The Library now subscribes to IBIS World which provides in-depth analyses of almost every industry in the New Zealand economy. It will be very useful for Business and Economics students as well as other disciplines since it includes reports on health, arts and recreation, education, media and telecommunications, transport professional and technical services such law, accounting and engineering consulting, and more…

As you know Web of Science will be cancelled in 2020 which means that a traditional source of citation data will no longer be available. Kerry and I have been asked to run a session for library staff on alternatives to Web of Science.  You might also like to look at the Measure Impact Subject guide

Time: Wednesday 24th October 11am to 12 noon
Place: Library Den

Please book here

This is a copy of a short summary of the Ithaka Survey which was written for the June Joint R&I/Library Research  Report. A more detailed analysis of the Ithaka results will be available in the near future.

The Library has received the results of the Ithaka survey (http://www.sr.ithaka.org/services/surveys/) which  was sent to 718 academic staff on 1 May. The survey was completed by 285 staff, a response rate of about 40%. The results reflect a largely positive attitude to the library and are consistent with international trends demonstrated by Ithaka surveys from other regions. Not surprisingly academics have moved away from the physical library model, embracing electronic services and focusing on the added value the library can offer in the areas of learning, teaching, and research support.

For the majority of academics the most valuable role of the library lies in managing and paying for academic resources (96%). There is a heavy reliance (94.29%) on the journal articles and scholarly monographs provided by the library for academic teaching and research. A high number of respondents (80.44% and 84.44% respectively) also report concern about the information literacy skills of both their undergraduate and postgraduate students and recognize the library’s contribution in addressing these issues.

Fewer respondents are aware of the library’s potential role in supporting their own research by assisting with publication selection, dissemination and impact of research outputs. However the university library was identified, closely followed by IT, as a valuable potential source of support for managing and preserving research data.

The survey also indicates a high level of support for open access with academics wanting to ensure the broadest possible readership for their research. Respondents also make good use of institutional and disciplinary repositories, with 72.05% reporting that they deposit journal articles and conference papers in the UC repository.

Electronic journals and books are valued but there are still reservations, particularly around scholarly monographs, with 39% of respondents reporting that print monographs still play a very important role in their research, especially for in-depth reading.

The survey indicates that the majority of academics are open to adopting new digital learning technologies and using open source instructional resources in their teaching.  Difficulties in locating suitable open access material are evident with 44.58% of respondents indicating challenges in this area.

We are very pleased to welcome two UC PhD students to the Library to talk about their PhD topics and how they have incorporated Kaupapa Māori principles within their work.

Corinne Lucas De Souza is undertaking her research in the School of Business and is investigating attitudes, enablers and barriers towards kaitiakitanga (environmental guardianship), focusing on mahinga kai (customary harvest and management of waterfowl and wetlands) due to its ecological and cultural importance to tāngata whenua.

Roisin Bennett is currently working in the AVC Maori Development Team.  Her PhD topic is Whakamana: An investigation into the cultural development and effective empowerment of ākonga Māori in Higher Education.

Morning tea will be provided.

Date: Thursday 31^st May
Time 11am – 12 noon
Venue: Puaka James Hight 201

Please book here

The Library now has two  terminals which access the large financial database known as Bloomberg.  They were surplus to requirements in the UC Trading Room located on the ground floor of the Business and Law Building.  The Bloomberg terminals are located on Level 2 just outside Room 210. They each a special colour coded keyboard.

Students can login into the PCs in the normal way and use their regular desktop applications. The Bloomberg icon will appear on their desktop and should they want to access Bloomberg the username and password is pasted above the screens (UCLIBRARY). They can subsequently create a personal Bloomberg login.  Bloomberg is a very complex resource and those who wish to use it should be referred to Janette.

Adjacent to these two machines is another PC that has Datastream access, another financial database.  Instructions for the use of Datastream, which has to be configured to each individual’s login are available here.

Next week is Gradfest, a series of workshops  provided for postgraduate students by the Library, Academic Skills, the Postgraduate Office and other services around campus.  It will take place in Undercroft 101, Room 210, Poutama and the Den.  You can view the programme here.

John Key is coming to campus on Monday afternoon to open the new UC  Business School Trading Room which is situated next to the cafe on the ground floor of the Business & Law Building. The room will contain several Bloomberg terminals,  the well-known business database used in most large banks and other financial institutions.

The Library is trialling WARC (the World Advertising Research Centre Database) until August 18th

WARC is the largest single source of online intelligence for  the marketing, advertising, media and research companies worldwide. It gathers over 15,000 articles, case studies, research and conference papers drawn from over 25 international sources covering all areas of marketing communications. Users can also access adspend statistics, demographic and economic data plus consolidated global industry news and marketing communications best practice papers.

The Library has a short trial of the Henry Stewart Business and Management Talks until May 31st.  The link and the evaluation form can be found on the Database trials page.

The talks are grouped in series. One of the series is Libraries in a Digital Age

Henry Stewart Talks are also available in a number of other disciplines.

We are also trialling Sage Business Cases until 9th June.

I will be away from work from 25th October to 2nd December.  If there are any business and economics related queries during this period, please contact my lovely colleagues, Margaret Paterson or Kerry Gilmour, who have kindly agreed to support the staff and students in this college.

Janette