Skip to content

Checking the Reserve Shelves

One of the tasks on the daily checklist is checking the reserves. This entails making sure that reserve books are on the correct shelf. At some point during your shift, you should check at least two reserve shelves.

Checking a course reserves includes the following:

  1. Checking that all the books on that shelf have the correct course code and number on the band. If there the orange band is ripping, please tape or replace it.
  2. Look at the list of books and make sure that all the books are there. Count the books to check. If there is a discrepancy, look up the course reserve in Tripod and see if any of the items are “not available” or “item not in place”. It is likely because someone has it checked out.
  3. Arrange the books in call number order
  4. Date and initial the course reserves that you have checked.

 

Posted in Uncategorized.

Comments Off on Checking the Reserve Shelves

By Laura Surtees – February 22, 2019

Paging

  1. When you do paging, you will go to the “pick from shelf” under Fulfillment.
  2. Select all the items and click print slip.
  3. Using the white circ printing card in the drawer, scan the Canon printer with the card. You will see all the paging slips displayed on the screen. Be sure to select all on the printer and print and delete.
  4. Some of them print on multiple sheets – unfortunately (and we are working on it – see below). It is important to pay attention to information on both sheets. The information in the grey box (circled below) is the library where the book is located. Destination above the box is where the book should be going. Pay attention to the location in the box because there may be times where you will print requests for items in Canaday or Collier. Disregard these requests for other libraries and leave them in the notebook for me circling the location.
  5. Find the books. Be sure to look in folio/non-folio as well as the reshelving carts.
  6. Scan them in and make sure that the destination is correct (name of the requester will also be displayed) and put them in the appropriate boxes. If you scan in the book and it says “reshelve to stacks” or there is not hold, double check to make sure you have the correct book. Some paging slips have barcodes but not all. Make sure the barcodes match. You may encounter this problem if there are multiple copies of the book. In this case, please find other copies and try to scan them in to see if they have holds.
  7. If you are not able to find a book, mark NOS (not on shelf) and write the date and your initials. DO NOT CANCEL OR “MARK AS MISSING”. To make sure the book is not there (and not misshelved, at a carrel etc), multiple people will look for the book. Paging slips should have multiple initials on it before a hold is cancelled. We look for the book for approximately 48hours before a student supervisor, Camilla or I will cancel a hold. You should NOT mark as missing or cancel a hold.
  8. One of the only time you should cancel a hold is if it is a BMC patron requesting a BMC book. However this is a little trickier to identify as the patron’s affiliation is not listed on the paging slip. As a result, the only time you will cancel a hold is if a BMC book is going to another BMC library (unless for some reason you know it is a BMC patron. This is an indication that it is a BMC patron (see #10 for detailed instructions). If in doubt, send the book along or put it on the holdshelf.
  9. Another scenario where you should NOT cancel a hold is if the book has a location of Fong Collection. Do not cancel the hold. These books are in Tripod as “by request”. While the Fong Collection is open and accessible to everyone (people should feel free to go use it), many students think that they have to request the book – as directed in Tripod. Never cancel a hold for a Fong book.
  10. To cancel a hold,  click on the cancel request button. A pop-up message will appear asking you the reason for the cancellation and whether you want to notify the patron. Always check the “notify patron” button. Otherwise the patron will not know that the hold was cancelled or why. Unfortunately the messages in Alma are a little different and there is no option for “own library”. So it is important to include a message in the note field. Please write the following message as shown in the 2nd image below.

Do not print paging slips outside of the designated times to avoid confusion and overlap with printing paging slips in Canaday and Collier.

 

Posted in Circulation Desk, Procedures for Student Workers, Routine Tasks, Specialized Tasks.

Tagged with , , , .

Comments Off on Paging

By Laura Surtees – January 31, 2019

Alma Tri-Co Training Website and Moodle Page

In preparation for the switch to Alma, I have created a Moodle page for Carpenter Circulation that includes links to the training videos as well the link to the TriCo Alma Training Website https://sites.google.com/swarthmore.edu/tricoalma/home. Students should familiarize themselves with this site and be prepared to consult with it after we go live in Alma on Dec. 20. If you are not working after we “go-live” with the system, you will have to review these materials prior to returning to work in January. 

Posted in Uncategorized.

Comments Off on Alma Tri-Co Training Website and Moodle Page

By Laura Surtees – December 13, 2018

Alma FAQs

Alma Student FAQs

Policy/Procedures

Q: What about a patron with no record? The Alma tutorial said you can set up a patron borrowing information but I’m assuming we do not do this??? Will we fill out the visitor form as usual? 

A: Nothing about our procedures for patrons with no records will be changing – you should still fill out the borrowing privileges form as usual so full time staff can determine whether someone is eligible for borrowing and make an account. Student workers should not create patron accounts.

Q: How do you mark items missing etc.?? 

A: If you’re paging and can’t find something, you can mark items missing from the Pick from Shelf menu by clicking the “Mark as Missing” button, which will also cancel the patron’s hold and send them a notice. Otherwise, you can look up the item in the search bar and click the “…” action menu and select “Toggle Missing Status” to mark an item as missing.

Q: Course reserves, how do we do it? 

A: You’ll be able to look up course reserves in the new version of Tripod much the same way you can in Tripod now.

Q:    How will we know when rooms are booked

A: You can see booking requests in the “Requests” section of a holdings record if you’re looking at the item, and in the “Requests” section of a patron record if you’re looking at the patron.

Login

Q: Is the username and password for Alma our current BMC login info, or another unique set of passwords? 

A: You will log in to Alma with your College email address and password, the same way you log in to email or other campus sites. If you are already logged in to Outlook when you navigate to Alma, it will sign you in automatically.

Q: Will Alma require Duo for login? 

A: Yes, if you are not already signed in to your email when you navigate to Alma.

Resources

Q: Will student workers have access to the training videos we just watched?

A: Yes, you can always view them on the Alma website. You can also view instructions for everything covered on the Tri-Co Library training site, once it’s finalized shortly.

Posted in Circulation Desk, Library Policies, Procedures for Student Workers, Routine Tasks.

Tagged with , .

Comments Off on Alma FAQs

By Laura Surtees – December 4, 2018

Missing Books

Books, book, and more books! It is that time of the semester when more people are looking for books in the library. For some people this may be the first time using the library and therefore may need some extra help and guidance. Do your best to help the patrons navigate the library and find what they are looking for.

Remember not all libraries have a folio and non-folio section. So if someone mentioned that a book is not on the shelf, suggest that they look in both folio and non-folio sections. They may not have noticed the location name with the call number or it is possible that the book was misshelved (it happens all the time). Also don’t forget to look on the reshelving carts behind the desk for them. Help them if possible especially if Camilla or I are around.

If the book is still missing, ask them to fill out the missing books form (found on website under services located on the left-hand side) or fill out the form with them so that we 1) know that the book is missing and can look for it, AND 2) know who is looking for the book so we can contact them when we find the book.  While it is important to know that a book is missing, it is equally important to know who is looking for the book so that we can make sure they have access to it.

Please bookmark the missing books form on the toolbar next time you work so that you can always easily access it. Let me know if you don’t know how to bookmark the page and I can help you.

Posted in Library Policies, Procedures for Student Workers, Routine Tasks.

Tagged with , , .

Comments Off on Missing Books

By Laura Surtees – November 14, 2018

Load Paper Message – but there is paper in the machine!

Load Paper Message – but there is paper in the machine!

The printers will sometimes show a flashing the orange error light with the message at the bottom of the screen saying, “Load Paper.” When you look in the machine, the paper trays are full. Typically, the issue is that the document isn’t a standard 8 ½ x 11 paper (this often happens with people whose computers are typically set to A4 size paper). The printer doesn’t think it has the right size of paper, so it wants you to load paper. To fix this, press the “Status Monitor/Cancel” button and a window will pop up with a diagram of the printer and types of paper. Click “OK” at the bottom right of the window and the orange error light should go away! Basically, you are overriding what the printer thinks and saying to print the job regardless of whether the paper is the correct size.

Posted in Routine Tasks, Specialized Tasks.

Tagged with , , , .

Comments Off on Load Paper Message – but there is paper in the machine!

By Laura Surtees – September 24, 2018

Canceling a Print Job

Canceling a Print Job

There have been some problems where the printers have been printing out copious amounts of plain paper with coding symbols at the top/bottom of the paper. Have no fear because there is a way to stop it! On the left-hand side are three buttons, hit the one called “Status Monitor/Cancel”. Press that button and a window will pop with the print job. Select the print job and hit “Cancel” along the bottom of the window.

The other day the printer kept printing blank sheets of paper. Again to stop the print job, cancel it through the “status monitor” button. You may need to cancel print jobs after there was a jam but someone had released a number of print jobs but left after it jammed or if the printer is doing weird things.

Posted in Procedures for Student Workers, Routine Tasks.

Tagged with , , .

Comments Off on Canceling a Print Job

By Laura Surtees – September 24, 2018

Trico Van Delivery – Books from other libraries

Trico Van Delivery

Every day between 11:30am-12:30pm and 2-3pm, Ken arrives with a cart full of books from across the Tri-Co. Some of these books are to be put on the holdshelf and others are being returned to Carpenter to be shelved. When Ken arrives, he’ll drop off the books by the main computer area and retrieve the boxes from the back room with books going out to the other libraries. Be kind to Ken and acknowledge him as you’ll see him around a lot and he is very nice!

After the books arrive, please unpack them, check all the books in and separate them according to those to be shelved and those to be put on the holdshelf. When you check in a book that is intended for the holdshelf, there will be a pop-up message “Put on holdshelf at BMC Carpenter for XXXX. ….. Print slip to place in book?.” Click no and make sure you’ve checked in the book (it will appear at the bottom of the Millennium screen). Most books will already come with the paging slip. If there is no slip, write the name of the patron that appears in the pop-up message on a piece of scrap paper (last name, first name). Hold books should be placed in alphabetical order on the holdshelf.

Other books in the boxes should be Carpenter books. They still need to be checked in so that their status changes from “in transit” as it moves between libraries to “available”. Carpenter books to be shelved should be placed in LC call number order on their respective shelving carts.  Be careful that only Carpenter books are being put back on the reshelving carts. Once the books have been checked in and placed in their designated positions, go into Millennium–notices–hold pickup — prepare (BCar is the correct printer) – click print–send notices (1 to each email – hit ok)–clear the hold notices. If you don’t send out the hold notices, people will not be aware that their books are ready, so please be sure to do that!

Make sure that there are 3 white boxes set up to go to the other libraries (Canaday, Magill, and McCabe). If there are more than 5 empty white boxes in the hold/reserve back room, please place the extras in the cage. There should never be white boxes on the hold shelves or near the course reserves.

If a white box is full, make a new one and leave the full one next to the cart. Do not put it on the shelves because Ken will not see it.

Posted in Procedures for Student Workers, Routine Tasks, Specialized Tasks.

Tagged with , , , .

Comments Off on Trico Van Delivery – Books from other libraries

By Laura Surtees – September 24, 2018

How to use the Phone

Over the summer we got a new phone at the circulation desk! Please review the following changes for making phone calls from this new phone

  1. To call other numbers on campus, dial the 4-digit extension (no need to press 8)
  2. Dial 8 to dial an outside number
  3. For non-local numbers, dial 8 plus 1 and then the whole number (xxx) xxx-xxxx

Posted in Procedures for Student Workers, Routine Tasks.

Tagged with .

Comments Off on How to use the Phone

By Laura Surtees – September 5, 2018

Linking LibStaffer to Office 365 calendar

Last semester there were a number of missed shifts or people forgetting about shifts that they picked up. To avoid this and help keep you organized, everyone must link your Office 365 email calendar with LibStaffer. You should set up your calendar to receive notifications (5, 10, 15mins before you shift) and it will block off that time on your calendar so you can’t double book yourself.

Here are the instructions: In LibStaffer – in your dashboard/home screen where you see all your shifts listed, there is an ical icon on the right hand side next to the save and print button. Click on it and a pop-up message shows up with a link at the bottom. Copy the link. Open up your email calendar in your browser and go to “add calendar”.  Choose “from internet” and paste the link into the box “link to the calendar” and hit save. Your LibStaffer shifts should show up in your calendar OR alternatively it may show up as a new calendar (which you just need to make sure is clicked on – you can have two calendars appear at the same time).

 

 

Posted in Uncategorized.

Comments Off on Linking LibStaffer to Office 365 calendar

By Laura Surtees – February 2, 2018