Posts

by Sara Clarke

On March 22 we were very lucky to have Carlie Forsythe join us for a workshop on collecting board games and developing board game programming in libraries.  Carlie recently completed an MLIS at Western and currently works as a Reference and Research Specialist at Fanshawe College. At Fanshawe, Carlie is responsible for developing the board game collection for Fanshawe’s Library Learning Commons and has also developed board game programming for the college community. In addition to having a wealth of professional expertise in the area, Carlie is an avid gamer and is always enthusiastic about talking about games and gaming. 

During the workshop, Carlie made a very compelling case for why recreational play is so important to include in library spaces. Carlie’s research on the topic demonstrates that there are more benefits to board game collections than many of us may realize, including social benefits, skill development, and valuable opportunities for community-building.  

Drawing on their experience developing the Library Learning Commons’ game collection, Carlie shared great tips for: pitching the idea of a games collection to management (hint: highlight the ways that adding the collection will align with the library’s core values) and establishing collection development criteria. While the benefits of creating a collection have outweighed the challenges in Carlie’s experience, they noted that creating a game collection and hosting game programming can be difficult when you’re working with limited resources and a lack of volunteers. Although Carlie touched on the potential for libraries to pivot to virtual gaming programming during the pandemic, COVID-19 has undoubtedly been a significant disruption for in-person gaming in libraries. 

Another highlight of Carlie’s presentation was their discussion of the different genres of games and the considerations to be aware of when collecting games from each genre. This led to an interesting discussion about the problems with colonialist board games and recommendations for anti-colonial games (Carlie recommended the game Spirit Island as one which challenges the colonialist underpinnings of other games).  

Additional Resources from Carlie  

Carlie has been very generous to allow us to make the slides from their presentation openly available, as well as their fantastic Board Game Toolkit. This toolkit contains information about collecting different genres of boardgames in libraries, a resource list, and a “Build Your Own Gateway Collection” tool for those who are unsure where to start in developing a new game collection for their library. If you plan on using or citing any of Carlie’s materials, please be sure to credit Carlie as the creator of these materials.   

Carlie has also written two articles on all things related to board games and recreational play in libraries for Emerging Library and Information Perspectives (ELIP), the MLIS journal published through the FIMS Graduate Library: Game On! Recreational Play in the Library: Reflections of a Board Game Librarian and Roll for Initiative: A Librarian’s Primer for Collecting Tabletop Role-Playing Games.  

Board Games in the FIMS Graduate Library 

The FIMS Graduate Library recognizes the importance of recreational play in libraries and has developed a collection of over 60 games. This collection includes a varied assortment of games, including everything from classic games and card games (e.g., Love Letter), to a new Inuit-designed strategy game, Nunami, and the all-to-timely cooperative game Pandemic. A list of the games in our collection can be found on our website.  FIMS Graduate students, faculty, and staff are welcome to play these games in the library or to borrow them to play at home. Please email us at fimslib@uwo.ca or visit us in the library if you have any questions about these games.  

by Kawmadie Karunanayake

Zines (from ‘fanzine’ or ‘magazine’) are mostly short, self-created, self-published little books. They often have themes, include collage and writing, and can be highly collaborative. In their origins they were traditional media, made by hand, delivered through mail or in person. In their current iterations many of them are online or multimedia publications. They cover topics from computer science and queer advice to fermentation and preservation. Zines can be about most anything the heart desires. I’ve personally made ones which are quite academic and include citations and essays, as well as ones which are just a collection of vibes and images.

In the Grad Library we came up with an idea to create a collaborative zine about the FIMS community pandemic experience. There’s been lots of work done around archiving this “unprecedented time” and we thought it could be interesting and useful to have a zine which captured the more personal, felt experiences of these years. The theme was textures: sensorial, emotional, mental, the embodiment and feeling of living through these years. The participants all approached the theme from diverse perspectives and created pages which captured their own internal sense of this shared time.

The workshops to create this zine took some finagling; the shift from online to in person was the push that was necessary to make it come to life. The sense of collaboration created through in person collaging and creation was much more within the sphere of zine making as a whole, rather than a zoom affair. (I do however want to give kudos to people who did manage to organize and run zoom based creative workshops, because I truly understand the amount of effort it must have taken.) Overall I personally enjoyed the process of creating both the workshop and the zine. In the true essence of a zine it ended up being a project created through the efforts of many people and with a final product which is a combined aesthetic of everyone’s ideas.

by Sara Jessica Clarke

In “Outside and In: Services for People Impacted by Incarceration,” Chelsea Jordan-Makely and Jeanie Austin point out that although “access to reading materials is a lifeline for people who are incarcerated,” the reality is that “the needs of people in jails, prisons, and other detention centers often go overlooked” (para. 2). While their article focuses on the various library services offered for people detained in American correctional facilities, the need it highlights for information professionals to support the information needs of people within these facilities is equally relevant in the Canadian context.  

Although the challenges encountered by institutional libraries to provide information access to inmates often goes under the radar, this is an issue that many LIS professionals and LIS students are aware of and often feel passionately about. This became evident to me while I was working on my MLIS at FIMS when discussions arose about ethics and information rights in various classes and when some of my peers undertook projects related to institutional librarianship. For example, in the most recent volume of Emerging Library and Information Perspectives (ELIP), Erica McKenzie wrote about a books-to-prison initiative that she undertook independently, and which was inspired by her desire to engage in a hands-on project that would support literacy within correctional facilities.  

A recent workshop in the FIMS Graduate Library: Bookbinding for Inmates, with Regional Librarian Kelli Jerome 

In October, we had a great student turnout to a workshop that was led by Regional Institutional Librarian, Kelli Jerome. In this workshop, Kelli, a recent graduate of FIMS’ MLIS program and a past Student Library Assistant at the FIMS Graduate Library, spoke about her work and the unique considerations that arise when developing collections for institutional libraries. 

Institutional library collections are subject to regulations related to both the content and physical form of their materials. In terms of the physical materials, there is a requirement for hardcover books to be rebound with soft covers in order to eliminate pockets or gaps where contraband could be placed. Unfortunately, rebinding books takes time and resources that are frequently in low supply for institutional librarians. Due to the need for help rebinding in-demand books and the high-interest amongst LIS students in assisting with this work, a mutually beneficial partnership has come to fruition between Kelli and the FIMS Graduate Library. 

During the workshop, Kelli instructed participants on how to properly remove the hard covers from donated books and rebind them with soft covers so that they can be added to institutional collections. By the end of the workshop, all in attendance were fully trained in the bookbinding process and had successfully rebound an entire cart of books! In addition to supporting institutional libraries, the workshop was a wonderful opportunity for FIMS LIS students to gain some hands-on volunteer experience and to work collaboratively in the library. It was lovely to be able to meet a number of new students for the first time and we truly appreciated everyone’s enthusiasm for helping with this project!  

Upcoming Opportunities to Get Involved and “Bookbind to Unwind” at the FIMS Graduate Library 

We received excellent feedback from students after the workshop and we plan to host regular bookbinding meet-ups in the library. Our next session will take place on Friday, November 12. All members of the FIMS Graduate community are welcome to attend. If you are interested in attending, please email us at fimslib@uwo.ca so that we will know how many participants to expect. All bookbinding materials will be supplied. 

We have also prepared a Bookbind to Unwind Cart with all of the needed bookbinding supplies for students to use during library hours. If you need a break from course work and want to log some volunteer hours, just contact staff at the library’s service desk about using these materials. The cart is equipped with bookbinding instructions and library staff are also happy to answer any questions about this work. 

Works Cited  

Austin, C. J.-M. and D. J. (2021, September 8). Outside and In: Services for People Impacted By Incarceration. Library Journal. Retrieved November 2, 2021, from https://www.libraryjournal.com?detailStory=Outside-and-In-Services-for-People-Impacted-By-Incarceration 

It’s that time of year when our LIS 9002 students begin using Cataloger’s Desktop! Eligible students will receive an email with their user ID and password. You will also receive instructions about changing your password.

This is a reminder to access Cataloger’s Desktop or the RDA Toolkit via the FIMS Grad Library website to prevent login issues. If you go to lib.fims.uwo.ca and select FIMS Electronic Resources from the Resources drop down menu, you will be taken to the FIMS Intranet and the Electronic Resources page. From there you can sign into Cataloguer’s Desktop using your personal CatDesktop username and password, or directly into the RDA Toolkit.

We have a limited amount of seats available for Cataloguer’s Desktop, so it is important that you access RDA Toolkit directly instead of accessing through Cataloguer’s Desktop. Also note, that when you are logged into RDA Toolkit from the library’s subscription, you should see University of Western Ontario – Library School in the top left-hand corner to indicate that you are signed-in. Once you see this log-in information, you are ready to use RDA.

To change your password for Cataloger’s Desktop, you must meet the following rules:

• Minimum length of 16 characters
• Must have three of the following:
  • At least one upper case letter
  • At least one lower case letter
  • At least one number
• At least one special character: ! @ # $ % ^ & + =

• Must not have consecutive repeated characters
• You cannot use your last 11 passwords
• You can only change your password once a day

Please stop by the service desk in the library, or email fimslib@uwo.ca if you need assistance.

To request a physical item from Western Libraries: 

1. Sign in to My Library Account in the top navigation bar on the far right or select My Library Account from the yellow ribbon.

2. Find the item you are interested in and select the title to open the full record display. 

3. Select Request from the Get It area of the record. 

4. Select a Pickup Location.

5. Select Send Request. 

To request a physical item from another Omni Library:

1. Sign in to My Library Account in the top navigation bar on the far right or select My Library Account from the yellow ribbon.

2. Find an item marked Not available locally, click for more options and select the title to open the full record display. 

3. Select Get it from another library.

4. Select your Preferred Local Pickup Location. The other fields will usually be pre-populated, but if not, fill out as many fields as possible.

5. Select Send Request.

Digitization – Article and Chapter Requests 

All Western University and Affiliated University College faculty, students, and staff can request portions of eligible physical library materials to be scanned and delivered to their inbox, subject to certain limits defined by copyright. 

Digital delivery is limited to one chapter per book, one article per journal volume, or an excerpt of 10% of a total work. 

To request digitization:

1. Sign in to My Library Account in the top navigation bar on the far right or select My Library Account from the yellow ribbon.

2. Select the location of the item you would like to request an article or chapter, etc. from.

3. If you do not see the volume or year you require, you can select the funnel icon and then select “Description” to filter to the year you require.

4. Once you have found the year/volume you require, select “Digitization” beside the volume and year or book chapter you require: 

5. Check the box next to “Select for additional request fields” and complete the form with the citation information for the specific journal article or book section: 

6. Accept the Copyright Agreement by checking the box.

7. Click “Send Digitization Request” 

Things to note

1. The FIMS Graduate Library is a non-circulating library. Books and other items are for in-library use only unless permission is obtained.
2. FIMS is not a pickup location for physical requests. Please select your next nearest library location.
3. Requesting materials from other omni libraries is currently limited to physical items only. If Western Libraries does not have an electronic resource, such as a journal article, please request it from another institution using Interlibrary Loan (RACER).
4. There is no guaranteed turnaround time for physical or digitization requests. Staffing issues, high volumes of requests, and items missing are some of the reasons fulfilment of your request might be delayed.

If you have any questions about requesting materials from Western Libraries or about a specific request you’ve made, feel free to email fimslib@uwo.ca.

FIMS students at Western have access to some of the best academic resources in the world. Through Western Libraries’ website they have access to top books, databases, news outlets and more. But there is another website where MLIS students, in particular, can find library-specific databases, websites and tools. These tools could make a big difference in their course work, so we want to make sure every incoming student knows about them.

This short video has instructions on how to get to the FIMS Resources page and a summary of the websites, databases and subscription-based tools you’ll find there. Then check out the page yourself to see what you can use for your next assignment. Access it from this link or from the FIMS Graduate Library Website under Resources.

If you’ve searched for items in Omni lately, you might have noticed a small but powerful new feature. As of yesterday, the Load More Results button is gone and in its place is the more classic style of page navigation. At the bottom of your search results, you can now choose the number of results to display per page, up to 50, as well as navigate between pages of results. 

Users will now have much more control over how their search results are displayed and how they navigate between results in the set. No more scrolling through results 10 at a time, which is especially beneficial when you’re trying to get to the middle of a large set. In other words, if you know you want to get to page 5, you can do that in one click, instead of 4.  

We hope you enjoy this small improvement to Omni. It’s one of many to come. Feel free to let us know what you think about this and other features. And if you need any help searching, email us at fimslib@uwo.ca.