Discovery of research, teaching and learning materials

In support of the Wits Vision 2022 Strategic Framework and the reimagining of services for the 21st century imperatives, the Library paid priority attention to enabling access to extensive collections; facilitating the intuitive discovery of research, teaching and learning materials; inculcating digital and information literacies for lifelong learning; promoting a culture of continuous organisational renewal; digitising, curating and showcasing the rare primary research materials and research outputs of the University; embracing emerging scholarly communication models; and, integrating library research, teaching and learning spaces.

This report covers the strides made in 2019, and gives a snapshot of the interactions that took place in both physical and digital spaces in support of the Wits Vision 2022 Strategic Framework.

ENABLING ACCESS TO EXTENSIVE COLLECTIONS

Acquiring and managing collections

Considerable progress was made in the development of digital collections. At the Commerce Library, access to electronic versions of the bulk of the recommended and prescribed titles in the short loan collection was activated while of the 95 titles ordered by the School of Governance, 90 percent were acquired in electronic formats. The cumulative total of electronic books as at 31 December 2019 was 28 406, including 34 titles published by the Wits University Press.

Temporary housing of Rand Mines archives at the Education Library basement

For the foreseeable future, Wits Libraries will continue to curate and give access to hybrid collections. In line with this projection, the Libraries acquired 7 622 books comprising 3 562 hard copies, 4 031 eBooks and 29 DVDs in 2019. The number of print journals available to users was 1 869 as at 31 December 2019. With respect to archival collections, Barloworld and The South African Municipal Workers’ Union (SAMWU) deposited with the Historical Papers Unit (HP) the Rand Mines archive and the SAMWU historical records, respectively.

Overall, the total Library holding (bibliographic) was 615 975. The cumulative total of volumes was 1 252 538. The information resources expenditure per patron in 2019 was R2 495 compared to R2 540 in 2018.

DISCOVERY OF RESEARCH, TEACHING AND LEARNING MATERIALS

Simplifed access to information across library databases, repositories and shelves

The Library Website was completely re-designed, resulting in an enhanced user-friendly interface. This delivered a 2.6 percent increase in visitor traffc from 663 509 in 2018 to 680 472 in 2019. Regarding access to the underlying information, migration of digital content from the old Historical Papers website to the Access

to Memory (AtoM) platform continued in 2019. With support from ArchProteus, HP converted 37 hard copy inventories to Encoded Archival Description-Extensible Markup Language (EAD-XML) formats and directly imported them into AtoM. This opened a most welcome window for the expedited linking of digital objects to the corresponding inventories.

Regarding access to hard copy materials, the Africana Library, William Cullen, organised exhibitions and special events that exposed the rare and special collections in its holdings. HP, in collaboration with the Wits History Workshop, organised an exhibition in commemoration of the Centenary of the formation of the Industrial and Commercial Workers Union (ICU), on 17 August. In addition, HP together with the History Workshop, South African History Archive (SAHA) and Public Affairs Research Institute (PARI) published the People’s Guide to Archives in South Africa accessible at https://www.wits.ac.za/history-workshop/archives-guide/ to empower civil society, researchers and organisations with information to access government and other

William Cullen Library celebrated 85 years

records for research purposes, administrative justice, transparency and accountability. On 12 March 2019, the William Cullen library celebrated 85 years. The frst 85 visitors to this Library on the day, were pleasantly surprised and treated to cupcakes, graciously baked by the Manager: Library Client Services, Mrs Janet Zambri. A display with information about the history of Cullen Library was mounted in the foyer. The event culminated into a rendition of happy birthday song by enthusiastic students who got the last cupcakes.

In order to facilitate small scale self-digitisation of hard copies for learning, teaching and research in the digital environment, the installation of Zeta scanners was expanded to the Engineering and BioPhy Libraries.

Research Support

The Library collaborated with the Research Offce, Faculties, researchers and postgraduates in advancing research initiatives of the University. The interventions ranged from bibliographic management software upskilling sessions; coordination of publishing workshops; evaluating the quality of journals being considered for article publishing; organising citations for National Research Foundation (NRF) ratings; identifcation of researchers with the highest cited papers; ensuring the identifcation and listing of all University research outputs for statutory reporting; to, research output comparisons against the higher education sector; identifying organisations the University collaborated with and the research/subject areas; citation and research output reports for appointments, promotions, funding, research awards and review purposes; converting of