Activities and Projects

The Library has joined the WorldCat bibliographic catalogue, a cooperative resource conceived, curated and constantly updated by the Online Computer Library Center. OCLC is a library organization that offers products, services and information systems to cultural institutions and their users, placing themselves, in fact, as the largest library network in the world. WorldCat, which today includes millions of records belonging to the collections of the numerous participating libraries, in addition to strengthening the sense of participation of the Library in the library universe, is an important showcase through which is possible to gain visibility worldwide.

The need to communicate the Library and to guide the user through spaces and collections on open shelves gave impetus to the design and preparation of the new signage. Together with the infopole at the entrance, furnishings and signs necessary for the identification of rooms and offices were first prepared; the positioning of lookouts on shelves followed, showing the classified system in use for the placement of monographic collections. Subsequently, signs regarding periodicals were set up: being the collection entirely free to access, a color-based system was adopted to facilitate the rapid identification of the different sections. Furthermore, again for the Periodical Collection, work has been done on the development of maps of the disciplinary sectors that have been positioned in the dedicated spaces and disseminated online through the Website. The preparation of signs for the Book Tower remains to be completed according to the redistribution consequent to the Relocation Project in progress. Finally, the signage of the monographic collection on open shelves was also integrated with maps describing works location according to the classification system in use and, once the Book Tower relocation project was concluded, new shelf signs were also prepared, essential for the orientation of staff and professors who have access to the main Library depository.

The relocation of the Book Tower was a part of a broader project to rationalize the patrimony distribution and optimize conservation spaces. The Book Tower is the main Library depository and houses a monographic collection consisting of approximately 350,000 volumes; it is distributed over 6 floors and increases every year by an average of 4,000 new acquisitions. These numbers, and the difficulty of immediately having new storage depositories, give the measure of how important a rational organization of spaces and a distribution of documentary patrimony was, based on the medium-term growth forecast of the various disciplinary sectors. Hand in hand with the relocation, all shelf signs and summary signs positioned on the floors have been updated. 

To communicate with users and to promote services and activities, the Library has launched its Facebook page. Given the increasing fragmentation of the production, dissemination and use of information, the intention is to relaunch the mediation role of the library and, through a work of information synthesis, organize, document and share content, transforming information into knowledge. 

As part of a more general review plan of collections, the Library has structured a qualitative review of the Periodical Collection. In the first phase, the section of current periodicals was evaluated by examining titles individually, contextualising them in the respective disciplinary sectors and reflecting on the choice of the paper and / or online format of the subscriptions; the aim was to encourage the sector harmonious development, keeping the collection compliant with the scientific and research interests of the academic community and the updates to the publishing market. In the second phase, the section of closed periodicals was analyzed for the discard; the reflection took place in respect of the historical mission of the Library and the institution it serves, aware of the responsibility to keep the University pedagogical track, to document the history of teaching and the tradition of Education.