Time to put your skills to the test!
As part of our ‘Level Up Your Academic Skills’ event we will be running an exciting ‘Escape Room’ mini challenge across three different locations this week.
In teams of 2-3 people you’ll be tasked with solving a series of puzzles against the clock, with the fastest team set to win a prize!
To take part, drop by our Academic Skills displays at the following times:
Have you heard about ASK? It’s the University’s one-stop-shop for academic skills.
Are you concerned about being accused of plagiarism? Having some difficulty with statistical analysis? Struggling to write a persuasive argument in your essay? Feeling like you’re not able to manage your lecture, seminar and assignment workload? Or perhaps you are a master procrastinator who needs to just crack on with some work. The ASK (Academic Skills Kit) can help!
Signposting you to the services, resources and support available across Newcastle University, it will help you identify where to go for advice and support to improve your study habits and develop skills that are invaluable for University and what comes after.
ASK directs you to the correct place for support and includes online resources such as quizzes and videos, to help you better understand where you may need to grow.
Why not start with the myth busting quiz developed by the Writing Development Centre for some quick tips on how to study well?
As you may guess from the name, the Library’s liaison team role is to liaise with the academic Schools at Newcastle University, to help us plan and deliver excellent Library services which meet the needs of staff and students. There are over twenty of us, and we’re a friendly bunch: you should get to know us!
Broadly speaking, our remit falls into three main areas:
Collection development
In other words, making sure the Library’s information resources are suitable for current research and teaching needs. So we’ll liaise with Schools about reading lists, discuss resource requirements for new modules and programmes, and arrange and evaluate trials of major databases. We’ll also help you get the best out of our resources, via our subject guides and resource guides, and of course, this blog!
Help and guidance
We’re here to help you get the best out of the Library. Every year, we deliver several hundred hours of teaching to students from all Schools and at all levels: from big lectures to small practical workshops, covering topics such as literature searching, subject resources, reference management and more. We’ve also developed a wide range of high quality online learning resources, including guides, videos and quizzes, to help you develop your academic skills.
We can also answer individual queries (see our contact information below). The Library’s excellent Library Help service will probably answer most of your questions, but for more specialist subject queries, we’re happy to help. You can also book a one-to-one appointment with us for more in-depth guidance (for example, to discuss your dissertation literature search).
Relationship management
No, that doesn’t mean we’re marriage guidance counsellors or agony aunts! It simply means keeping in touch with staff and students in our Schools: finding out what’s going on, and keeping you up to date with what we’re up to. We do this in various formal and informal ways, including attending meetings and events in the Schools (everything from Student Voice Committees to PGR student conferences); producing regular newsletters; using social media; and just generally being nosey!
You can find the contact details for the liaison team for your subject area here. We recommend you use the subject team email addresses, rather than emailing an individual person. That’s because some of us work part-time, or may be away: emailing the team will ensure you’ll get a prompt answer.
We’re probably all familiar with the fact that the library is where you find the books, but this month, why not explore all of the other types of information that can add to your academic skills bag of tricks. The library’s Resource Guides draw together the best resources available, organised by the type of information rather than subject area.
So if you are trying to find historic newspapers, company financial data, market research, standards or images you will find a resource guide for all of that!
The guides are updated all the time as we add new subscriptions to our collection or identify online resources that we think will be useful for teaching and research. You’ll find the Resource Guides on the library website and as quick links on every Subject Guide.
We’ve also highlighted the Resource Guides that are most commonly used for your subject area in the Specialist Resources section.
So next time you need to find a newspaper article, a government paper or some statistics to analyse, visit the Resource Guides to help you identify where to look.
Pick up more tips and tricks for searching on our skills guides.
Time to get your game face on and level up your academic skills!
Throughout your time at University, you are required to develop a whole range of important academic skills, from knowing where to find information to critical thinking to reference management. These skills are not only important for completing your degree successfully but they can also be transferred to the work you do once you leave the University, making them invaluable for your future career.
Developing some of these skills may seem daunting but the Library is here to support you at every level of study with our range of online tools, videos and guides as well as one-to-one support from your Subject Liaison team and staff at the Writing and Development Centre.
This month we’re inviting you on a study quest to explore our guides and tools and gain some serious Study XP (experience points).
To get started take a look at your Subject guide for advice on finding information in your area or see our Employability guide to explore how these skills can help in your future career.
From 11 – 24 March 2019 visit our display in the Library to chat to our helpful staff, pick up postcards, guides and fun freebies, and if you feel up for a challenge, take on our exciting mini escape room game (more details to follow)!
Ready, Player One?
We have reactivated this trial and now have access to this collection until 5th April 2019.
This curated, thematically-organized, and curriculum-driven collection offers students and scholars a new way to examine how revolutions, protests, resistance, and social movements have shaped and transformed the human experience globally from the 18th to 21st century.
• 175 hours of video, including documentaries, original footage, and personal accounts
• 50,000 pages of primary sources and archival collections (personal papers, organizations, government documents, and others)
• 50,000 pages of journals, reports, monographs, and speeches
• 1,000 images from key movements and revolutions
• Ancillary materials including scholarly essays, bibliographies, sourced chronologies, and links to websites
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To access the collection, click on the link here . If you are off-campus, click ‘Log In’ and type in Newcastle for the institution name. You will see the university name so click on that and you’ll be taken to the NU log in page. You can also access via RAS if off campus.
The trial ends on 5th April. Please explore and email us your feedback, or post it as a comment on this blog.
“What would you guess is the most common job?” Michael Lai, Outreach Lead at KGI, asked an audience of students at his Columbia Heights TEDTalk back in 2016. His audience members offer a few suggestions. “Engineer?” “Fast food workers?” After several failed attempts, Michael puts them out of their misery,
“3.5 billion truck drivers in the United’s States” he tells them. “Experts predict that in the next 12-15 years, most of the cars on America’s highways will be self-driving… so what’s going to happen to the most common job?”
The future of the job market – and it’s inherent uncertainty – has been receiving a lot of attention in the international press in recent years, with Universities UK analysis predicting “65% of children entering primary schools today will work in jobs and functions that don’t currently exist.” In previous generations, new graduates could expect to work with the same company for several years, steadily climbing the corporate ladder in a predictable, but reassuring linear way. In the 21st century however, the face of the job market is changing, and once you graduate, you may find yourself looking at a “portfolio career” over traditional career progression – something Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg described as more akin to a career “jungle gym” than a career ladder.
But what does all this talk of truck-driving and emergent markets mean for you, the UK Graduate? Well, if the gig economy becomes the norm in the next 10 years, one of the key challenges for new graduates will be the perpetual need to upskill yourself, and market your own skill base to different employers. This puts the spotlight on what have traditionally been referred to as “soft” transferable skills that are required across many different roles and sectors – skills such as resilience, team-working and critical thinking. Here at the Library, we’d argue that information and digital literacy falls under this bracket (well of course we would, we’re librarians!). The ability to find and use information and make considered use of digital tools is an important capability in any graduate job. Don’t just take our word for it – we spoke to several students returning from placement who told us their information skills had helped them get ahead.
The good news though is that your degree programme offers you the chance to work on and demonstrate all of these skills. Employers will know that you may not have extensive work experience as a new graduate, but make sure you cherry-pick prime examples from your University work, part –time jobs and any voluntary experience to exemplify the skills employers are looking for (and remember, the Careers service can help you with interview preparation.) Make the most of the workshops and sessions open to during your time at University so you are in a great position to articulate these important skills. For more information on how the Library can help, check out our Employability Guide
References
Grey literature. Black Literature.
Did you even know they existed? Possibly not.
Depending upon your source, “black literature” can be defined as books and peer-reviewed published journals. This is the familiar material you will source and use through your University Library and its catalogue.
Grey literature is something else entirely. Grey literature is research or material that is not produced by commercial publishers. It may be wholly unpublished or published in a non-commercial form. Think along the lines of industry-related materials, academic publications, government publications and think tank papers.
GreyNet, the Grey Literature Network Service has more detailed information on this vital research resource.
Grey Literature can be unique and an important source of information. There is a range of grey literature you may need to consult to ensure your research is complete. Examples of these materials include:
Most databases, available via your Subject Guide, will allow you to limit your search by document type, including grey literature, which does improve accessibility to this type of material.
Other resources include:
The list can go on…
Once you have located your grey literature, do question it using the CRAAP test – currency, relevance, authority, accuracy, purpose. Consider what is publicly available versus a subscribed (or paid for) resource. It may be biased and you should include that assessment in your work.
And finally, don’t forget, not everything is available online!
![Shades of Grey [Literature]](https://blogs.ncl.ac.uk/subject-support/files/2019/02/samuel-zeller-118195-unsplash-825x510.jpg)