Library Blog

QUB staff and students now have trial access to 6 key US newspaper archives:

Chicago Tribune
Indianapolis Star
Los Angeles Times
The Boston Globe
The New York Times with Index
The Washington Post

To access the trial click here (access is restricted to on-campus only)

Trial access ends 20th March 2015

We would appreciate your feedback – please leave it here.

The Library has set up trial access to the Artech House collection of 500 e-books. Artech House specialises in publishing books for a number of high-tech fields including:

• Microwave
• Radar
• Electronic defence
• Antennas
• GNSS/GPS
• Software development and security
• MEMS and nanotechnology

A range of subscription options are available including packages based on title selection or subject area. The trial access ends on the 28^th February 2015.

Please let us know what you think about the Artech House e-books by emailing d.holden@qub.ac.uk.

The Library is currently gathering information on books recommended in module readings lists for semester 2. All readings lists will be checked for book availability whenever received by the Library. Please note, however, that for lists to be checked for availability in time for the start of the semester, lists will need to be received by Friday 16th January. We would encourage staff who have not already done so, to send module reading lists as soon as possible to their subject librarian.

In February 2014 we emailed a survey to 1,673 students who were registered with Disability Services in order to evaluate the service that the Library provides to them. Overall the survey shows that the Library is providing a good service to its disabled users. The service is generally very accessible and staff are helpful and responsive to the needs of students. There are, however, areas for improvements and the 212 respondents provided some constructive criticism in their feedback. Through this feedback, key areas for concern were identified and the following improvements put in place:

• Increased awareness of the services that the Library provides to students with disabilities.  In conjunction with Disability Services we now send an email to all registered students detailing their entitlements and all the various services on offer to them. This email will be sent out at the start of each semester and a paper guide will soon be published which will also carry these details.

• Improve access to books on the higher shelves. To address the issue of high shelving for people with mobility issues, at least one set of hand rail type steps has been purchased per floor. These are located between the computers and the book stacks in the area overlooking the atrium, so that they are easily located when required.

• Raised staff awareness of the issues facing students with disabilities. Library front line staff receive regular training from Disability Services on specific disabilities and assistive solutions. This will continue on an annual basis to ensure that staff are given the tools to help students with disabilities.

• Improve Library staff customer service skills. All front line staff received comprehensive customer service skills training in autumn 2014 to embed an ethos of excellent customer service across the service. Continued staff training and education should improve the experience of students with disabilities when using the Library Service at Queen’s.

A further area which was raised in the survey was the difficulty in finding a quiet place to study especially during peak times. The Library is currently investigating the possibility of having a small number of bookable desks in the ground floor Silent Study room. Students eligible to book these desks should then be able to guarantee a quiet location and thus reduce anxiety levels in a relatively anonymous way. Watch this space!

The Library has developed a suite of customer-focused service standards and measured our current performance against these standards.

If you have any feedback or comments, please let us know via our Customer Feedback Page.

We are particularly interested to hear if you feel that there are other important areas of service delivery that we should focus on.