In 2012, it was decided that the database contained sufficient entries to make the website publicly available.

The University of Groningen uses digital files on a large scale, also in comparison to other university libraries. Last year, the number of search actions in WebofScience, for instance, was 40% higher than the national average.

Remarkably, the decrease in the number of loans at the University of Groningen occurred relatively late, being at 23% in the past four years, which is higher than the national average (18%).

One of the survey’s main conclusions is that staff and students are very satisfied with the collection as well as with the services provided. They are highly satisfied with, for instance, the University’s range of electronic files (e.g. electronic journals). This is confirmed by the high number of consulted articles in e-journals (about 3.8 million).

The average number of search actions in Science Direct by University staff and students is 16.3 (in 2011). In contrast, the average number of loans by staff and students has declined in four years from 10.52 to 7.22.

It should at the same time be noted that a relatively large number of services are less well known to University staff and students. This applies to support for online information services such as Libguides (57%), RefWorks (45%), Open Instruction Sessions (43%), assistance with Electronic Publishing (33%), and Repositories (19%). These will therefore require extra attention in 2013 and beyond. The biggest challenge will be to improve the visibility of library services and products.

• the merger of two specialist libraries into the Zernike Library
• the expansion of the collection and facilities
• the renewal of the Information Skills Teaching Programme

Merger of libraries

The most notable project in 2012 has been the merger of the Mathematics and Natural Sciences library and the Economics and Business and Spatial Sciences library into the Zernike Library. Since mid-October, there is one joint library for these three University faculties at Zernike.

In a short period of time, a 2.2 km selection of the original 5.5 kilometres of books was made in consultation with faculty staff and in cooperation with several colleagues. This collection is on open shelves in the Duisenberg Building under the new name ‘Zernike Library’.

Library staff have done a tremendous amount of work to make this merger a success – a merger that, besides a revision of the open collection, also involved changes to procedures, task distribution and new partnerships.

Expansion of the collection and facilities

Apart from just cuts, the collection has undergone some expansions as well:

• The order-suggestion profiles have been expanded and improved for the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences (FWN). Life Sciences has acquired a digital magazine archive.
• The Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB) has been given access to an increased range of financial and economic data.
• The Faculty of Spatial Sciences (FRW) can now consult an increased range of relevant e-books.
• A Data Room for researchers at the University of Groningen was set up in the Zernike Library in 2012. Here researchers can, by appointment, consult specific databases via remote access, such as historical documents from databases from Bureau van Dijk and microdata from Statistics Netherlands (CBS).

In exam periods, students invariably call for extended opening hours of the library; as a modest response, and because a night like this is a good way to strengthen ties with our users, the UB remained open in the night of 18 to 19 January 2012.

There was a warm welcome in the stairwell by director Marjolein Nieboer, followed by small-scale activities at regular intervals. The library’s thirty-millionth visitor, for instance, was given a festive welcome. Chinese student Lui Xiaowan, who’d never set foot in the UB before, didn’t know what had hit her!

There were still a few hundred students left in the building in the first hours after midnight; the general impression was that students do not want to stay up all night (which would  also affect their concentration during exams), but do want to continue beyond midnight, which is when the library usually closes.

However, a few dozen die-hards stayed all night: forty students stretched their legs during morning gymnastics led by Johan Poppinga, followed by a well-deserved free breakfast in the canteen.