Kia ora koutou

My gratitude for some wonderful food-focussed celebrations this (short) week.  We had the fudge extravaganza on Tuesday – so delicious!!  And then the Matariki shared kai earlier today.  This was a special moment to come together, contemplate the past and look ahead to what the next and new year will bring.

On which note, various initiatives continue at pace!  We’ve had a focus on collection and shelving moves over the last few weeks, in all libraries and all locations (Meremere basement, Henry Field Store and the Annex, PJH Central Library and Archives as part of the Shelving Replacement Project).  Thank you Jenny for a tour of the Dovedale campus yesterday as well – great to see things firsthand!

Our Library Committee has a new confirmed Chair, with Associate Professor Arindam Basu stepping into the role.  Arin’s tenure as Chair commences at the next Library Committee meeting (Friday 21 July) and will provide the opportunity to set the scene for the year/s ahead, particularly in light of opportunities emerging from the review panel’s findings and recommendations.

Just a reminder that there is the ongoing opportunity to provide your thoughts or feedback to the panel, and I know groups of staff are preparing this now – thank you! We also have the project room and Padlet available for anonymous ideas sharing, too.  The panel are working to an end-of-August timeline, to have a first draft of their report ready for us to receive.

You may have picked up that I am currently reporting direct to the VC, with Ian being on medical leave for the next couple of months. I had my first one-on-one with Cheryl earlier this week and found her interested in and engaged with both the Library and the review process.  Great to see!

I hope you all have a safe, happy and very restful day tomorrow, and weekend ahead.
Mānawatia a Matariki!
Kat

Kia ora Koutou,

As you will be aware, Tomo is away from work undergoing treatment for cancer. While the initial results are very positive, Tomo is not anticipating being back at work until the beginning of next year as his treatment takes its course.

When Tomo first left for Japan, we put in place an urgent acting TL role for three months while we gained some understanding of Tomo’s condition and his likely treatment regime. Now we have the needed clarity, and the initial three-month appointment is ending, I need to arrange the team leader role for remainder of the time he is away.

I am inviting Expressions of Interest from current library staff who would like to take up the role of Team Leader in the ELS team. This would be a fixed-term secondment until February 28, 2024.

If a leadership and coordination role in a busy front facing customer service team sounds like you, please send your CV and EoI to me by 5:00 p.m. Wednesday 19 July.

If you would like to discuss this role, please do get in touch!

Ngā Mihi,

Simon Burge
Kaiwhakahaere Ratonga Kiritaki | Manager Engagement and Learning Support.

Kia ora koutou, 

The rising of Matariki around mid-winter marks the start of a New Year, a time when crops were harvested, and seafood and birds that had been collected were stored away. This ecological shift in season marks the new year – a time to celebrate new life and new beginnings.  

To celebrate Matariki, please come along to a shared kai this Thursday (13 July) at 10am-11:30am (swing by at a time when you’re free!) in the space between the level 5 tearoom and Aurelia/Helen/Kat’s offices.

Please bring something to share if you are able to. It will be great to catch-up over some kai! 

Ngā mihi,

Isabella, Aurelia, Jemma, Lani,

There is now more of the Store H collection available for requesting and we have removed the Temporarily Unavailable status from these items.  Collection in the Store H call range A – QP should now be available, but it excludes some P material.

All items that were kept on level 2 of Henry Field are still unavailable, but we hope to have these available by end of August.

Further updates will come as we make progress with moving, unboxing and shelving the remaining material that is still located in Henry Field building.

Thanks to the hard work of our casual staff who have been busy over at Dovedale unboxing the collection.

Jenny

Kia ora koutou,

We’re excited to announce that all entries for VYT 2023 are now available for viewing on UC’s YouTube channel.

Voting for the People’s Choice award opened at 8am this morning, and closes at noon on Monday 24^th July.

So, take a look at some of our post-grad research students’ great work … and get voting 🙂

Ngā mihi,
Rachel, Brian, Kiera and Roman

Central Library will be closed on Sunday 9 July (this Sunday) due to the campus-wide heating outage, therefore all UC Libraries will be closed on Sunday (MB will be routinely closed over the weekend, and EPS is closed on the weekend over the mid-semester break).

The boilers will be off from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on Sunday to allow for the work that is being carried out to convert from a coal-fired boiler system to one running on renewables.  The consequent difficulty of heating the building, our inability to use mobile electric heaters, the time for the building to reheat, the forecast external temperature and the lack of sun, would mean a pretty  unpleasant experience for our students and staff. Both People & Culture and UCSA support this approach and student numbers are low, so this should not inconvenience a large number of people.

Thanks to the marketing team, Dale and our eResources team for the rapid messaging that has gone out on our social media, digital screens, posters etc. Simon will come in to be around for an hour at 10:00 a.m. to manage communications with any disappointed users who have not seen the messaging.

Ngā mihi,

Isabella

Kia ora koutou

Not really sure where the week has gone!  We’ve had some sparkly winter days and frosts this week, which have been ‘invigorating’ to say the least!  And I realise a number of you are on leave, going on leave soon, or doing battle with winter and other illnesses.  Do take care, one and all.

Academic Board meets soon, so I’ll post this in advance as the meeting can take a couple of hours.  By the way, our move to Folio gets a mention in the most recent VC report to Council, which is quite exciting!

A reminder that ongoing feedback to the review panel is invited and welcomed.  The project room on Level 5 PJH is still set up with post-its galore, and has a dedicated space for us all to share Challenges, Opportunities and Ideas.
We also have the anonymous Padlet available and a couple of virtual post-its have appeared already. You may otherwise/also like to submit some written feedback, individually or as a group, which can be on-shared with the panel.

It was lovely to join the Te Rua MakerSpace Mingle this morning.  Thank you team for hosting this welcome and having a range of fun activities available to try out. As noted in the invitation, this event gave us all the opportunity to learn more about what Te Rua has to offer, so we can give recommendations to library users and make use of the space ourselves!

Thanks also to Roman and Ryan for their rove reporting skills earlier this week. Looking forward (with a considerable measure of trepidation about my interview, I admit) to seeing the interviews with staff go live on our social media feeds sometime soon….!

Happy and safe weekend all,
Kat

Kia ora koutou

Just a reminder that Tuesday 11 July is fudge day!

Who: Everyone

Where: All the libraries

What: Make some fudge, and have it ready to go by 9:30. Kiera and Kathryn will collect fudge (Level 5, Level 2, EPS & MB) and then distribute it throughout the libraries so everyone can try the different kinds. No competition this time, but you can write nice things about the fudge on Teams if you like.

When: Tuesday July 11, 9:30am

Why: It’ll be fun and we all get to eat fudge!

Kia ora koutou

Digital services are doing some maintenance work that will affect remote access.

When: Wednesday 5th July (today!), 5-9pm

What: Users will be disconnected twice if using go.canterbury.ac.nz during the upgrade but will be able to log back in immediately.

gostudent.canterbury.ac.nz will be unavailable for approximately 30mins during upgrade, after which you will need to log back in.

If you have access problems after 9pm today, please contact the ITS service desk, or raise a ticket in the Services Portal.

Ngā mihi,

Claire (on behalf of Library Systems)

Kia ora koutou,

I am very pleased to share that Hine Ngarewa has been appointed to the fixed term position of Kaiāwhina in the Macmillan Brown Library.

Hine has been on the casual team for several years and has previously worked in a fixed term role at MB.  We are delighted to have Hine joining the team in a more long-term role.

Her start date is Monday 10 July and she will be in this role until end of January 2025. Hine will be working Monday to Thursdays.

Ngā mihi nui,

Fiona