#DULibIntroducing Kate Williamson

In the next of our series introducing members of staff, #DULibIntroducing meets Information Assistant Kate Williamson.

Please tell us your name, full job title, and a brief description of your role.

Kate Williamson, Information Assistant. I work at the Bill Bryson Library in a customer service role. You will usually find me at the Help and Information Desk helping with queries, finding books for people, fixing printers, and passing out the ever so popular staplers and pens. I am also part of the team that processes resource requests, which is our service to help provide staff and students with Scan and Deliver requests, Postal Loans, Inter-Library loans, and book purchases through our Acquisitions team.

How long have you worked in the library?

I started in October 2021, so haven’t been with the library for very long! It definitely feels like I’ve been here longer though – the team has made me feel so welcome and included from the start.

What’s the most interesting/enjoyable aspect of your job?

Aside from the people, it’s got to be seeing what books and articles people are interested in and request through our resource request form. Some of the research people are doing at the University sounds amazing! As an English Literature graduate too, I can’t help but be interested by the fiction titles people request through Liberate my Library and for their own general interests.

When you are not at work, what do you enjoy doing?

I enjoy reading – although I do have way too many books on my TBR pile and nowhere near enough time to read them. I also like to walk my dog Archie. He’s a puggle (a pug and beagle cross) and his favourite place is the beach, so you can often find us there walking along the sand, trying to avoid getting our feet wet when the tide comes in.

Which part of the world would you love to visit and why? 

There’s not one specific place that I would love to visit, I would just love to travel a lot more! With Covid it has meant I’ve been restricted to a lot more UK breaks (not that I’m complaining), but going abroad soon would be lovely. Aside from a beach holiday, I would love to visit somewhere like Italy and travel across the country visiting cities like Rome and Venice. I’ve never been but it looks beautiful and it’s something to tick off my bucket list at some point.

If you had an unlimited budget, what addition would you make to the library?

If money was no object, I would completely gut out the library and give it an update. New paint, new furniture, a cohesive colour scheme. We know how busy the library can get and how in demand the study rooms are too, so extending to add extra study rooms and more disability support rooms would also be a priority.

What is the best piece of advice you could give to our library users?

If someone is in front of you on your way out of the library, wait a moment before you scan and please don’t follow people out of the gates! Trust me, waiting the extra 2 seconds for the gates to stop saying ‘please wait’ will save you much more time next time you try to come back and it says you’re ‘already in’.