YOUR FUTURE LIBRARY UNIVERSITY LIBRARY STRATEGIC PLAN 2020–2025
The Auchmuty Banner Project Ruby Tjangawa Williamson Ngayuku Ngura and Mary Napangardi Gallagher Mina Mina Jukurrpa Courtesy the artists and Tjala Arts and Warlukurlungu Artists of Yuendumu, and the University of Newcastle Art Collection
Acknowledgement of Country We acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which our campuses are located: • The Awabakal and Worimi Nations at our Newcastle City campus • The Pambalong Clan of the Awabakal Nation – Newcastle campus at Callaghan • Darkinung Nation – Central Coast campus at Ourimbah • Biripai Nation – Port Macquarie campus • Gadigal People of the Eora Nation – Sydney CBD We also acknowledge and pay respect to the other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander nations from which our students, staff and community are drawn.
WHAT’S THIS PLAN ALL ABOUT?
It’s about the future of your Library. OUR CONTEXT
Coral Black University Librarian
The University Library has a strong reputation in delivering excellent support for students, researchers and the community. We are continually ranked in the top quartile for customer satisfaction across Australian University Libraries. Over the next five years, there will be some significant changes to how we operate and best serve the needs of our community, and support the vision and aspirations of the University. This document will be your guide to understanding our new strategic direction, our plan for the next five years, and how these actions will change the way you use the Library.
The Library has always played a pivotal role in supporting the learning and research activities of the University of Newcastle community. However, as the environment we work in continues to change and the role of technology continues to shape the new digital world, the Library must evolve too. In preparing for the future, a new vision and strategic plan has been developed to meet the challenges of the next five years, to shape our services and our teams, and to ensure we remain agile in this rapidly changing environment.
OUR VISION Our students and staff will succeed in their chosen futures and make a lifelong connection to learning.
OUR MISSION We will enable our community to flourish through people-centred environments and access to knowledge, expertise and opportunities.
OUR NEW STRATEGIC DIRECTION…
It’s all about
Know How. Whether we’re connecting people with resources, people with people, or questions with answers, if you come to the Library, we will know how to help you. We might not always know the answers, but we will always know how to find out.
We live by our ‘know how’ attitude.
We know how to create spaces to enjoy learning in, to deliver resources fit for modern learning, to create partnerships that will impact the world, and to improve learning outcomes for all students and researchers regardless of their location.
Over the next five years we will focus on four key themes that will shape what we do and what our future success will look like. These themes are underpinned by our unwavering commitment to be the partner of choice for our students, staff, industry, and the broader community. We will engage and collaborate meaningfully to create an unrivalled student experience and a successful researcher journey.
Enabling Digital Capabilities
LIBRARY AS PARTNER Reimagining Our Places and Spaces
Empowering Researchers
Enhancing the Student Experience
Reimagining Our Places and Spaces
Reimagine our existing spaces to create an active learning environment; a place not just for study but for collaboration, for community building, for play and for experimentation.
We will: ✓ Redevelop our libraries to ensure a quality on-campus experience in spaces that are fit-for-purpose. To support this and reflect stakeholder needs this redevelopment would need to: – Provide more flexible, collaborative spaces to support interdisciplinary research and learning projects. – Increase our technology rich content creation, exhibition and visualisation spaces. – Increase visibility of, and engagement with, our significant historical and cultural collections.
2025
Our existing library spaces will be re-imagined to provide an active learning environment that will attract and engage students, researchers and the community.
WILL LOOK LIKE
The library will be the space of choice – providing a focus for study, collaborative learning, community building, for play and experimentation. Technology, the physical space and service delivery will be intrinsically linked.
Deliver a seamless, virtual library experience that mirrors the level of service and support available in our physical library.
We will: ✓ Continue to improve discovery, personalisation and integration through a new digital library platform. ✓ Design technological solutions to deliver creative services and support mobile learning and research. ✓ Improve and simplify research outputs systems and services.
2025
WILL LOOK LIKE
Our virtual experience will match the physical with high quality, personalised service.
Access to our digital information will be seamless and intuitive. Every digital interaction should be a positive one.
Accelerate our capabilities to lead and deliver in our digital future.
Enabling Digital Capabilities
We will: ✓ Actively collaborate to implement the Digital Capabilities Framework and contribute to the development of UON graduate attributes. ✓ Develop a targeted approach to library support and services, integrating and scaffolding skills programs to scale in an effective, efficient and impactful way. ✓ Partner with teaching staff to further extend our role in curriculum design to support pedagogical development, and to create new digital learning content. ✓ Increase support for digital scholarship and provide opportunities for digitisation projects that benefit our researchers, students and the broader community.
2025
Our students and graduates will have the skills that enable them to live, learn and work in a digital society.
WILL LOOK LIKE
Skills programs will be embedded in the learning management system. Our digitisation program will increase global access to local and regional knowledge.
Develop and deliver a ‘digital first’ policy, providing seamless access to quality, curated digital content.
We will: ✓ Refocus our policies, processes and programs to support the accelerated growth in digital content. ✓ Provide tools to enable the community to discover and use content effectively. ✓ Promote access to, and facilitate the discovery of, cultural collections and archives, strengthening connections to teaching and research.
2025
Providing access anytime, anyplace, anywhere our content will be predominantly in digital formats as we strive to be a ‘digital first’ library.
WILL LOOK LIKE
Enhancing the Student Experience
Partner with our students to cocreate a range of opportunities to support employability and future life skills.
We will: ✓ Strengthen Work Integrated Learning opportunities (WIL), through placements, internships and curriculum-based projects. ✓ Establish a ‘students as partners’ program to embed the student voice in everything we do. ✓ I ncrease our student workforce, providing broader opportunities to utilise and develop relevant skill sets.
2025
Students will be active in the co-creation of our services. As equal partners they will engage in a range of Work Integrated Learning (WIL) experiences.
WILL LOOK LIKE
Students will form an integral part of our workforce, developing skills and confidence for future employment.
Develop personalised services that support learning, belonging and wellbeing.
We will: ✓ Develop a student-centred service, partnering with other units to deliver a collaborative approach. ✓ Better understand the learning needs of our priority groups including pathways, Indigenous, international students; and target support to meet their needs. ✓ Create a student peer support approach to deliver and develop new services.
2025
The Library will be renowned for its excellence in customer service, building support around student needs. Our peer support model will see students supporting students, developing communities of practice and creative new services.
WILL LOOK LIKE
Empowering Researchers
Strengthen our partnerships with researchers to enhance their success in a complex and changing environment.
We will: ✓ Develop a deeper understanding of our research community to support researcher success. ✓ Develop a better understanding of researcher needs and provide more targeted and timely advice, resources and training. ✓ Expand our expertise to support growth in cross-disciplinary approaches to research. ✓ Review the effectiveness and performance of library systems and tools that support research.
2025
Playing an active part in the research lifecycle, we will provide a range of programs that enhance researchers’ ability to navigate the evolving scholarly research landscape.
WILL LOOK LIKE
Provide leadership and guidance in the creation of open, connected and impactful research.
We will: ✓ Champion and advocate for open scholarship, educating our research community on its benefits; and lead the discussion on transformative publishing. ✓ Increase the discoverability, accessibility and visibility of UON research outputs and data.
2025
WILL LOOK LIKE
Open creation and dissemination of research will be the norm.
Our researchers will have the knowledge, skills and tools to measure and extend the impact of their research.
Now. AND IT ALL STARTS…
A plan is nothing without action, and we are creating your future library right now.
LIKE TO KNOW MORE ABOUT THE FUTURE OF OUR LIBRARY? newcastle.edu.au/library library@newcastle.edu.au
NEWCASTLE.EDU.AU
02 4921 5822 @uonlib