Achievements

Through the years, the Library has introduced many new technologies to the Hong Kong Library Community. In 1993, the Library worked closely with a US-based system vendor to develop an innovative “Image Management System”. This system scanned faculty’s handwritten notes, images, assigned reading materials, etc; and provided sophisticated searching capabilities. It was the first of its kind.

The Library installed Compact Shelving on LG4 – a safe, elegant and user-accessible electronically operated mobile shelving system that was the first and the largest of its kind in Hong Kong.

In 1998, similar compact shelving systems were installed to hold the growing collection of microfiche and microfilm and for the University Archives.

When the web technology was first unveiled, HKUST Library responded enthusiastically by developing its website immediately. This server allows users seamless access to library information and collections and provides a gateway to electronic resources worldwide.

• May 1995: 18,180
• May 2001: 1,217,336

Functioning as the institutional memory, the University Archives was formally opened to the University community.

The Special Collections, under development since 1991, include Landmarks in Science and Technology, Antique Maps of China and other valuable items which became available for researchers for the first time.

The Library undertook the responsibility of providing efficient access and retrieval capabilities for a large number of premier full text databases via Ovid to Hong Kong libraries, including most UGC libraries, along with the Hospital Authority, Vocational Training Council, and some private companies.

As international network connections improved, the need for this service was reduced, and our access migrated from the mirror site to a direct connection to the United States in 2000.

The Digital Archives, Electronic Theses,  and the HKUST News Clippings were the first digital libraries developed in-house. They provide sophisticated searching and instantaneous full text display.

Digital Archives allows users to search and retrieve University documents and publications online; Electronic Theses contains dissertations of our graduate students; and HKUST News Clippings included University-related full text news online.

HKUST Library partnered with Nanjing University in the production of the first electronic Chinese Social Sciences Citation Index Database (中文社會科學引文索引). China’s Ministry of Education in 1999 named this project as one of the most significant projects.

It initially covered 496 Chinese language periodicals with over 280,000 citations in the humanities and social sciences published in the mainland, and will grow to include another 100-150 periodicals published in Hong Kong and other countries.

The Library has close exchanges with many libraries in the mainland. In recognizing her contributions, our University Librarian was conferred Guest Professorship (客座教授) by Peking University (北京大學) in 2000, Nanjing University (南京大學) in 1999, and Jilin University (吉林大學) in 2001. She was appointed Library Advisor in 1996 by Tsinghua University (清華大學).

To meet the needs of the 334 curriculum changes and the expanded student population, the Library has undertaken various initiatives and projects which have succeeded in:

• Increasing and Creating New Spaces
• Expanding Collections
• Enhancing Learning Support
• Supporting General Education

The Library Extension, completed in spring 2011, added 1,800m² of floor space. In February 2012, the Library opened a Learning Commons with a technology-rich environment. In addition to increasing user seats to 2,900, and adding new flexible and state-of-the-art facilities, the Library has begun to buy additional e-books and other materials to support common core courses and general education. During the spring 2012 examination period, the new Learning Commons stayed open 22 hours a day (until 6am) to support learning and study; while the two new E-Learning Classrooms, Tutorial Space, and multifunction room have already proven popular with students, faculty, and staff members. More information on the Library’s preparation for 334 changes can be found at http://334info.ust.hk/facilities_library_faqs.html

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of HKUST, the Library prepared and staged a commemorative exhibition, “Our Miracle Continues – A Visual Presentation“.

By strolling through the Library Gallery, members of the University community and visitors were able to walk through the past 20 years of the University’s accomplishments, enjoying photos, images and memorabilia. The exhibition, held from 12 May to end of December 2011, was very well attended. Due to its high popularity, the exhibition panels were reproduced and shown in the Lobby of the new Shenzhen IER building during its opening ceremony.

To further enhance research and to support general education, the Library acquired a few notable collections in the year. Filmakers Library Online streams 800 award-winning multidisciplinary documentaries for students and instructors for use in classrooms, or in private study and learning. World History in Video contains 1,000 hours of streaming video from 1,750 critically acclaimed documentaries, providing a global survey of human history from the earliest civilizations to the 21st century.

The number of e-books available on the MyiLibrary platform has grown from 4,500 titles to 12,500 titles in different subject areas. Two more citation indices were added, Conference Proceedings Citation Index – Science and Conference Proceedings Citation Index – Social Science & Humanities. These citation databases provide bibliographic information and abstracts to papers in over 110,000 conference proceedings worldwide.

Several of the Library’s collections moved in the past year, some more than once. To prepare space for the Learning Commons ,the Library moved 83,000 volumes of less-used books and bound journals from the LG1, LG3, and LG4 to temporary storage in January 2011. This formed the new “On Call Collection” (available on the request of users within one working day).

In April 2011, the Media and Microforms section and its collections moved to the newly opened Library extension. The newspapers and magazine moved to LG1 to join the current periodicals in a beautiful setting for current reading.

Over the summer of 2011, the empty shelves were moved to new areas of LG3 and the entire book collection and bound periodical collection was redistributed across LG3 and LG4. As a result, every volume in the Library was moved at least twice over the past year.

In November and December 2011, the On Call Collection was moved to its new semi-permanent home, where it will remain until the proposed Joint University Research Archive (JURA) is up and running.

This year, the Library began a systematic replacement project of Laser Discs and VHS. In 2011-12, the Library withdrew 658 titles on VHS format and 198 titles in LD format and replaced them with the same titles (or more recent material) on DVD or streaming video. The DVDs and two new streaming video collections Filmakers Library Online and World History in Video, will make using AV for learning and teaching even more convenient.

As part of our efforts to provide service excellence to the HKUST community, the Library conducted a service quality survey among current students, faculty, and staff (November 1 to December 8, 2011).

This was the second time HKUST and other JULAC libraries conducted the LibQual-based survey. In addition to collecting user opinions, LibQual is useful in allowing Hong Kong university libraries to compare with each other.

Over 4,400 library users responded to the survey, a response rate of 31.85%. The overall scores we received were significantly better than the average scores of participating JULAC libraries. After we analyzed the results and comments, we took action to further enhance our services (see http://library.hkust.edu.hk/libqual/Services-Survey-2011.html).

HKUST students gave good grades to the Library in the HKUST Students Union (SU) online survey rating services provided by various University units (December 1-16, 2011).

Students were asked to rate services provided by nine units (ARR, CSO, FMO, HSEO, ITSC, ISO, LANG, Library and SAO). They could choose “Very Satisfied & Satisfied”, “Neutral”, or “Very Dissatisfied & Dissatisfied” for each question.

Of the 19 questions covering different service areas, the Library’s score was significantly above the mean score for “Very Satisfied & Satisfied” and well below the mean score for “Very Dissatisfied & Dissatisfied”. These results show that students value Library services and facilities highly. While Library staff members are very pleased with the results, we will not “rest on our laurels”, but continue to seek new and better ways to serve the University community.

On February 1, 2012, after two years of planning and construction, we soft-opened the new Learning Commons; with the Grand Opening Ceremony held on March 26, 2012.

This state-of-the-art facility provides welcoming learning spaces, including group study rooms, two e-learning classrooms, tutorial spaces. It also includes a Creative Media Zone, managed by our partner the Publishing Technology Center (PTC), which has a graphics workshop, a fully equipped video production studio, and 4 smaller AV editing suites.

The Library made considerable efforts to introduce this new facility to departments and service units on campus, to promote effective use of Learning Commons in support of students’ learning activities.

The Learning Commons quickly became a popular study and meeting place. In the examination period of Spring 2012, the Learning Commons operated 22 hours per day, which was very well received by students to help them in their study and learning.

In Fall 2011, in collaboration with CELT, the Library administered a web-based standardized test to assess the information literacy (IL) skills of our First Year undergraduates.

Developed collaboratively by the James Madison University (JMU) Center for Assessment & Research Studies and JMU Libraries in the USA, the test is designed to assess how students have achieved the Association of College and Research Libraries Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education.

Consisting of 60 multiple-choice questions and requiring about 75 minutes to complete, a total of HKUST 266 students took the test. The results have already provided us with useful information for future IL assessment and teaching, to help us assist students widen and deepen their ability to search, find, assess, and use information wisely and ethically.

In fall 2011 and spring 2012, The Library and the Language Center collaborated to pilot a multi-year, multi-session program for First and Second Year students of all the four Schools. These sessions were designed to build up students’ information literacy competencies.

700⁺ First Year School of Science and School of Engineering students studying LANG 1001 attended 52 library instruction sessions in fall 2011. In the next term, spring 2012, ~1,200 students in the School specific courses LANG 2030, LANG 2049, LANG 2070, and LABU 2052 attended the workshops.

Library instructors introduced students to subject-related literature and databases and taught them how to use them effectively to find relevant information. Students also learned about proper citation how to avoid plagiarism. After collecting feedback from students and Language Center instructors, we have reviewed and made plans for further improvement in the coming year. We are confident that what we learned from these pilot sessions will be invaluable in teaching the incoming double-cohort of students in September 2012.