshments for the talk.

Contributed by Yeo Pin Pin

NTU Entrepreneur Seminar with panelists from LAS

The NTU Entrepreneur Seminar 07 was held on 3 March 2007 at the Traders Hotel. NTU Division of Information Studies hosted the Seminar and the LAS Special Libraries Section was invited to coordinate some participation from LAS for the discussion and sharing session on entrepreneurship opportunities in the information and knowledge sector.

The afternoon Seminar began with invited panel of entrepreneurs giving presentations. The speakers were:

• KC Wong, Sparky Animation
• Lim Bak Wee, Integro Techonologies
• Rakesh Kumah Gupta, Heuristic Lab
• Tan Beng Hiong, XYSoft

There was so much to share that the speakers inevitably ran over the time allocated. The speakers had no trouble capturing the audience’s attention with their inspiring, thought-provoking talks and savvy media presentations.  The section was useful with the participants rapt in attention listening to the entrepreneurs recounting their challenges and rewards.

The Entrepreneur Seminar ended with a dynamic question and answer session facilitated by Prof Margaret Tan, NTU. The Q&A session had 8 panelists. They consisted of the earlier 4 speakers together with the t other panelists on entrepreneurship opportunities in the information sector. The latter panelists were:

• Choy Fatt Cheong, University Librarian, NTU, a library consultant for 4 years before he joined NTU in April 2004
• Patrick Lambe, Principal Consultant and Founding Partner, Straits Knowledge
• Leow Kok Meng, Deputy Director, Business Development at Civica
• Wendy Lee, an entrepreneur with a firm providing legal information consultancy services to local and overseas legal professionals

On the whole, the speakers and the audience did a good job and the seminar went smoothly except for over-run in time. The panelists shed light on the skills needed by entrepreneurs used to build and manage their enterprise. Skills highlighted included integrity, human relations, communication skills, ability to operate out of the comfort zone, identifying niches and taking steps to fill that niche. In response to the question on the catalyst for their enterprise, their takes were as diverse as the speakers, which included:

• “Believe in yourself and keep pushing for it”
• “A sense of ownership”
• “Passion & drive”
• “Sense of adventure & take calculated risk”
• “Leave a legacy”
• “Experience life”

The speakers certainly gave the audience some food for thought. The seminar participants also consulted the entrepreneurs present on some issues. In response to the question on the usefulness of  a business plan, some of the speakers thought that although research needed to be done for information and direction, an outline of the plan seemed to suffice as the plan became obsolete quickly and the entrepreneur needed to adapt the plan along the way.

During the 3-hour seminar, we got to hear from some great speakers as well as to engage the entrepreneurs who came to share their experiences. The SLS was grateful that a total of 9 LAS participants attended the seminar even though short notice was given and scheduled on a non-working day. For the participants, it was a fruitful session.

Contributed by Foo Yan Chuin

Workshops for Students in the Singapore Polytechnic Library

A series of ‘How-To-Workshop’ kicked off in the library with the first session held on 1 November 2006. Subsequent sessions were held on 6, 8 and 13 December. For the first time, these workshops, which traditionally were held in the School classrooms, were now played out in the library. The library sees this as a good way to collaborate with the Department of Language & Communication and also engage students in using library resources for their coursework.

A total of 134 students signed up for these 4 fun-filled activity-based workshops. The Self-Access module conducted by the LC Dept was attended by lst and 2nd year students, comprising of a mix of local as well as international students, mainly from China and Myanmar. 

During the 2-hour workshop held in the Colours Zone, they were taught English language skills, presentation and creative writing skills through an activity-based programme which required them to use library resources.

During the first workshop, the students either paired off with someone whom they did not know or worked in teams of 4-5. They were given worksheets painted with different scenarios. The teams had to locate suitable books from the Colours Zone and pick up relevant information on the following topics:
- spend a good time in France
- overcome feelings of sadness
- manage time and anger
- improve self-image
- find the right treatment for eating disorder
- find a suitable martial arts activity

Students were also introduced to the use of transition markers to help them connect ideas and establish relationship in their writing. They were asked to insert the transition markers between sentences in a given passage.

Two DVD programmes from the ‘Get Real’ series [Teens sex and Branded Stuff] were screened during the 2nd and 3rd workshops. Then followed a lively discussion in which sttudents talked about the issues involved and explained why they took a certain stance on the two topics.

A reading program was introduced in the 4th workshop in which students picked up their favourite books from the Colours Zone. Then they trooped off to the library courtyard to read some passages and share their reasons for choosing the books and passages with their fellow students. It turned out to be a pleasant experience for the participants as they enjoyed the readings over some light refreshments in the warm ambience of the library courtyard.

Lecturers Cyrine, Melinda and Lee Yee who facilitated the programme were pleased that the students not only picked up relevant language skills but also understood better how to locate library resources more effectively from the briefing given by the librarians. They also became more familiar with the collection and layout of the Colours Zone.

The students themselves were upbeat about the programme, as these positive comments show:

“The workshop is great! I got to learn and improve my English so that I can get a better grade in my language module. The most remarkable part is that the course is very fun. It actually really helps me to remember what I’ve learnt in the workshop. I really had an enjoyable and wonderful time in the workshop.”
- Jessica Ependi (DPFM/2B/04)

“The workshop was interesting and beneficial. The activities helped me to learn better, e.g. improving my writing skill with the use of transition markers.”
- Yan Piang, Myanmar student, DECC/FT/1B/07

“I found this workshop fun and interesting as I learnt something new. It also helped me to prepare for the argumentative test.”
- Suwati (DPFM/2B/03)

“The workshop was interesting. We were able to communicate and learn from each other.”
- Chng Hwee Yen Christina (DPFM/2B/03)

“I enjoyed watching the show and participating in the discussion.”
Xu Jia Wei, Chinese student, DCNT/FT/1A/26

Contributed by Charlotte Toh, Reference Librarian, Singapore Polytechnic Library

Investment Resource and Information Service @ National Library

Retail investors, researchers and library users will now find it much easier to research information on listed companies in Singapore, as well as gain access to financial information on Singapore stocks and derivatives.

With the launch of the new Investment Resource and Information Service (IRIS)@National Library, 6 new computer terminals at the Business Collection, Level 8 of the Lee Kong Chian Reference Library (LKCRL) will provide a one-stop destination for investor research.

IRIS is a collaborative effort between the National Library Board (NLB) and Singapore Exchange Ltd (SGX), and was officially launched on 28 November 2006 with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between NLB and SGX. Representing their respective organisations in the signing were Dr N Varaprasad, Chief Executive, NLB and Mr Hsieh Fu Hua, Chief Executive Officer, SGX. Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports, officiated at the MoU and affirmed that IRIS will “make investing, for the general public, more than just a gamble.”

Forged from the common vision of both NLB and SGX in promoting Singapore as a financial hub, IRIS aims to improve financial literacy amongst the general public so as to help them make educated investment decisions.

It hopes to achieve this by working with cutting edge market data providers such as ShareInvestor, NextView and Standard & Poor’s that will provide free access to real-time stock prices and trading tools such as charts, ratios, and independent research reports.

Of the 6 terminals, 3 provide access to SGX’s Archive Investment Resources. This would cover electronic copies of all listed companies’ Annual Reports, Corporate Announcements, Prospectuses and Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) from 1997 to the present. This in itself is an invaluable source as both a repository of local heritage (business) publications, as well as a convenient one-stop directory of information on listed companies in Singapore. This consolidated database is not available anywhere else in Singapore, and even the SGX website offers company reports that date back to the last 2 years only.

The other 3 terminals consist of 1 dedicated terminal each for ShareInvestor’s “SI Station”, NextView’s “NV Advisor”, as well as Standard & Poor’s. Although LKCRL already has 4 existing Bloomberg terminals that are very popular with our patrons, the new IRIS stations have proven to be a big hit as well with its real-time information and relative ease of use. Some regular users of Bloomberg have even been spotted “defecting” over to these new stock market databases.

In addition, SGX will contribute its physical annual reports and IPOs to supplement the library’s current collection. Future plans also include SGX-NLB investment education programmes on financial literacy to be conducted at NLB libraries.

Both partners are understandably excited about the collaboration. Said SGX’s Mr Hsieh, “NLB’s partnership allows us to reach a broader audience. At the end of the day, it is to engage the man-in-the-street, to promote retail participation in the market.” NLB’s Dr Varaprasad referenced NLB’s Library 2010 Strategic Plan by likening IRIS to “a kind of repositioning for the National Library, as a trusted source of relevant, reliable information and knowledge, provided in a globally connected way, available real-time, and supported by a group of competent library professionals.”

Contributed by Chris Tang, Lee Kong Chian Reference Library, NLB