Graduate intern update: Elisabeth

Graduate intern Elisabeth Prestgard updates us on what she’s been up to in the last month or so…

Hello again everyone! Here is my update for the month. The Document Delivery Service team has recently changed its name to Interlibrary Loans team. I’m still part of both the ILL and Customer Service teams. I have been working more days onsite, which has been nice as it allows me to learn more about the different queries at the Help and Information Desk, and it gives me the opportunity to meet friendly and interesting people in person (especially since a lot of my time has been spent working from home.)

Continue reading “Graduate intern update: Elisabeth”

Five from the Hive: Top 5 Fictional Librarians.

Welcome to the latest Five From the Hive blog post! Who are your favourite fictional librarians? We often have this conversation, so for this latest Five from the Hive we are looking at the 5 Most Popular Fictional Librarians (as voted for by staff at Durham University Library and Collections). Then we’ll look beyond the stereotypes of librarians to highlight the diverse work we really do!

Continue reading “Five from the Hive: Top 5 Fictional Librarians.”

Graduate intern update: Beth

Graduate intern Beth Hall updates us on what she’s been up to in the last month or so…

It’s been nearly three months since I started here at Palace Green Library in Durham, and time has definitely flown! My mornings are spent helping out in the search room to make sure our readers and collections are well looked after. It’s still quiet in Palace Green while restrictions are still in place and students are enjoying their summers, but there’s still been a steady stream of reprographics requests and enquiries to take care of to ensure researchers still have access to our collections remotely. I haven’t seen this building in its fully populated state, so I’m intrigued to see what it’ll be like in here once the students are in!

Continue reading “Graduate intern update: Beth”

Graduate intern update: Elisabeth

Graduate intern Elisabeth Prestgard updates us on what she’s been up to in the last month or so…

Since I wrote my introductory post, there have been a few changes. I still work with DDS from home, and also work onsite with the customer services team. However, now that the summer is here and more of the staff are taking their holidays, I am working more at the library. Mondays and Tuesdays are the busiest days of the week. When working at the front desk, there are more queries to answer, as there are more students coming to the library. I also noticed on Wednesday, whilst bringing the returned books to the quarantine room, that there were a lot less books.

Continue reading “Graduate intern update: Elisabeth”

Conservation training during Covid-19

Katie, one of our conservators based at Palace Green Library, is studying for her ARA certificate in Archive Conservation. A significant element of her training is getting practical experience – not the easiest thing to accomplish at the moment. But last year, in between lockdowns, she managed to head to Flintshire Record Office for her placement with Conservator Mark Allen. In this post, she shares the results of her training.

Continue reading “Conservation training during Covid-19”

University Library and Collections – favourites from our collections…

As part of our World Book Day celebrations, we’ve been exploring the theme of ‘Choice – curiosity has no age limits and neither do books.’ There can be no better examples of this than from our very own collections held within our archives, special collections and museums. With a vast range of books that are as fascinating today as they were when first written, they continue to generate a desire to discover and learn and will cultivate this curiosity for many, many years to come. 

With that in mind, we’ve asked some of our librarians and curators to choose their favourite book from our collections and share their insight into these incredible items… 

Continue reading “University Library and Collections – favourites from our collections…”

#DULibIntroducing… Richard Holmes

Please state your name, full job title, and a brief description of what that entails:

Richard Holmes, Faculty Librarian for Social Sciences. The central element of my role is to communicate between the departments in the faculty and the University Library and Collections to ensure we are delivering services and resources that meet their diverse needs. I do this by attending key committees within each department to promote new and impending library developments and to pick up changes that may have an impact on the Library, Special Collections or Museums. I also provide support to enable members of Durham University at all levels of study to get the best out of the wonderful collections available. This can range from answering basic email enquiries, through one-to-one tuition, to delivering research skills classes embedded within teaching programmes. I also have a role in collections development, ensuring the right materials are available when needed to support each department’s teaching and research activities.

Continue reading “#DULibIntroducing… Richard Holmes”

12 Activities of Christmas: Library Staff Challenge

As we lead up to Christmas, we’ve given over this post to Sarah Hyland and Katie Skellett, who have been forcefully injecting Christmas cheer across Library and Collections staff, who have worked hard across 2020 to get services up and running, buildings back open and reading materials available online.

“We probably don’t need to say this but what a year it has been! Normally we would be decorating the offices and you wouldn’t be able to see people or books for tinsel and Christmas trees.  We would also be having staff parties, Christmas cracker relays and sharing delicious Christmas treats that the bakers amongst us had whipped up.  This year is obviously a bit different but the University Library and Collections Staff Development Group still wanted to try to do something to bring colleagues together.  We wanted to share a bit of Christmas cheer and help to make people feel festive – wherever they are just now.  So, we came up with the “12 activities of Christmas”.  It started on Monday 30th November and ran until Tuesday 15th December – culminating in a virtual Christmas quiz party!”

Continue reading “12 Activities of Christmas: Library Staff Challenge”

Powered by WordPress.com.

Up ↑