| Newsletter 13, October 1996Editorial: No Worries Mate! It's Cool! |
Regular readers will recall that this time last year I wrote about
going to the World SF Convention in Glasgow. Well, this year I
went one better and attended the World SF Convention in Anaheim,
California! In fact, whilst I was about it, I went two better
and travelled the long way round, stopping off for two weeks with
my sister and her family in Darwin, Australia!!
(I could even say I went three better, because after the SF convention I managed to spend a day visiting old haunts in Santa Monica, where we lived for a while 30 years ago “when I were nobbut a lad”!!!)
One of the problems I found, of course, was having to cope with different accents and terminology. Just as I’d got used to Australian English, there I was in the USA having to cope with the American version. For the first couple of days in the States, when I was having difficulty understanding the natives I found myself trying to run what they’d said through a mental Ozzie-decoder and momentarily being even more confused!
And then there were the occasional surprises, when I found something familiar called by a completely unexpected name, or something that had different names in Oz and the USA, neither of which was the British version — and even, in one case, a combined example of both! (“Sweets” (UK) = “candy” (US) = “lollies” (Aus).)
Which finally links back to the major news in this Newsletter: a new, different name for some familiar facilities. Take a bow, the Beckett Park Learning Centre!
So what’s a Learning Centre? Well, its major feature is the provision of the Library and IT services of Learning Support Services all behind a single entrance. You’ll notice that this new togetherness means we’ve been able to blur some boundaries. In particular, there’s no longer any barrier between the erstwhile Library and IT Suite — and, indeed, there are some PCs beside the bookshelves, and even a laser-printing room on each floor. We hope everyone will find this arrangement to be much more convenient.
Why a new name, then? Basically, it’s to reflect this oneness. Instead of going separately to the Library and IT Suite, you can now just visit the Learning Centre and use whichever facilities may happen to be appropriate. (Also, just to be slightly facetious for a moment, it’s a heck of a lot easier than referring to the “Library-and-IT-Suite” all the time…!)
But there’s more to the Learning Centre than I’ve been able to mention here — that’s why there are 7 pages devoted to it in this Newsletter! I don’t think even all the LSS staff have quite assimilated the totality of the Learning Centre, and no doubt some of us will be adjusting our understanding of the term as time goes by. To some extent, I think it will be a case of applying Humpty Dumpty’s principle: “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less” (Alice Through the Looking-Glass). [Whew! —does that win me today’s prize for most contrived link to a favourite quote?]
Well, I suppose it’s about time I moved on to look at the rest of this issue. Starting with the regular Services Update section, there are some Library Service Changes to note, news of the Printing Facilities within the Learning Centres (we hope laser printing will be more reliable this year), and some New AV Loans Equipment including improved projectors and new dictation equipment. There is also a section of Educational Development News.
More Library Services news is of both good and bad varieties. The down side is represented by Inter-Library Loan Charges, the up by self-access now being permitted to the Short Loan Collection, and also by news that Library Services is involved in Testing Times as a participant in some trials of electronic document supply.
Also from the Library Services side is a CD-ROM Update, including a complete list of CD-ROMs available both over the network and stand-alone, and details of recent changes to Tutor Librarians’ areas of responsibility for Library Liaison with Schools.
Contributions from the Computing Services side include a summary of the Computing Services Courses on offer this semester, including some new Internet-related ones, and the latest Quantitative Methods news which introduces the latest release of Minitab.
Well, as usual I’ve filled my space without fitting in a mention of everything in the issue — so, as usual, I shall conclude by asking you to browse through and read everything that might be of interest.
Mike Ford
