 |
 |
|
This section includes case studies of how Heron is being used at different institutions. It intended to provide information about the different ways in which subscribing institutions are using Heron's services.
Study 1 - University of Sheffield (March 2004) Study 2 - University of the West of England, Bristol (May 2004). Study 3 - University Central England Study 4 - London School of Economics (November 2005)
Staff contacts:
Lyn Parker, Academic Services Development Librarian and member of the HUG committee 2004.
Clare Scott, Head of Collections Management and Heron administrator (C.Scott@sheffield.ac.uk) Brief description of institution:
•
Founded in 1905. Member of the Russell Group.
•
72 academic departments in 7 Faculties (Architectural Studies, Arts, Engineering, Law, Medicine, Pure Science, and Social Sciences).
•
More than 23,000 students, from over 120 countries, and 5,500 staff.
•
Mission is to teach students in a research-led environment.
•
WebCT Vista rolled out to all courses from September 2005.
Current Library projects related to access to resources:
•
Development and rollout of online reading lists with full text links using TalisList, including their integration into WebCT via a PowerLink
•
Access to electronic resources through the University portal, Muse
•
Online information skills tutorials to be delivered within WebCT.
•
Electronic offprint pilot:
- To compare costs and benefits of using Heron versus in-house copyright clearance and digitisation - Investigate the integration of the e-offprint service with the provision of online reading lists via Talislist with links to full text e-journals, e-books and web documents, including access via WebCT - Evaluate the impact on student behaviour and performance in liaison with academic staff - Monitor student preference for print course packs v. electronic packs - Estimate resource requirements for rolling out the service beyond the scope of the digitisation licence - Targeted action with academic departments to increase liaison with individual course leaders to improve information availability and student satisfaction.
Heron membership:
•
Joined June 2003
•
Piloted Eoffprints with 4 departments from summer 2003, (Human Communication Sciences, Law, Nursing and Psychology)
•
3 packs submitted to Heron for first semester – Total 35 extracts
•
Pilot extended to another 2 modules for 2nd semester
•
Service rolled out to individual departments from January 2005 under New Partnership Target Action project
•
Purchased Packtracker January 2004 to manage both electronic offprints and course pack compilation
•
Signed HE Trial Scanning Licence October 2005, once User guidelines confirmed that extracts could be linked to from TalisList, our online reading list software.
Access
•
Extracts held on library server with statistics on usage available via web log
•
Remote access available via Muse, the university portal
•
Links are provided to the electronic offprints within TalisList, the online reading list software, and via WebCT as required
•
Links have not been provided via the catalogue
Issues of interest – Heron related
•
Impact of blanket scanning licence on service provision and Heron
•
Delays in obtaining or not obtaining copyright clearance
•
Costs particularly variation in price per page so difficult to set realistic budgets
•
Uncertainty of student numbers – need to clear pack before student numbers are known. These can vary considerably, difficult to set ballpark figure
•
Compatibility of HERONweb and Packtracker to ensure information is always up to date
Issues of interest – general
•
Funding models – top slicing or subject funds
•
Balancing the budget of the overall pack(s) when estimates are received above (or below) the expected cost. At present we are using a rough guide of 8p per page per student
•
Specifications for in-house digitisation, particularly to meet SENDA legislation
•
Publicity to students of availability – even with direct email to individual students on the particular module, evaluation shows some still did not know about their availability
•
Evaluation shows students are evenly split between having a preference for a print course pack for them to purchase at cost as opposed to electronic articles which may need to print at 5p per sheet
•
Liaison with academics on reading list provision and ensuring access to material whether in print or electronic; purpose of reading list; whether essential reading, background reading, choice of reading; whether ‘spoon feeding’ or scaffolding
Documentation to date
•
Internal project reports
•
Stubley, P. (2002) Going beyond resource discovery: integrating services into a virtual learning environment. Library and Information Update. 1(6), 52-54.
•
“Blended learning, blended resources: a collaborative approach to supporting students”. Paper presented at the Networked Learning Conference at Lancaster University 5th-7th April 2004.
•
“Rethinking reading lists” Presentation to the Assign AGM 26th April 2004 at Aslib HQ.
Staff contacts:
Anne Petrie, Heron Administrator and member of the HUG committee 2004. Brief description of institution:
•
Formerly UWE was a Polytechnic and became a University in Oct 1992.
•
There are 10 Faculties:
- Applied Sciences - Art Media and Design - Built Environment - Bristol Business School - Computing, Engineering and Mathematical Sciences - Education - Humanities, Languages and Social Sciences - Health and Social Care - Law - Hartpury College for FE and HE in land based courses, sports and equine studies.
•
There are 6 campus libraries that form UWE Library Services with 8 service points and approximately 662,000 books, 9,970 journal subscriptions, 23, 640 AV materials with over 47,500 new items of stock added each year and over 2,300 study places.
- Currently we have over 24,000 students of whom over 4,000 are postgraduate, just over 1,000 students whom are from overseas and over 3,000 staff. - The mission of the University of the West of England (UWE) is to 'advance an inclusive, civilised and democratic society and its enrichment through education, research, consultancy and public service.'
•
There are over 8,000 enrolled users of Blackboard on over 470 courses for 2003. This number will double for 2004-5. Blackboard was introduced in September 2002 as the University’s supported VLE.
Current Library initiatives:
•
Pilot of 24 hour opening at the main campus, with a reference only service when the library is not normally staffed. We have introduced self issue machines to provide additional services when library staff are not available.
•
We are making increased use of e-books and downloading of catalogue records.
•
We have introduced a wireless hub system to allow students to access the student network on their own laptops within the library.
•
We have developed a study skills course which is made available on Blackboard to every module.
•
We have developed an interactive guide to the Law Library to support law students in their use of both print and electronic legal resource materials.
Heron membership:
•
Joined sometime before 2000
•
Experimented with obtaining clearances and digitisation of a paper collection in 2000
•
Pilot with two faculties in 2002-3 102 requests in 5 packs for 575 students.
•
2003-4 we made 365 requests in 41 packs for 4,300 students across all 10 faculties.
Access and procedures
•
These extracts are stored on Hyperion which is an add-on to our library management system, Unicorn.
•
Hyperion also contains past exam papers (over 7,500), lecturers PowerPoint presentations, student dissertations and a collection of enamel images.
•
Usage statistics can be obtained through Hyperion. Students can access from home but need their library id and PIN number. It is possible to create a seamless link to materials on Hyperion from a Blackboard module.
•
We don’t use Packtracker at the moment but rely on the HERONweb database, an excel spreadsheet and 10 pamphlet boxes one for each faculty and plastic wallets for each pack. Unsophisticated but it seems to work.
•
Currently there are 1.5 staff who deal with Heron and Hyperion.
•
We have a PDF form on our website for staff to fill in the information being ordered as required on HERONweb (we don’t always mange to get these completed for us) and bib checking is time consuming.
•
We promote the service via our web pages, with additional leaflets and also run sessions for academics in faculty staff development days.
Funding
•
Last year the library top-sliced an amount from each Faculty Librarian’s budget to pump-prime the initiative. Feed back has generally been very good and statistics show that vast majority of resources have been well used. Some faculties decided to commit more of their book fund to support electronic material.
•
This year each Faculty Librarian can choose what amount they will put aside for Heron requests. In general most want to continue to support the modules that used Blackboard last year and some are putting aside more resources to support electronic delivery.
•
It is hoped that the faculties will be willing to contribute some funding.
Issues of interest – Heron related
•
Impact of blanket scanning licence on service provision and Heron
•
Delays in obtaining or not obtaining copyright clearance
•
Costs - particularly the variation in price per page making it difficult to set realistic budgets.
Issues of interest – general
•
Use of databases such as Hyperion to store materials
•
Funding models – top slicing or subject funds
•
Specifications for in-house digitisation, particularly to meet SENDA legislation. Currently we don’t digitise materials in-house.
•
How Libraries become more involved in supporting VLEs.
University of Central England (UCE), Birmingham UK http://www.uce.ac.uk
Staff contacts:
Beth Delwiche, Digital Library Officer, Heron buyer, and member of the HUG Committee 2004.
Nikki Griffin , Digital Library Officer and Heron buyer
Chris Dodd , Digital Library Manager, and Heron administrator Brief description of UCE:
•
UCE is a fairly new university, established by statute in 1992. It evolved from combination of various technical colleges throughout Birmingham.
• UCE delivers over 300 courses to more than 23,000 students (7 campuses) • 9 Faculties (Birmingham Conservatoire, Birmingham Institute of Art and Design, Built Environment, Business School, Computer Information and English, Education, Health and Community Care, Law and Social Science, and Technology Innovation Centre). • A VLE at UCE is currently under development using Moodle.
•
UCEEL is the digital library for UCE.
•
Core Content includes exam papers, journal articles, book extracts, and student projects (5,247 items on system as of April 2004).
•
Special Collections: Contemporary Jewellery images (Birmingham Institute of Art and Design).
•
Content Management System: Formtek Orion.
•
Accessed by student/staff members using library card and pin number.
•
Working on creating a link between TALIS prism and UCEEL resources
Heron membership:
•
UCE joined Heron in 2001
•
Pilot with 2 departments-TIC (engineering) & CIE (Computers, Information, & English)- Materials hosted for all faculties in 2004.
•
Primarily use Heron for copyright clearances as most digitization is in-house.
Issues of interest – Heron related
•
Impact of blanket scanning licence on service provision and Heron
•
Delays in obtaining or not obtaining copyright clearance
•
Costs particularly variation in price per page
•
Implementation and enforcement of European copyright directives.
•
Audiovisual and image copyright developments.
London School of Economics (LSE), November 2005 http://www.lse.ac.uk
Contact details:
Jane Secker, Learning Technology Librarian and Heron User Group Committee Chair since 2003, LSE Centre for Learning Technology. Brief description of LSE:
•
Founded in 1895 by Beatrice and Sidney Webb.
• Member of the Russell Group. • From its foundation LSE has aimed to be a laboratory of the social sciences, a place where ideas are developed, analysed, evaluated and disseminated around the globe. • The School has around 7,500 full-time students and over 800 part-time students. They come from 152 countries: 36 per cent from the UK, 15 per cent from other European Union countries, 49 per cent from other countries around the world. • The School has over 1,700 full-time members of staff. A total of 44 per cent are from countries outside the UK, half of these from European Union countries, the remaining half from other nations around the world. • There are 19 departments and institutes. Several subjects have been pioneered at LSE, including anthropology, international relations and social policy. • The School uses WebCT and over 280 courses now have some element of blended learning to support face-to-face teaching. • The Library and Centre for Learning Technology have collaborated since 1999 to provide an electronic course pack service, which allows digital readings to be made available via WebCT. • The Centre for Learning Technology employ a Learning Technology Librarian to advise staff about copyright issues more widely. • The Library has also been involved in a large number of JISC funded projects which have explored digital library and e-learning issues.
Heron membership:
•
LSE joined in 2002.
• An in-house permission and digitisation service has always operated in parallel to the use of Heron. • Approximately a quarter of all permissions and digitisation work are out-sourced to Heron to cope with the increased demand for the service and in order to provide better quality digitised files than can be produced in-house. • Packtracker was developed by Heron for use at the LSE to manage both in-house and Heron e-course pack requests. • LSE have continued to work with Heron to develop the functions of Packtracker.
Access
•
Extracts held on library server with statistics on usage available via web logs .
• Student access to readings is through an online reading list available in the relevant WebCT course. • An in-house online reading list system is currently under development in the Library. • At present online reading lists are designed in HTML by WebCT course designers who receive a template and training from the Centre for Learning Technology. These lists are uploaded into WebCT which is the only point of access for students. • Links to readings are not provided via the Library catalogue.
Issues of interest – Heron related
•
Impact of blanket scanning licence on service provision and Heron, in particular Heron are extremely helpful in identifying what constitutes a UK publisher.
• Delays in obtaining or not obtaining copyright clearance. • Costs, particularly variation in price per page so difficult to set realistic budgets. • Compatibility of HERONweb and Packtracker to ensure information is always up to date.
Issues of interest – general
•
Balancing the budget of the overall pack(s) when estimates are received above (or below) the expected cost. At present we are generally not accepting over 8p per page per student.
• Specifications for in-house digitisation – would ideally like to improve quality of in-house scans, which are PDF image. However, this is difficult to achieve without reducing the volume of material that can be processed. • Use of HTML reading lists in WebCT is not ideal long term so we hope to have a more dynamic system to ensure that as soon as material has been scanned and uploaded it is available to students from the reading list in WebCT. • Students preference is still slightly in favour of printed course packs as opposed to electronic articles which they have print at 5p per page. • Ensuring that we fully exploit our collections of e-journals and e-books and make staff aware of the issues of linking to such resources. • Liaison with academics on reading list provision and appropriate access to reading material is available for their students. With this in mind we recently established a One Stop Shop for Course Packs to advise academic staff about to most appropriate format of reading list material.
Documentation / publications to date
Jane Secker and Olu Abomide. (2003) Providing and monitoring student use of electronic readings – what does it tell us? Poster presentation at ALT-C (Association for Learning Technology Annual Conference) 2004. Secker, Jane. (2005) DELIVERing library resources to the virtual learning environment. Program. 39 (1) 39-49. |
 |
What does Heron do?
Case studies