You Said We Did feedback from (03/6/13)
Read the whole You Said We Did Archive on the Comments and Suggestions page.
(03/6/13)
Get a microwave plz.
Thanks for completing a Library You Said/We Did card the other week asking us to install microwave facilities.
I’m afraid we have no plans to introduce a microwave in the Library. As the café is the only area of the building in which we allow hot food to be consumed, the microwave would need to be located in that space and it’s very limited already. We do allow students to bring their own food and drink (or food and drink purchased from other outlets) into the café, something that other university cafés don’t allow – i.e. they only permit students to consume food and drink purchased from within the café they are sitting in.
I think if we were to allow a microwave, it would compromise the café’s ability to remain as commercially viable as it needs to be.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
Perhaps instead of banning coffee it would be more prudent to provide paper towels so that if we were to spill a little coffee we could wipe it up ourselves thus solving the coffee stain issue.
Thanks for completing a Library You Said/We Did comments card a couple of weeks ago – sorry for being slow to reply.
I’ve been talking to colleagues in Cleaning Services about the possibility of providing some kind of cleaning stations, probably blu-roll as you suggest, that could be distributed around the Library. Now that semester has finished, we will be meeting soon to take a final decision on the coffee policy for the Library from now on.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
Thanks to the help desk for providing blue paper for printing for a dyslexic friend. It would be great if alternate colours were available from the help desk and this was publicised – for students with disabilities.
Thanks for your comments about coloured paper being made available from the Helpdesk. As the printing service is run by our colleagues in IT Services, this would be something they’d need to consider.
I’ve passed your suggestions on to the IT Service Desk Manager.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
Your chemistry books aren’t really in very good order (to chemists).
Thanks for your recently completed You Said/We Did comments card when you mentioned the order of Chemistry books.
I’m not clear from your comments if you are referring to the order of the books in terms of their classification arrangement or the order of the books in terms of their quality etc. The Academic Liaison Librarian with responsibility for this subject area is my colleague Vicki Cormie (vhc1) and I’ve asked her to contact you directly – she should be able to help.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
How about next time during exams and revision you don’t have someone using sandpaper on the walls as it is very distracting?! Thanks.
Thanks for your comments and I’m sorry that you were disturbed during exams. I’m afraid I wasn’t aware of work of this nature taking place and have spoken with our Building Operations Supervisor who was also unaware of any work during the period you describe.
From time to time, trades people from Estates will come to the Library and carry out repairs without the knowledge of Library staff. If you are disturbed by something like this again in the future, please do alert a member of our staff immediately. Loud or disruptive repairs in silent areas during exams are not something we would normally authorise unless of course the repair was critical.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
I feel like signs telling us to read the signs would fit the library’s current policy of wasting time and money on stupid and aggressive signage….
How about some positive encouragement instead?! We do not spend so many hours in here for our simple enjoyment of deadlines and exams. The current policies seem wildly out of touch with the vast majority of us who use this place. “Learning” is more than deadlines and exams but the library now feels far removed from the institution of learning it is meant to be.
Thanks for your comments and I’m sorry that you’ve not been happy with the recent campaign related to noise in the stairwell. As the signs illustrated, there are many other users of the building who disagree with your view that these signs were stupid and oppressive. Indeed, they were installed to highlight the real and negative impact that the behaviour of some users was having on many others.
The evidence since the installation of the signs is that they did reduce the noise levels. I think those students being affected by loud and prolonged conversations on the stairwells would prefer our signs to ask for quiet so that they can therefore concentrate on their revision rather than feel inspired to do so. No matter how inspired one may be feeling to study, it would be difficult to do so when distracted by screaming and shouting from a few feet away.
As you’ll see from some other comments on this page, other students have thanked us for our efforts in order to keep the noise down in this area.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
Thank you for all the signs in the stairwells! Maybe the selfish and ignorant amongst us will get the message – this is a library and not the union, yes?As for those complaining about being treated like children – being treated like adults doesn’t seem to work does it?
Keep up the good work.
Thanks for your comments. I’m glad that you feel the signs have made a difference and I agree with your comments wholeheartedly – in an ideal world, we wouldn’t have to adopt such direct (or “passive aggressive” I think was a term frequently used in reference to this campaign) tactics but that would assume that all users would show due consideration for others in their use of such a busy building.
We will be removing the quote signs shortly although it’s been fascinating to see such a negative reaction from students to the views of their colleagues.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
The library is always far too hot. It’s uncomfortable and seems like a waste of limited resources.
Thanks for your recent comments about the temperature in the University Library.
We’ve been having problems with the heating system since its installation two years and it has, despite how it may have felt, actually been switched off for several months now. We are working with colleagues in Estates and engineers in order to investigate the problems further during the summer vacation.
Hopefully we’ll be able to resolve these long standing problems soon.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)
(03/6/13)
Now that the library’s rather empty it is also quite cold. Especially level 4 is chilly. Would it be possible to turn the air conditioning down a bit please?
Thanks for your comments about the heating. I’m afraid we’ve been having problems with the new heating system since its installation 2 years ago. It has been switched off for several months because it was causing two main problems – it was too warm and it had caused some leaks. Investigations are taking place during the summer vacation to try and establish what the underlying problems are in order that they can be fixed.
In the meantime, I’m afraid there’s little we can do about the temperature so please accept my apologies on behalf of the Library for any discomfort this is causing you.
Ewan McCubbin
Assistant Director (Liaison & User Services)