 |
The Olive Tree |
|
The Olive Tree |
I am very pleased to be writing to you as a new Fall Semester is upon us and we
welcome the Class of 2010 to the University of Maine. Fall has always been my
favorite season with the warm days and the cooling nights and as I write this I
am reminded of all the new beginnings that fall brings. We began this year with
the Maine Hello on September 1st and on Labor Day we welcomed the new and
returning students with tours of the library. As usual this year will be very
busy at Fogler with interesting new projects, new services, new collections,
and, of course, our users, both new and continuing.
The library staff were tremendously busy this summer preparing the building and
the services we offer and two major activities have led to the most visible
changes our users will see. One is the Information Commons which was created by
a collaboration between Fogler Library and Information Technologies. Together we
created a space on the first floor of the library that combines the services of
the Reference Department with the services of the IT consultants. This one
service point will help all users who have research or technology needs. We are
very pleased with this new service and as the year progresses we will be
monitoring the use of the area and evaluating the need for changes. As with many
projects we consider this as an initial phase and will respond to our users
requests for different organization of computers or services.
We also added shelving to accommodate our growing collection. This major task
was undertaken by the Circulation Department. They moved approximately nine
miles of books during the summer to make room for new volumes and to make the
bookstacks easier to use for our patrons.
The Library staff has also worked to make more connections with our patrons and
to reach out to where the students gather. So, this summer we made a number of
links to students through a variety of venues. We have created a space for the
Library in Facebook, the online social community, we have added hours to our
virtual reference service, we have connected with the Academic Support services
for the student athletes to arrange library introductions for the first year and
transfer athletes, and we are working with the coordinator for the commuter
students. We also created a portal for access to our website for our Alumni
through the Alumni Association home page.
This year will also see the development of more digital resources as Fogler
Library, in partnership with the Maine State Library, works to produce digital
collections of materials for our users. This is an exciting venture that we hope
will make our resources more widely available to all users.
Once again we have a number of events and activities and I know there is
something of interest to everyone. These programs are open not only to the
Friends, but are free to all interested in attending. We would love to see you
here. If you are able to visit us I would be honored to give you a tour of the
library so you can meet the staff and see the resources and services I have
described. I hope you are pleased with what we are doing and you will continue
to support us into the future. I thank you for your support.
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