the top 350 institutions in the world in the Times Higher Education’s World University rankings 2020. We hold a TEF silver, and are the second biggest provider of degree apprenticeships in the UK. The University Library consistently performs at around benchmark in the National Student Survey for question 19 on library resources. In the past year, our Customer Services Team has won a Vice Chancellor’s Award, team members have won internal funding for teach- ing focussed projects and the team has represented ARU externally through speaking at events, mentoring colleagues and contributing time, knowledge and experience to groups such as Sconul, Customer Services Group UK and cpd25.
Careers in Information Event Our drive to promote careers in Librar- ianship and other information related professions was started with an event in March 2019 held in our Cambridge Library, which brought together a spec- trum of people from across publishing, data analytics, librarianship and human resources. With speakers from ARU, AstraZeneca, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge University and
Schlumberger, the event showcased the routes and opportunities a career in infor- mation can provide. We had support from colleagues within our Careers Service and took the opportunity to promote our Graduate Trainee position which we were recruiting to using an ARU First policy (see below).
The purpose of the event was to demon- strate to our students (and staff) the wide pool of roles which can be available as an information professional. The speakers certainly showcased different routes in the profession and gave our delegates opportunities to reflect and ask questions. Unfortunately the event was not particu- larly well attended by students, however those in attendance engaged in discussion with the speakers and were positive about the experience. This event may not be run on an annual basis, but we can see it being repeated in the future.
ARU First Policy
In 2019, the University Library made a commitment to attempt to recruit an ARU graduate to our Library Graduate Trainee post. This is something which had not happened for a number of years, but we recognised the benefit for one of our graduates as well as ARU’s returns in the outcomes surveys previously men- tioned. We launched the advertisement for this role at the careers event and offered this role only to ARU students and recent graduates. In addition, we guaranteed a bespoke service for those that applied – if they made an application for the role and were not shortlisted for interview, we gave them feedback on the application and the opportunity to apply again having reviewed this. A number of our students applied (including some of those who attended the careers event) and went through this process. Unfortun ately due to changes within the University Library we were unable to recruit to this role, however we hope that the feedback provided to applicants proved helpful for other roles they were making applications for.
Internship Opportunities In addition to these activities, in the summer of 2019, the University Library provided two internship opportunities for current stu- dents. These paid placements lasted between eight and 12 weeks and helped the service move forward on vital projects. The projects the interns concentrated on were the deliv- ery of a new electronic core textbook scheme
January-February 2020
for Level 4 students and the creation of a new wildlife themed induction video for Lev- el 4 students new to ARU and the University Library (
https://bit.ly/3a4Yo13) The interns were recruited via our in-house employment bureau who shortlisted prospective students and then the Library interviewed them. The two students selected were able to give us a valuable insight into the projects and helped us deliver more student focussed services. Furthermore, the scheme gave some Library staff the opportunity to recruit and manage an individual – developing new skills and experience for themselves. We can definitely see the Library repeating this programme in the summer of 2020.
Ambitious Futures Early in 2019, ARU signed up to the Ambitious Futures Programme, which is a collaboration across a number of higher education institutions in the UK aiming to provide participants with an excellent grounding in professional university man- agement. All applicants must be graduates and they are to undertake a placement lasting 18 months, at two different institu- tions. ARU decided to recruit two graduates and those who applied undertook a series of selection processes including a video
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