All change at the ISC Library

In addition to the Bill Bryson Library and the Barker Research Library up in Durham, there is also a ‘branch’ of the University Library down in Stockton-on-Tees.

The International Study Centre (ISC) Library is for use by ISC students and staff at Queen’s Campus, Stockton, and can be found on level 2 of the Ebsworth Building. There specifically to support the foundation programmes which run at the ISC (although Durham University staff and students who live in the area can also access study spaces within the library), it houses a few thousand print books and a range of study spaces.

The library’s function has changed somewhat over the years. When the campus was first built life in 1992 as University College, Stockton (UCS), before being renamed University of Durham, Stockton Campus in 1998. The library was originally in the Holliday building before being relocated to the Ebsworth Building in 1997 and renamed the Information Resource Centre (IRC – not to be confused with ISC). For the first 20 odd years of its life, the IRC supported the teaching and research done by the various University departments on campus. Over 2,000 university students per year studied at what was the campus – renamed ‘Queen’s Campus, Stockton’ in the Queen’s golden jubilee year of 2002.  

By 2017 the role of the campus had changed. The ISC, run by Study Group, offers foundation courses to overseas students, preparing them for higher education. The ISC library’s role is now to support these students. Because the courses are of a different academic level to those previously supported, and the student numbers are lower, the library space needed to be altered to reflect this.

In short, the library was too big and many of the books were not fit for purpose!

Over the course of the past serval years (owing to a Covid interruption) the book stock has been weeded, added to and made fit for purpose. This summer, there have also been big changes to the physical layout of the library. With Study Group wanting to use a sizable proportion of the library space for teaching purposes, the library’s ‘footprint’ has been reduced. However, this has allowed us to create a space much more suitable to the students’ needs and appropriate to the number of users. There is still a range of study spaces and access to all previous services. The users now see books when they enter the library (previously they were tucked around the corner, meaning it looked like a library with no books to the casual observer!) and with the study spaces being located much closer to the Help and Information Desk, the students are much more likely to ask for the help they need!