Library Camp South West (#libcampsw)

On a very wet Saturday in Exeter, a group of librarians (plus one non-librarian) met for an unconference. For readers who are unfamiliar with this concept, an unconference is based upon open space technology, the philosophy of which can be encapsulated as: 'In Open Space meetings, events and organizations, participants create and manage their own agenda of parallel working sessions around a central theme of strategic importance' (1).   Basically, sessions are pitched on the day and attendees can choose to go along to whichever sessions they fancy, choosing to up and leave to sample another parallel session if they want. The south west event was a regional spin off from the UK national librarycamp and various international librarycamps.

I have to be honest and say when my alarm went off at an ungodly hour on my day off, I did question my sanity. But nevertheless I played the game of chance with the branch line to the main station (I won, but only just) and made it to Exeter. Let us take a moment to think about those who didn't make it. Those stuck in Honiton, for example, whose trains got stuck in the torrential weather conditions. Anyway, I met a few others on the train and we bravely trotted up the hill to the University campus.

I've had a busy few weeks: three conferences (one of which I helped to organise), registering as a mentor (or mental, as I have become affectionately - I hope - referred to by my mentee) and generally a bit of a tumultuous time at work, preparing to move campuses in September. Why not add another event to the mix? On my day off? And worse still, suggest a session topic for library camp south west? 

Table 1 of 2 of cakes

And so, with Claire, I found myself facilitating a discussion about why librarians should consider doing research, as well as supporting it. Supporting the researchers in my department was an objective on my annual review last year, not least because I felt I could do it better. I made contact with the Faculty research officer and had discussions with the two job-share librarians whose remit is to support research within my library service. But it wasn't really until I attended the ARLG national conference in Newcastle and the DARTS3 conference in Dartington last month, that I began to see the importance not just of supporting researchers, but possibly becoming one myself. 

Claire and I learned a lot from all the speakers at DARTS3 and especially Miggie Picton, who demystified research and made me realise that I was already doing things in my work which could be viewed as research with just a few little tweaks. All the benefits of doing research (to myself in terms of development and confidence, to my institution and to the profession at large) also became clear to me. Inspired by Miggie's interactive presentation, I suggested to Claire that maybe we could have more of a conversation about this at libcampsw. 

Claire pitched the idea to everyone and our idea was written on a post-it so people could decide which session to attend. A lovely group came to our session, ranging from people who did not consider themselves researchers to those who had experience of presenting at conferences and writing articles for peer-reviewed journals. We had a great conversation about what we meant by research, what research people had done and what they had found difficult as well as what they had got out of it. To finish, we asked everyone to think about one thing they were going to do when they got back to work.

One part of the conversation focused on how new researchers could access and learn from those who had more experience (e.g. maybe they had already published material). The potential value of a new researchers forum was mooted, a place where those new to research could pitch ideas, ask for help from those with more experience, discuss any problems they are having etc. I think this could be a really great resource and together with Claire and Rachel and anyone else interested, hope to investigate whether others think so too and set something up. Or maybe something already exists that we don't know about?

So, this was my first experience of facilitating a session like this (somehow staff and student training sessions don't seem to count) and it wasn't half as scary as I thought it might be!

Macaroons and fruit (no prizes for which I preferred)

The next session I attended was the Chartership one. I chartered quite a while ago (just checked, it was 2006, a lot later than I remembered) and don't have terribly fond memories of translating the criteria and writing it all up. It seems like similar anxieties are felt by Chartership candidates now, so as a new mentor I found it really interesting to sit in on the discussion they were having. Checking the meaning of criteria, tips on how to link evidence to the Body of Professional Knowledge, but most importantly, the value of networks to share information and support. I didn't have a mentor when I was going through the process and I certainly didn't have access to the online support networks that information professionals have, but I can see how valuable these are. 

A mixture of a supportive and understanding mentor but also one who can set deadlines and 'be scary' when necessary seemed to be required so I vow to try to get this balance right! I flippantly suggested that mentors could advertise how scary and deadline-setting they were: 1 chilli for kindly mentors, 5 chillis for scary ones! Actions for me are to refresh my memory on the Chartership process and guidelines (having undergone the CILIP mentoring training recently) and make contact with other mentors for advice and tips (mentors need networks too!). 

The third session I went to was led by Michael Davis who demonstrated Cranfield University's CRM (customer relationship management) database. This was an in-house programme which aimed to collate various data in order to better support their researchers. The value of this to Cranfield was clear but scaling it up to work in a large institution with a broader range of users proved to be the area for debate. The fascinating discussion about how valuable this could be, whilst trying to ascertain how it could be scaled up to a large institution, included debate over the role of the academic liaison librarians in forging strong links with their academics and researchers, the complexities of supporting users with additional needs, the various ways in which institutions were trying to converge student enquiries through one portal and issues relating to the maintenance and updating of an enquiries system. 

The next session I went to was facilitated by Ciara Eastell, who asked us what our dream library would look like. Brilliant ideas ranged from the imaginary, such as a library that maintained itself (ie repainting itself, never needing new carpets etc) and Johnny Depp reading to you over coffee, to slightly more realistic ones, like the importance of layout and flexible spaces in a library. Ciara promised to write up the ideas and share them. As for me, I felt that the use of colour and design to encourage users to behave differently would be worth investigating more. For instance, one person talked about the role of libraries in helping people to talk to each other and I wondered if the design, furniture and layout could really influence that. This isn't an original idea but one which really interests me. Oh and the real importance of natural light, which money can't always buy.

The final session I attended focused on a topic which isn't directly relevant to me in my current role but was fascinating nonetheless: it was all about how to get funding for projects. Tracey Guiry talked about the importance of partnerships when applying for funding and gave practical tips on how to go about identifying foundations and other sources of funding. I found this session fascinating because public librarians were asking questions about the sorts of projects which they would like to do, so it was a great insight into the challenges faced by librarians in another sector.

Plenty of coffee, home-made cakes and a delicious lunch made me forget the rain and I was really pleased to hear that there will be another libcampsw next year. I would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone (not just librarians) who are interested in meeting library workers across a variety of sectors, learning about new library developments, discussing ideas and sampling just a little bit of cake!

References

1. Open Space World (2012) What is Open Space Technology? Available from: http://www.openspaceworld.org/cgi/wiki.cgi?AboutOpenSpace [Accessed 08 July 2012].


Update - new link added: Ciara has written up some of the dream library ideas on the Library Camp SW wiki.