Wake up a little tired, it might be because of yesterday's exercises. I did my normal preparation for the day and was ready for the day.
Niek came to pick us up at our Hotel at 08:45 am for library tour. The plan was to witness and understand how other library manage information and what are the tools used to run library. We arrived at Central Library of the University of Groningen, one the of the oldest and biggest Library in Netherlands. in this Library each discipline has got its own Library and this is what make it bigger, speaking of size, it is bigger than Institute of Finance Management (IFM) in Dar es salaam. You might wonder how do people work in the such a huge facility and every thing is in order and nothing gets lost.. this is what brings us here and lets find out together.
We arrived at the Central library at 09:30 am, someone was there already to guide us and show us around, her name is Joke Bos, she is one of the staff in the Library department, she was happy to be with us and had lot of energy to show us around and introduce us to other staff. To be with someone new you don't know for six to seven hour and that someone to be satisfied and enjoy him/herself is not an easy job, but Joke was able to make us enjoy and made us wanting to stay more in the library. The tour was very comprehensive and enjoyable, with lot of excitements.
Joke received us warmly and started our tour at the main entrance, here is where every user of the library must pass through. There are number of lockers in which Library use place there belonging, user are only allowed to carry their laptops, water and some materials that could be of use in the library. Joke told us that the introduced a certain system for user of the library to place their things in lockers and that is there are bags in the locker that has the number of the locker you put you belonging to to make it easy for someone to remember his/her locker and also to help them to carry few things that they are going to use in the library, too bad library users did not like it and librarians are looking at some other way to implement it. This library is 395 years old, one year younger compared to University.
Library users are allowed to carry their phones with them and are supposed to move to the corridors to attend their phone when they have someone in the phones. Again, they can carry somethings to eat with them but only water can be taken in the library, other things should be taken at the canteen or somewhere else but not in the library.
Library has got four floors and some wings in it, each discipline is attached to certain floor and some discipline share the floor and even wings. Each floor has computer system that could be used by Library user, the good thing about this computer system is that there is a certain dedicated system that could tell where unoccupied computer is, so no would be wondering around looking for computer. The Library has got about 4oo computers and again Library user can bring there laptops with them and can access the same content as other computers, laptops are connected to the system using a wireless accessed network. Connection to the wireless network is not done as anyone thinks it could be done, configuration information are given and that information works only within the Library. This system can also be available if Library user use IPhones, IPads or Smartphones.
The Library has got a dedicated website within University website, lot of information about library is this site such information includes News, General information, Catalogs, Requests e.t.c. some information change every now and then but some change after some time. With this site Library users can check availability of books anywhere they are if the book is not in the Central library inquiries can be done some other library in town as there is an interlinking of libraries ans user will have to contribute for some amount of money to have the book he/she requested. After the book has been received in the Library, user can be informed using his/her email account.
Although everything could be found in the website, Library make use of Blackbord, one of the licensed e-learning web-based system to make learning proses more structured. This library is not only having a wonderful system to keep and making information available but it has some old books and old machined used for printing.
We also got a chance to discuss technologies which could be of handy for our college. No one can not agree with me that to have a best system such as one in the Central university you need to have lot of funds and support and funds but this is not necessarily the fact as the are lot of open system which could be used with small amount of funds compared to the licensed ones, such systems includes moodle an open e-learning facility and system which has almost similar functions as blackbord. For such a growing College such as ours, we will need to invest a lot in the infrastructure and on the software side we need to check possibilities in Open wares and software which are indeed available for us to use.
To visit this Library did not only make aware of how good a library can be but it also show me how people like and proud to show others what others are thinking are impossible to implement. I also appreciate the fact that someone could be there for someone else and being able to offer him/her an assistance required. If the make it we can also make it as they were where we are right now and with globalization we can make it within no time, lets face this as a challenge that need an immediate response.
I would like also to say my sincere thanks to each Central library department staff who in one way or another make us enjoy ourselves and contribute to our staying and surveying in the library.
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