Library Communications student internship – first few weeks

Elizabeth Andrews
Tuesday 2 July 2019
outside main library building sunny day green grass and leafy tree
The main library on a beautiful day; I was so grateful I got to soak up the sun while they sent me out to take pictures

My name is Csilla, I’m a soon-to-be fourth year Biology and Psychology student, and unlike most other undergraduates who have happily left their books behind for the summer, for the past two weeks I have spent the majority of my time either in the library, going to or from the library or thinking about going to the library. Rather than being the result of some kind of belated exam-period zeal, this is due to my new post as the Library’s Communications Intern, a position I was offered through the University’s Summer Internship Scheme. Rather than just shelving books, which is what some of my friends assumed I would be doing, over the course of this internship I will be conducting ethnographic research on how people use the Library and finding out if there are any improvements that can be made. I’ve always noticed differences in the ways various people use the Library, even between me and my friends, so I was excited to be able to investigate what might cause these.

My first day on the job was already filled with excitement, as I got to take a tour of the Library as a member of staff instead of a student, gaining access to lots of previously off-limits areas – the space downstairs is so much bigger than I realised, and a veritable labyrinth which I am still trying to find my way around. I even got to see the Library store (which is where the Library stores books that have been borrowed less frequently), a cavernous space full of rolling shelves and mountains of boxes that I had absolutely no idea even existed. I also did some customer journey mapping, which involved me trying to use some of the Library’s services, namely recalling a book from said Library store and borrowing a book from the shelves, and noting down my thought process at every step (I turned out to be an ideal guinea pig for this due to my abysmal memory, which meant that I did not remember how to do or where to find almost anything and was doing everything as if for the first time).

Photo of the Library Hold Shelf information notice
Hold Shelf – A sign I didn’t read carefully enough at first

In the following two weeks I worked on a huge variety of tasks and projects, my main task being participant observations. These are essentially a Library-sanctioned people-watching exercise and involve me sitting down in one of the Library spaces and observing the general atmosphere, what people do and where they go in the space (so if you have noticed someone looking at you while you study these past two weeks, I’m sorry and I promise I’m not being creepy!). They often involve me assigning different colours to the people in the space, noting down what objects they have with them and keeping meticulous track of their actions, up to and including observations like “shifting around, fiddling with his jacket on the back of the chair 10:04, shuffles papers. Blows nose 10:11, coughs 10:34”. While this may seem a bit excessive, it can actually help us gauge if people are comfortable in the space or bothered by noises other users make, for example. So far, I’ve conducted these observations in the Gateway Well, various spaces in the Main Library, and most excitingly, the previously off-limits postgraduate library, Martyrs Kirk.

Photo of participant observation map with different colours mapping different participants
It was fun playing with coloured markers again – I was using them to mark the paths people took moving through the space

I have had lots of other interesting assignments as well, ranging from taking advantage of the rare sunshine by taking pictures of buildings in which the library manages spaces (which I saw when tagging along with my supervisors on a tour to examine the signage in these spaces – there are a lot more of them than I realised!) to helping set up a display for World Oceans Day. In these two weeks I have sat in on a meeting to brainstorm how to deal with table-hoggers, set up lightboards (I apologise if you’re finding the messages cringy – blame me and not the other library staff), planned future displays, worked with data collected in the Library Satisfaction Survey, and even offered help to the Proctor’s Office to give out free food in front of the library to chat to students about their experience and encourage them to fill out the PGT survey. I have also been working on setting up focus groups to talk to said PGTs about their library experience, and learning how to use NVivo (qualitative data analysis software) so that I’ll be able to analyse the comments we gather – as you can see, I have not been idle! Every day has brought exciting new tasks and challenges, and I’m really enjoying learning how to do such a large variety of things.

photo of large purple flower in foreground of St Salvators Quad
A picture from my brief foray into photography

However the most important thing I’ve learned so far is just how many people it takes to keep the library running and how many people are working to make it a better place every day – there is a lot going on behind the scenes, and seeing how complex it all is and the amount of effort put into even the smallest aspects of the student experience makes me so much more appreciative of how smoothly the library runs. As for the next few weeks, I will soon be finding out and writing up what the PGTs think of the library, so stay tuned!

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