NTU Library held its 4th E-Resource Fair from 12 – 13 October 2009 with 9 database vendors.
With its tagline “Learn & Win”, the Library offered a series of activities and games aimed at getting its community to take a closer look at its electronic resources.
7 database vendors set up shop offering quizzes, prizes and souvenirs.
The “shop-front” and quizzes gave them a chance to demonstrate and showcase their databases and interact with the NTU staff and students.
Talks on managing student research projects, online career tools, careers in taxation as well as how to select a journal to publish in were also held.
To encourage participation, staff and students were asked to collect 4 stamps by participating in 4 activities to qualify for a Grand Draw. Elsevier sponsored 2 big prizes: a Sony E-book reader and a Casio Exilim Digital Camera. The Library also planned a fringe activity called Spotted at E-Resource Fair. Visitors to the Fair were photographed and their photos uploaded to the NTU Library Facebook Page [http://www.facebook.com/ntu.library]. These visitors were encouraged to tag themselves and their friends to stand a chance to win a Flip Video Camera sponsored by Alexander Street Press.
In all, the response for the E-Resource Fair was encouraging. For instance, each database vendors spoke to an average of 120 visitors while the Grand draw attracted 149 participants and the Facebook fringe event resulted in 159 people being tagged from the 220 photos taken.
The E-resource Fair was first mooted by the University Librarian in 2006. It was planned and executed by the Library Promotion Division with the participation of all professional librarians.
The key idea is to organize a Carnival-like event outside library premises to bring the library out to meet the community. The Library Promotion Division accomplished this by forging close collaboration with the database vendors as well as designing activities that create a context for resource exploration.
Many have wondered why NTU Library spent so much effort trying to engage what they considered an already “captured audience”. The truth is, although NTU staff and students are all library members, many of them, particularly students are non-users.
By bringing the library out with a fun fair, NTU Library is attempting to become more visible and grab the opportunity to present its resources outside the library setting. The hope is that by attracting the community with fun-filled activities, they will, through the process of play, learn something new about the resources being promoted. Ultimately, the Library hopes to see the newly acquired knowledge lead to an improvement or enhancement of its users’ learning or working life.
Contributed by Phoebe Lim Choon Lan, NTU Library