DCDC21 | Approaches to audience engagement
Channel: ResearchLibrariesUK
Date: 2021-07-05

DCDC stands for Discovering Collections, Discovering Communities. It is a cross-sectoral conference, hosted by The National Archives, RLUK and Jisc, that brings together the GLAMA sectors (galleries, libraries, archives, museums and academia) to shine a light on our shared experiences, innovations, interests and concerns. The DCDC21 Conference explored how crisis can act as a catalyst for change within libraries, archives, museums, and cultural organisations. https://dcdcconference.com/

Libraries in Lockdown
Isobel Hunter, Libraries Connected

Public libraries had to close their doors in March 2020, at the start of lockdown. What happened next was an extraordinary surge of creativity. Libraries pivoted their services online and developed new ways of supporting their communities. eLending surged, thousands of people received phone calls and home deliveries, partnerships were forged with charities to reach disadvantaged families, people were helped to get online. This paper draws on research by Libraries Connected and Carnegie UK Trust to explore how public libraries responded to the crisis, how they will contribute to post-pandemic recovery, and what this means for their services in the future. 

The ‘No Barriers’ Approach: Making the Inclusive Archive a Reality
James Ranahan and Joanna Terry, Archives West Midlands

‘No Barriers’ is a project and evolving approach by Archives West Midlands to tackle the ‘archive crisis’ - the exclusion of large parts of contemporary society from our workforce and services. Through a targeted partnership with current non-applicants and non-users, we are working to embed a meaningful commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion; and developing a methodology to share across the sector. We will explain our approach for the project and our aspiration for a Rapid Assessment Model for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion - so services can simply and quickly bench-mark and adjust their plans and actions accordingly.

Item Handling in Lockdown: Presenting the Virtual Collections Classroom
Johanna Green and Bob MacLean, University of Glasgow

The Covid-19 Pandemic has significantly impacted in-person access to Archives and Special Collections. The University of Glasgow has long used their Archives and Special Collections (ASC) for object-based teaching but the limitations on physical access brought by the pandemic threatened this. The solution: a new Virtual Collections Classroom suite of technology, including a WolfVision Eye-14 ceiling-mounted camera, to offer “over-the-shoulder” live handling to remote classes. This paper will offer two perspectives on this innovation from Bob MacLean, Assistant Librarian at ASC and Dr Johanna Green, Lecturer in Information Studies and early adopter of the technology within her teaching.