WEDNESDay 23 fEbruary 2011 • SuPPLEMENT (1) TO NO. 4944 • VOL 141 Gazette Supplement Curators of the University Libraries The Bodleian Libraries: Annual Report August 2009–July 2010 1. Summary and introduction as has been the case at other repositories awaited storage facility and moving ahead undergoing renovation. on its exciting plans to renovate the New The bodleian Libraries continued their bodleian Library, it responded creatively accelerated pace of change in 2009–2010. The scale of the bodleian’s undertakings and constructively to a request from the Having outlined their academic strategy exceeded that of any other library in the university to model a ten per cent reduction of increasing user access to information world. Over 6.5 million items were to be in its PraC funding over the coming three through direct access to collections and by barcoded, and every item being prepared fiscal years. The Libraries decided to protect increasing electronic access, the Libraries for transfer into the book Storage facility the budget for collections and access to advanced their complex estates initiatives, required a record in the online catalogue. online information because this is the focusing especially on the creation of Teams of people had to be hired for area perceived to be of highest value to secure storage and a reading room in the this work as well as for the book moves students and researchers. With inflation in radcliffe Science Library to house and serve themselves. One of the most remarkable the price of periodicals far outstripping the rare books over the coming four years, the accomplishments was the development retail Price Index, our purchasing power construction of the book Storage facility of a plan to employ and train over ninety for periodicals, particularly in scientific in Swindon to accommodate much of the people in a brief period of time to inventory subjects, is eroding, and the prospect of Libraries’ print collections, and the planning and barcode the collections. In the Long journal cancellations looms large. although of the Humanities and Mathematics Library Vacation a special effort was made to recruit the decision had the effect of shifting the on the radcliffe Observatory Quarter. Oxford students in order that they might be burden of reduction chiefly to staff costs, the the beneficiaries of funds in an economically a guiding principle was to maintain a high Libraries resolved to sustain this position. difficult environment. as planning and quality of service even in a prolonged and implementation progressed, it became In the end, the university’s Planning intense period of reform and displacement. apparent that conventional management and resource allocation Committee Thus the radcliffe Science Library approaches were inadequate for such a recommended savings that added up to 8.4 continued uninterrupted service even complex series of estates and infrastructure per cent over three years. However, almost while much of its collection was boxed up projects. Leaders of the various intersecting one-third (approximately £600,000) of and stored underground in the caverns of programmes came together in a group this is projected to come from increased salt mines, and while Special Collections known as the bodSquad. Communications revenue, which will take the burden off the prepared to relocate the rare books and improved, problems were nipped in the Divisions’ substantial contribution to the manuscripts collections and reading room bud, and best practice was shared. as a maintenance of the Libraries. for example, to the Library. Similarly, staff and readers consequence of this tempering, the team Sunday tours of the bodleian, increased of the New bodleian and Duke Humfrey leaders and managers have grown in their sales from bodleian Publishing and the endured with patience and even good cheer capacity to generate business plans, identify shop, and endowments of positions are the disruption of the successive closing of and manage risks, and to move decisively expected to make solid contributions to the reading rooms and shifting of materials to and rapidly to overcome obstacles and meet bodleian’s bottom line. Taking advantage their new locations. There were trade-offs. targets. of OMIS, the Oxford Mobility Incentive room to spread out at reading tables was at Scheme, the Libraries will use voluntary a premium, and some users were advised The positive investments in the capital departures to lessen salary costs. In order to sign up for desks in advance. On the programme and the supporting elements to manage with fewer staff, the Libraries other hand, requested materials could be provided a forward momentum that are rethinking workflows, increasing delivered quickly when requested from the counteracted the sobering news of the automation, eliminating products such as rSL rare books vault. Perhaps the ultimate impending budget reductions that were printed guides ( now moving to the web) and consolation was that materials in transit to beset higher education. because making other changes. were only out of circulation for days and the bodleian was finally, after years of weeks, rather than for months and years, demoralising delay, building its long- 443 444 University of Oxford Gazette • Supplement (1) to No. 4944 • 23 february 2011 The maturity of the university library keeping the utilitarian design of the original • The Making of Modern Law (over 20,000 system created as Oxford university Library space but updating it for readers’ use. eighteenth- and early nineteenth- Services in 2000 was such that in 2010 In preparation for the removal of books from century works on law) the Libraries discontinued the use of the the underground bookstore, over 11,000 institutional name OuLS and were renamed • US Congressional Serial Set 1817–1994 high-use items in it were identified. These by university statute as the bodleian (including American State Papers) have been retained in the centre of Oxford, Libraries, taking advantage of the world- and will move back into the underground • Confdential Print North America 1824– recognized status of the bodleian. bookstore upon the completion of its 1961 The Libraries advanced their reputation as refurbishment in summer 2011. They will • Colonial State Papers they celebrated, along with the museums be joined in these open stacks by another and collections of the university, the award 240,000 items for readers to browse The ongoing provision of access to a wide of the Queen’s anniversary Prize, given directly. range of electronic resources accounted, from the e-journals collections alone, for in recognition not only of the distinctive In other initiatives, an additional 350 high- over 6.8 million downloads. as readers collections, but for widening access to use titles in the Social Science Library can switch from print to electronic access, the them. In april the bodleian experienced now be consulted on open shelves, while Libraries have been able to cancel the print an unexpectedly high profile when, after in a similar exercise the Education Library equivalent, saving the costs of duplication, taking an engrossment of Magna Carta to relegated materials not consulted for storage, and handling. These key e-resources New york for the North american reunion, several years to the stacks, making room are now central to the requirements of our bodley’s Librarian and the Keeper of for high-demand items. Within the various readers. Special Collections were stranded with the Humanities libraries, a number of projects priceless document following the eruption helped to identify and move low-usage c. Digitization of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland. Lightning- material from reading rooms. quick discussions ensued, with the result The bodleian Libraries have many hundreds that Magna Carta was displayed, with much Planning was carried out in preparation of thousands of digital master images of publicity, in J. Pierpont Morgan’s Library in for the move of materials from the New items from their holdings that have been the Morgan Library and Museum until it bodleian reading room to various created over the past two decades, and was safe for it to travel onward to Winnipeg, destinations, including Duke Humfrey’s numbers are increasing dramatically in where Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was Library and the Oriental Institute Library, so response to emerging technologies and laying the cornerstone of a Human rights as to keep these high-demand items close at the changing expectations of readers from Museum. after remaining in Oxfordshire for hand while the New bodleian is undergoing around the world (more than 15Tb of image almost 800 years, Magna Carta was racking its refurbishment. data were added in the last year alone). To date, these digital image assets have been up frequent flyer miles and reaching out on all such moves are planned so as to held on a variety of systems within the behalf of the bodleian, Oxford, and the uK. minimize disturbance to our readers. a bodleian, with the most important items comprehensive book moves plan has been also being copied to the central back-up 2. Service to readers created to assist in the management and facilities operated by Oxford university financial costing of the entire programme. a A. LIBRARY RESOURCES Computing Services. With the creation of summary chart is being developed to help in the bodleian Libraries’ own Digital asset a. Improving direct access to materials providing information for staff and readers Management System (DaMS), which will about the progress of the project. a major element of the bodleian Libraries’ offer a robust and professionally managed strategy is to bring collections closer to b. Online access digital preservation environment, work readers by reorganizing and redesigning began during the year to consolidate our Our readers continued to benefit from direct spaces, analysing usage statistics and holdings of digital images and migrate these access—in the case of university members, coordinating with our subject librarians to collections to the DaMS.