Monday 10 October 2011

The talks given by the two US interns were very enlightening. What I would take back with me from Sunette Steynberg's experience is her example of the 'human boolean'. Interestingly she spoke about how much the mind can take in and expand. She sees herself not part of support staff but as a research partner. Cyrill Walters emphasised the idea of physical space which is so important to meet the needs of students. Students should love being in the library as is the case at UCT. What I would take back with me is the practice at Purdue Univ? where every student is matched to a librarian. Emails are sent by the librarian to every new student. Carla Tsampiras from the History Department, Rhodes Univ presented a very refreshing talk about her collaboration with librarians through her research process. Through her cooperation with librarians she has amassed a huge amount of information something that she would not have been able to do had she done it on her own.