1. Enhancing life-long learning, teaching and research through
information resources and services
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2. Driving Academic Adoption at NTU
Ian Rogers, Liaison Librarian
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3. Email of 19th October 2012 reporting 100% take up
of Aspire use at NTU
RLMS Stats as of 11am Friday 19th October 2012
17 new Learning Rooms were added to the statistics this week from the Change Reports
School List not Populated Unpopulated %
needed
A&D 446 158 0 100
AAH 905 303 0 100
ArchDBE 397 260 0 100
ARES 311 252 0 100
EDU 775 158 0 100
Graduate 62 7 0 100
School
NBS 1135 316 0 100
NLS 416 131 0 100
SOC 561 323 0 100
SST 746 408 0 100
Others 32 1 0 100
Total 5786 2317 0 100
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4. Accompanying Chart
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5. Brief Background
• NTU using Aspire since Summer 2010
• Tied in tightly with VLE Structure and Acquisitions processes
• Rolled out by Academic Liaison Team of 10 Liaison Librarians
• Target of 2000+ Aspire Lists to be created by the Academic Staff
• Some old-style reading lists copied to Aspire
• Full scale roll out – no pilots
• Widget linking to Aspire list prominently displayed in all modules of
study on the VLE
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6. An NTU VLE “Learning Room”
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7. Methods of Engagement
• Demonstrations of the system to strategically important groups
• University-wide emails
• Bespoke training sessions for Schools
• General training sessions
• Offers of one-to-one training at the lecturer’s desk
• Reports on progress of School/Programme at Programme and
School level committees
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8. Selling the system: Pros
• GENERAL
• Advantages of the system for the students
• Accuracy of the lists produced by bookmarking
• NTU SPECIFIC:
• Sufficient books will be bought for Library
• Articles and Chapters will be digitised
• Links will be checked and made robust
• Senior University Management support
• The shame of having an empty widget?
• Student focus groups
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9. Selling the system: Cons
• Some academics struggled with the software
• Some academics struggled with the concept of the toolbar button
(or sometimes their computers did)
• Lack of time to devote to the process
• Happy with reading list in a different format
• Inability to replicate specific referencing systems
• Some lecturers not happy about open access to lists from outside
the University
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10. Bookmarking from Primo
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11. 100% Target
• After two years, take up plateaued at c. 70% of modules
• University demanded 100% take up by October 2012
• Library responsible for achieving 100% Target
• “Non-populaters” allowed to email or post their old-style reading
lists to Library to be converted into Aspire
• Possibility of empty lists having to be filled by raiding VLE for
indicative reading lists, which would then be converted to Aspire
Lists
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12. Result
• 100% achieved by October 19th 2012
• However, statistics have to be collected on an on-going basis to
continue to prove 100% take up
• New modules appearing each week on VLE = new empty Aspire
Lists = less than 100% take up!
• More granular statistics required on modules labelled as “Resource
Lists not Required”
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13. Quality of Lists
• Some lists of questionable quality
• How is “List Quality” measured – very different opinions
• Currency, Length, Onlineness, Grouping, Ease of Obtaining
Materials, Annotation (by staff and students), etc.
• A high quality list is one that is “used and useful”
• Dashboard helps us to see usage
• More student focus groups
• Any other suggestions?
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14. Why this is important to us?
• Increasingly Talis Aspire lists shape the collection
• Less emphasis on collection building by subject librarians
• Less emphasis on Patron Driven Acquisition?
• High quality lists = high quality collection = satisfied students
(or am I just saying that…)
• A list that satisfies the student = a high quality list
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