What will you be doing?

OK, I won't to clear up a little confusion with my friends. This is a "voyage" and not a "cruise". It has a purpose. "But" they ask, "what will you be doing?" They know that I'm the librarian, but they haven't realized that the ship has a 13,000 volume library. The collection has been carefully selected to represent ports we will visit and the classes that are taught. Each voyage has a different theme, so we've added volumes to support the "sustainability" theme of our trip. We have also acquired the books needed for reserve reading and copies of some of the textbooks. In a few weeks, Mary Johnston and I will meet to pack the books to be shipped to San Diego to the MV Explorer. HOPEFULLY, the boxes will be waiting in the library when I arrive and will be lovingly located in their assigned places waiting for the student to use. The subjects of the books range from psychology in foreign countries, to literature of a country to bird watching. The catalog can be searched at http://virgobeta.lib.virginia.edu/catalog?f[library_facet][]=Semester+at+Sea&facet.limit=500&facet_sort=hits&id=library_facet&random=1260222488985&sort=date_received_facet+desc&width=490


Once we arrive on the ship (several days ahead of the students), the assistant librarian, Theresa Pepin, and I will get into the online library system to load the "patron records" of all the students and faculty so that they can check out materials. We will also load the bibliographic records for the new books. Then we will load the digital files of the course readings (ie. journal articles) on the ships intranet, so that students will have access to the readings on their laptops.

We will work with the faculty to let them know what kinds of support we can give for their class assignments. The library will have eight student assistants to help with the shelving and evening checkouts. They will all have to get extensive training.

Then the students arrive, and we give presentations to their classes and serve as an information point to direct students around the ship since we are in a central location. As the student trickle into the library, we will assist them in setting up their "proxy accounts". These accounts verify that they are students and then give them access to all the UVA databases and the 70,000+ journal titles. That's a lot of hand holding.

Theresa and I will start to provide reference assistance and trouble-shooting. I'm a morning person, so I'll staff the library in the morning, and Theresa will staff in the afternoon, and we'll both be on call at all times. The library will be open 7 days a week when we are "at sea".

So, I expect to be busy.