Where did the long summer holidays go.....

Well, I am afraid that the Presidential Blog has been neglected a bit of late. As you might have guessed, September is a slightly chaotic time in the life of an academic as all those things that you had planned to get done during the "long" summer period suddenly crowd in around you ahead of the return of students. Indeed, the students have started reappearing this week for Freshers and Induction with actual teaching beginning next Tuesday. So, your president has been gainfully employed doing the day job over the last few weeks.

I was supposed to be at CILIP's Big Day in Newcastle last week. This was something I had been looking forward to but, unfortunately, a family issue arose which meant that I couldn't make it and I was bitterly, bitterly disappointed to miss it. Tonight I am off to the opening of the Moray Book Festival in Elgin, an event which I spoke at last year. I've been out doing a number of local history talks over the last while including one on the Earls of Aberdeen to Ellon Historical Society and another on the use of the Census in Local History (as opposed to family history) to Aberdeen and North East Scotland Family History Society. I think I have something like twelve or fourteen such speaking engagements over the next year and have bookings right up to September 2013!

Next Monday, I am attending the official opening of Aberdeen University's wonderful new library. It will be opened by Her Majesty the Queen and there is a lovely programme of events across the day. I will, of course, be wearing the Presidential Chain although I fear it might not compete with those rather sumptuous ones which Her Majesty has as part of the Order of the Garter or Order of the Thistle ;o)

I am in the midst of doing annual staff appraisals at the moment so these two events are very nice diversions. Not, of course, that I don't enjoy doing annual appraisals you will understand. With that, it is time for the next one. Oh my cup runneth over.

Pastoral idyll Aberdeen style

I am sitting in my office looking out at what can only be described as a very dreich Aberdeen morning; the fog which seems to have enveloped the north-east for the last three weeks is as thick as ever and it is drizzling persistently. Added to this, I have diggers, drills and lorries making a noise below my window as building contractors do work on our car park. Altogether, therefore, it is a pastoral idyll that I am looking out at. Not.

It has been a while since I last posted mostly because I've been caught up in the day-job and it has been a hectic two weeks and I see time slipping through my hands ahead of my holidays at the end of next week. Normally, I'd be saying roll-on the holidays but this year I'm wondering how I can fit in a couple of extra days to get various things done ahead of my leave.

I have, amidst this frenetic fortnight, managed to achieve something immeasurably satisfying, namely a major clear-out of the office with stacks of stuff put into recylcing and a good tidy-up. My office now looks respectable again (but I fear it won't last once I come back from holidays). I am rather delighted to have fallen heir to a complete run of the Library Association yearbooks which are now very neatly arranged in my office (I know, I am showing how sad I am).

One other thing that I did during this fortnight was have lunch with two people that many readers of this blog will recall with great affection, Douglas Anderson and Mike Head. Doug and Mike were, for quarter of century and more, the backbone of the library school at RGIT and many of you were doubtless taught by them and, of course, Mike was President of the Scottish Library Association in 1984. What we all describe as "the old gang" Mike, Doug, Dorothy Williams, Robert Newton, Rita Marcella, Liz Davidson (our school administrator in the 1990s) meet up a couple of times a year to reminisce over lunch about Dewey Decimal, Ranganathan, AACR2 and other such cerebral matters. I should add that is not "old" as in age.

In about an hour, I am heading off down to Bridge of Allan for the official reopening of the library there and I am very much looking forward to it. Avid readers will recall that I was down there in April for the Central Branch "Meet the President" which I much enjoyed and I am looking forward again to seeing all my friends in Stirling Libraries. And, then, after that I have an evening meeting in Stirling itself at which the Immediate Past President His Excellency Mr Alan Reid will be present. I know Alan is having a tour of the new library in Dunbar and the John Gray Centre in Haddington today and, as you know, I was so impressed by these the other week. I look forward to hearing Alan's take on them this evening.

Tomorrow is also a busy day. Not only do we have a visitor to the Department from Austria but then, at lunchtime, it is the celebration of 120 years of Aberdeen Central Library and I am looking forward to this very much and I have my speech all prepared. I do fear, however, that as in Dundee, the Lord Provost's chain will out-do my one. I really think CILIPS should get something more like the Order of the Garter ;o) for the President. Funny how this job turns every president into a connoisseur of regalia.

I will be posting up details of both the Bridge of Allan visit and the Aberdeen Central Library event towards the end of the week.

External Examining, Conference and Johan Helmich Roman

By now, you will know my tendency to include cryptic references in the title of these blogs; you'll have to wade right to the end of this post to find out about Johan Helmich Roman.

Today I was down at the University of Strathclyde, at the Department of Computer and Information Science, where I am the external examiner for their MSc Information and Library Studies course. I'm also external examiner for the same course down at Northumbria University in Newcastle and I have their boards to go to immediately after our conference. The external examiner role is one of the great, unique strengths of the British higher education sector. The external is there not to act as a "third marker" on assignments and exam papers but to ensure that the assignments are fair in the first place, that the marking has been done consistently and appropriately and also to ensure broad comparability in the taught provision because they invariably come from a similar department elsewhere. Most asessment boards wait, anxiously, for the external examiner's comments at the end (I know I always do when the boot is on the other foot back at RGU). In most cases, however, it isn't anything very critical; normally a few little constructive suggestions and a good deal of support and encouragement for the academic staff. I hope I got the balance right today.

Library schools often come in for some criticism from practitioners and, indeed, I tackled this head on in my paper in Belfast which I've already spoken about which I entitled "What on earth do they teach them in library schools these days". Many of you will know I have strong views about this and about the importance of library-school teaching being professionally-relevant. And, I flatter myself that if I hadn't been endeavouring to do that with our curriculum at RGU then I wouldn't have been invited to serve as CILIPS President. However, there are a few important things to add to that statement. Firstly, we can't teach absolutely everything in Masters course and nor should we or else it ends up being training rather than education. An important part of education is developing the ability to learn oneself and develop in other areas. Learning to learning in other words. That leads to my second point, learning on the job is also absolutely crucial - our much-vaunted lifelong-learning in fact - none of us were "oven ready" for the world of work when left education whether that was library school or somewhere else and we kid ourselves if we think we were. Thirdly, no part of education can teach everything, we can try to enhance or improve some skills (e.g. communication skills or interpersonal skills) but we cannot treat everything like a competency that can be "taught" and "learned". As I say to the students, your qualification will get you the interview; it's everything else about you that will get you the job.

Anyway, enough of that. The rest of this week has been spent on preparation for the conference the week after next. It looks fantastic with great speakers in both keynotes and parallel sessions, loads of exhibitors, a lot of built in fun and something for everyone. I am really looking forward to it. I do fear, however, that I am probably driving Elaine, Cathy and Rhona demented with my queries and questions! I spent all day Tuesday writing up my "bits" and ended up with a lengthy accompanying email of questions for them. As we say up here in the north-east "puir quines".

This Saturday I'm doing my Meet the President with the North Branch at Aberdeen Central Library. Goodness knows why anyone is coming - they've all met me so many times and know what a jibbering idiot I am already and the adornment of the Presidential chain won't change that. Never mind, it will be great fun I'm sure. :o)

When I got home today there was some mail waiting for me. The first was depressing; a statement showing another decline in an investment. Thank you global economic downturn. The second, however, was much more exciting. It was a CD I had ordered of some music by Johan Helmich Roman, den svenska musikens fader (my Swedophile tendencies to the fore there again). Anyone who likes Baroque music (Eleanor McKay sit up straight) should give Roman a try. He is wonderful but sadly little known outside his native country and recordings are not easy to come by. The one I received today had been ordered from the Czech Republic of all places. Start with the Drottningholm Music.

Marking. Lovely, lovely marking.....

At this time of year the life of an academic takes a dark turn as the marking appears, as if by magic, on your desk. Anyone would think that we'd actually set assignments for the students to do. The thought of marking is, actually, much worse than the doing it. The piles sit glowering at you until you finally have to rid yourself of all displacement activities (aka top priorities that you'd rather be doing like counting paper clips or arranging your bookshelf in Dewey order) and knuckle down and do it.


Actually, I'm fairly far on with it this year (but, ssshhh, don't tell the rest of the department that) and this is probably down to the fact that things will get busy again on the Presidential front from the middle of next week. So I have been disciplined this year. The one downside of this mark carry-on is that, very unfortunately, I won't be able to make the CILIP Cymru conference at the end of this week. This is a pity as I would have really like to have gone and because Mandy Powell, the Policy Officer in Wales, is one of our former student (they get everywhere don't they?). Anyway, I will certainly be following events in Wales on Twitter #CILIPW12.


One of the best bits of the assessment period is seeing some of the really good and creative assignments that the students produce. I was marking research proposals yesterday. These are, basically, the feasibility study for the topic students will take through to their dissertation. As you might imagine, I have a clutch of ones around local studies but I also have a really interesting one looking at the way the Public Library Quality Improvement Matrix is used by library services, after the PLQIM visit, to help drive up quality of provision. A really interesting topic indeed. I've also a lovely one based on one of the special collections in St Andrews University Library, a good old-fashioned (in the best sense) piece of historical bibliography.


There is light at the end of the tunnel with the marking and when you get really creative and really interesting ideas being explored then it is hugely rewarding. Right, I've now got to go off to Aberdeen University's wonderful new library for meeting. I'm also going to meet up with Alistair Campbell of Moray Libraries in Elgin on Friday to plot some conference shenanigans......so watch this space. I feel some mischief coming on.

Pride and Glory: Marcus Milne and his vision

"Let us see the pride and glory of a public library....in the magnitude of book circulation among the people, in the number of new readers enrolled, in the speed with which enquiry for any book is satisfied, in the quality of books lent for home reading and in the number of children led to good reading and the use of the library"

Marcus Kelly Milne used this quote by Lenin in his introduction to the Aberdeen Public Library Annual Report for 1941-42. His timing was impeccable given that the Soviet Union was a key ally during the Second World War. His rhetorical flourish was also impeccable; Milne was no Leninist, far from it indeed, but he was never one to miss the opportunity to use a good piece of prose to advance the cause of the library.

For thirty years until his retirement in 1968, Marcus Milne held sway over the libraries in the Granite City. Arguably some his finest moments came during the Second World War when during a time of extremely adversity, he introduced many innovations. He enthusiastically promoted the Scottish Library Association's policy (of September 1940) encouraging public libraries to make temporary membership easier for those displaced by war or for members of the armed services stationed away from home. He thought creatively about outreach, sending books to ARP posts and even to HMS Scylla, a frigate adopted by the City of Aberdeen. In October 1941, he introduced Books you can borrow a current awareness bulletin providing recommendations for books, arranged by theme and with a lively editorial by himself. Milne managed to make the public libraries in Aberdeen positively buoyant during a time of extreme crisis and left the service in a good position when he went off to become an officer in RAF late in 1942.

When he returned after the end of the War, his enthusiasm was undimmed. Between 1950 and his retirement in 1968, he oversaw the opening of four new branches, the introduction of the mobile library service, a housebound reading service and radically restructured the organisation of the central library. Between 1965 and 1967, he was a staunch supporter of the establishment of a library school in Aberdeen. He was openly critical of the attitudes of the Library Association in London for their perceived hostility to the notion of a library school in Aberdeen. As with most things, Marcus Milne had his way. His career was crowned by being President of the Scottish Library Association in 1967.

Marcus Milne demonstrated that a time of crisis often leads to the best innovations and he certainly showed that during the Second World War. He was a big man with a big personality and was known throughout the profession in Scotland and, here in the Granite City, he was in fact know as "Mr Aberdeen" because he was so active in so many things. He died in 1989 at the age of 87.

The President's Progress

This has been a busy but incredibly enjoyable and rewarding week for the President. On Tuesday evening, I was down in Bridge of Allan doing a "Meet the President" event with members of Central Branch who have been so wonderful in their themed costumes at Branch and Group Day over recent years. Sheila Miller, the Chair of our CILIPS Council, very kindly took me for a bite to eat first and it was a real pleasure to be in Bridge of Allan as my father lived there in the 1950s and was very active at the golf club so I always have felt a real connection with the town.

The Meet the President was in the newly-refurbished Bridge of Allan library and stunning it looks too with great decor and furnishings, turning the library into light, bright space with huge flexibility. I was delighted to see friends old and new at the event and Yvonne Manning welcomed me on behalf of the branch. It was also really great to be welcomed to Bridge of Allan library by Victoria McAra, one of our super talented former distance learning students. I spoke for a while about what it is like to be a library school academic and how important it is for us in the teaching side of the profession to keep abreast of what's happening and to have really strong links with practitioners. I touched on one aspect that I also mentioned at the Irish conference, namely my profound belief that library schools should play a role right throughout a professional's career, not just at the start of it for a professionally-accredited course. I really believe in the importance of the library schools providing all levels and all types of education, training and continuous professional development from bite-sized chunks of learning through to higher degrees and research activities.

What a fabulous group Central Branch are and it was great to be able to speak to them and then have a really good discussion about some current issues and challenges. Thanks to everyone for making me feel so welcome and congratulations to the brilliant team at Stirling Libraries for making Bridge of Allan library such a lovely and inviting venue.

From Bridge of Allan, I drove on down to Irvine in North Ayrshire. Now, I have to declare an interest here folks. I really love North Ayrshire for many reasons: the coastline, the landscape, the friendliness of the people and also, of course, for Dr Audrey Sutton who is someone I admire (read adore) enormously. I've got strong links with the library service there anyway because I've been known to do local history talks in that neck of the woods and I was really keen to see the full range of things that North Ayrshire Libraries do, so I asked to visit.

On Wednesday, I spent a wonderful day seeing some really fascinating, innovative and pretty inspiring things. I must thank Paul Cowan for having organized such a varied and interesting programme for me. I spent time at Library Headquarters and met the team there and saw planned developments for online provision. Then I went out to Irvine Royal Academy where I met the librarian, the head teacher and some pupils including David and Colt who have been involved in taking pictures of the town to help record local buildings and landmarks. What a great feel the library had and these two lads were so engaging about and engaged with their project. Next it was of to Irvine Public Library which, like Bridge of Allan, is a great physical space and the essence of what a modern library should look like. I always think that if you walk into a library and think it could be in one of the Nordic countries (where they really have got a handle on library design) then it is doing its job and Irvine library is one such building. Here I met Tom, a retired electrician, who has been through a number of the library's computer courses and was in for a chat about iPads. What's all that about lifelong learning? Haven't us librarians been doing that stuff for years? Yes, of course we have, and Tom's a brilliant advert for it.

Then I saw round the Harbour Arts Centre or HAC (of which more later) before Paul took me to lunch in Saltcoats. We then visited Saltcoats Public Library and I had one of the most inspirational meetings I've had in a long time. The library has teamed up with Macmillan and there is a Cancer Information and Support Service facility within the library staffed two days a week by Macmillan volunteers. I met Mary and Helen, both survivors, both lovely, both passionate about their work, both inspiring and both now are fantastic ambassadors for libraries, just like Tom. What a terrific partnership between North Ayrshire Libraries and Macmillan. Then my last stop was the Heritage Centre, a place I know well and it was a great delight to end the tour with Norma Cullen, one of my former students and a good friend. I had a brilliant time there as you might imagine.

Norma was showing me some albums that she had acquired only last week at the auction of the contents of Blair Castle (the Ayrshire one that is). We were flicking through one photograph album of the great and the good in the mid-nineteenth century and a face jumped out at me. It was Elizabeth Duchess of Gordon who built my church up in Fochabers, Gordon Chapel. Elizabeth Gordon is an ever-present part of our life as a much poorer copy of the same photograph hangs in the church. So it was a real thrill to see a much better one and, of course, an incredible coincidence.

In the evening, Audrey and Harry Sutton, Audrey's brother John his partner Mel and Marie from HAC took me for a meal at the Harbour Arts Centre. What a cool venue that is and the current photography exhibitions is well worth seeing. Then, we all went to a performance by Woody Pines, a mix of rural stringband meets blues meets ragtime. Four young American guys who are incredibly talented and very, very good.

So, I had a wonderful time this week meeting friends old and new, visiting wonderful libraries, meeting superb, dedicated, innovative members of staff who are doing all the things we should be doing and so much more besides. The adjectives I could use to describe this week could go on and on and they would contain a lot of words like dynamic, creative, inspiring, fantastic etc etc. But, hey folks, that's what libraries and librarians are. So thank you Stirling Libraries, Central Branch and North Ayrshire. You are all enriching society and proving just how damned good our libraries are.

Thank you and au revoir Sheila

Reflecting on LILAC last week, it was so nice to catch up with Sheila Corrall at the conference. Many of you will know Sheila from her career as a university librarian or, more recently, as Professor of Librarianship at Sheffield University's iSchool. Sheila is about to leave Sheffield to take up a post in Pittsburgh and I think it is right to pay tribute to her before she goes off to the US.


We were very fortunate to have Sheila as our External Examiner for MSc Information and Library Studies for a number of years. We always have two externals, one practitioner and one academic so that both bases - professional relevance and academic rigour - are covered. Sheila was initially appointed as our practitioner academic when she was University Librarian at Southampton. However, shortly afterwards, she was appointed professor at Sheffield and so became our academic one. I think this is almost unique and what it does emphasise is something that I've always held to be really important in librarianship education, namely that the academic and the professional can and should go hand-in-hand and that the "library schools" are not located in remote ivory towers.

Sheila has been a terrific ambassador for the profession and for professional education and she has been an excellent advocate for the work of library schools over recent years, particularly when she was Head of Department at Sheffield and during her time convening BAILER (the British Association for Information and Library Education and Research) the group which brings together all of the departments in the UK and Ireland which teaching information science. Sheila has a real understanding of our profession and has done so much good work, in so many areas, to move our sector forward. She has also been a very good friend of RGU and our Information Management department. As external examiner, she was rigorous, clear-sighted and always incredibly fair.

So, it was a great pleasure to catch up with Sheila ahead of her move across the Atlantic. I really wish her all the best for the move to Pittsburgh. Good luck Sheila and au revoir for now.

Right, better get my act together.....off to Belfast for the LAI/CILIP Ireland Conference :o)