Author Archives: Janine McDonald

Equipment-Oriented Reminders to Circ Supervisors

This is a good time to remind all of us that our digital cameras, camcorders, iPads and laptops always need to be charged when checked in, and when appropriate, re-imaged and completely erased of data (camcorders, iPads and Mac laptops). If you ever have any questions about charging and/or erasing data on equipment, please let me know, and I will be glad to show you. The other day I found a Mac laptop with the power on in its case. Also, several of the digital cameras had hardly any power left in their batteries.

You can also leave some of these items for me to charge/erase, especially when they are checked in later in the day and you might be busy. Feel free to put them on my desk with a note and I can take care of them. I don’t mind at all.

We will be getting new MacBook Air laptops in the near future, and we will then have new instructions for checking them in and out. Stay tuned for that update from Dan.

Circ Desk Rule on Mac charger loans

TO ALL STUDENT CIRC DESK WORKERS:

DO NOT loan out Mac chargers to anyone longer than one day. This is a rule that cannot be altered. So don’t alter it. I have heard that someone overstepped their bounds by allowing Mac chargers to be loaned out for an entire week. That is absolutely, unequivocally unacceptable. We are low enough in our charger inventory, as you are well aware, so this is particularly bothersome. You have to ask a supervisor for ANY EXCEPTION to a circ rule. Specific equipment questions can be directed to Janine or Dan. Be careful.

New Equipment Arrives at Circ!

We are pleased to inform supervisors and student staff members that 12 near professional-grade hand-held camcorders (Canon Vixia R42 models) have been added to our inventory, as well as one additional very popular high-performance digital camera, the Canon Rebel T3i. The intent for the hand-held camcorders is to have a uniform supply, which simplifies loan use and instruction. We also have seven new Canon Power Shot Elph 100 cameras and Behringer headphones. There was a particular enthusiastic welcome to a palm-sized Aaxa Pico LCD player. Feedback so far on the Pico LCD has been A+, despite its less than perfect technical features to the larger models; it has been checked out since we added it last week, and reports are that DVDs screen just as vividly as on larger projectors. Naturally, the ease of transporting cannot be over-emphasized.

These items were on our “wish list” back in the Spring, and we are so grateful to have them to loan out. We now have 12 LCDs (10 at Davis and 2 at Armstrong), yet we still had an empty LCD shelf Wednesday night, the last night of break. It was movie night for plenty of students!

The new headphones have also had excellent reviews from the students.

We are trying to keep up with the high demand for Mac chargers each night. Many suffer wire damage with use and others get lost. I know our most popular items are chargers and headphones.

Please ask questions if any arise about the new equipment. In the meantime, as the saying goes in U.K. applies here at Circ, “Keep Calm and Carry On.”

Thank you to Dan, Petar, Charlie, Mary and Carol for managing these additions. We are so glad to have them to loan out.

Congratulations to Circ’s New Students of the Month!

A well-deserved congratulations to the first Fall semester 2013 Circ Student Employees of the Month;
Tiffany Park and Himi Kanaumi!

Tiffany and Himi were nominated from the pool of all LIS student employees.

While we realize that all of our Davis and Armstrong students are of the most excellent quality, we wanted to acknowledge and honor these two particular standouts, Himi and Tiffany. They are exemplary student professionals who are preparing themselves well for success in their futures beyond college. Senior life can be stressful as you seniors know too well, but Tiffany and Himi always have a sense of humor while they work hard, running the desk. Over the summer, and now into fall, they continue to show us just how responsible they are, while providing efficiency and top-rate service to anyone at the desk. Their future employers will be grateful when they realize how smart they were after hiring these two smart, charming upcoming recruits!

New Media Equipment to Circ this Fall

We will be adding several new items to our to our media equipment inventory this fall.

The goal is to standardize most of our cameras and camcorders for our patrons, and to ease the support aspect.

7 additional Canon ELPH 150 digital still cameras (upgrade from the 110 model)
10 (approximately) Vixia hand held camcorders, which will replace the older FS11 line we currently use. (We are keeping our FS 200 models).
We will stay within the XA10 line for the high end camcorder. We have two.

We will receive one palm sized LCD projector. This is a new technology so we will monitor its checkout frequency and performance feedback.
We were unable to add more LCD projectors so we will loan out what we have (8 students, and 5 fac/staff).

One more digital Rebel T3i will be added (yay)!
Tripods
Mac chargers
Headsets
(checking on i-Phone chargers)

No iPads or Kindles. These have tapered off in borrowing. We have 10 to circulate which will be fine.

More news will be coming (via the blog) regarding PC laptop re-imaging procedures.

New Printing Guide at Circ Desk

We have a new step-by-step one page guide for our language school students who need detailed instructions when printing. I placed it on the circulation desk as a sign, and there are copies (next to the sign) for students to take, if they are so inclined. We think this guide is very helpful, and it will alleviate many of the repeated questions we receive at circ, while assisting the language school patrons.

Tiffany created this tonight entirely on her own and without a request from anyone. Thank you Tiffany! We appreciate your initiative and great help.

Also, a giant thank you to James from the Help Desk for assisting circ tonight during a busy time with language students printing.

New “Go” Link — called LLG: an Accessible Map for our Language School Patrons

Our circulation student staff member Evan, created a Go link for our language students. It is called go/llg and it is found in the Middlebury Gotionary. It accesses a map which shows the Davis library locations of language areas, including dictionaries for all languages, literature for Hebrew, Russian, Chinese, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and German.

We are also keeping a sign of this map on our circulation desk for visitors.

Thank you Evan!

http://go.middlebury.edu/llg

Booked Laptops

Hi Circ Staff Supervisors!

Since the laptop metal cabinet has moved a tad closer to the supervisor checkout computer, it makes sense for me to place the booked laptops inside the laptop cabinet. It is a little closer, and more efficient to just reach behind the computer to retrieve a reserved laptop. It will free up the space in our equipment wooden cabinet too.

Importance of Being Equipment Cautious for Check-outs

Greetings Supervisors and Sleep-Deprived Students!

This is a friendly reminder to take your vitamins and eat your spinach! Last night I realized iPad #3 was listed “available” in Mill, yet I could not find it anywhere. Today I began to really worry. Fortunately, a little lucky goblin returned it to the red equipment cart when I wasn’t looking, but when I did see it, I exclaimed “Voila! I was so worried you grew feet overnight! I am so happy you came back.”

This was a good lesson for me to relay how careful we should be when checking out our media items. You know better than anyone that this is absolutely our uber busy end-of-semester season so it is very easy (and dangerous) to rush out a (non) checkout. But when it comes down to iPads, camcorders and cameras, we really need to make sure to confirm their checkouts. Well, you know what to do. Please make sure you look at the Mill screen when checking out all items.

I thank you for your continued diligence and razor focus while working at TCD (the circ desk).