Introducing the RLUK Digital Shift Forum #RLUKDSF

RLUK’s Digital Shift Forum brings together colleagues from across the information, research, cultural and heritage communities, and third and commercial sectors, to discuss the future of the digital shift in collections, services, and audiences. 

These monthly seminars include high-profile international speakers, from a wide variety of backgrounds and professions, who are at the forefront of current thinking around the digital shift. They provide time and space for wide-ranging, inter-disciplinary discussions regarding the future of the digital shift, and provide a springboard for cross-sector collaboration. The Digital Shift Forum is open to all, and you do not need to belong to an RLUK member institution to attend or participate.

The series aims to promote cross-sector discussion and debate, to enable knowledge exchange, and inspire collaborative endeavour across sectors and communities, for the benefit of RLUK members and the wider research and information management communities. 

Announcements

We will be announcing new Digital Shift Forum events soon. Please keep checking back on this page or follow #RLUKDSF.

Why are we convening this series?

In May 2020, RLUK launched its manifesto for the digital shift in research libraries. The manifesto provides a future vision for the digital shift occurring within research library collections, services, operations, and audience interactions. The manifesto explores what is required in terms of skills and leadership, stakeholder engagement, collections and scholarship, and library spaces to enable this digital shift to continue, diversity, and deepen.

The time is now

Since the launch of the manifesto, members of RLUK’s digital shift working group have worked to implement the manifesto’s delivery plan in light of the Covid-19 crisis. The coronavirus crisis has enabled information, research, cultural and heritage organisation to hold a mirror to their experiences of the digital shift in their collections, operations, services, and audience interactions. The experiences of RLUK member libraries have been presented in RLUK’s research report, Covid-19 and the digital shift in action (July 2020) and in a co-authored chapter ‘Covid-19 and the Future of the Digital Shift amongst Research Libraries: An RLUK Perspective in Context‘, New Review of Academic Librarianship (November 2021).

RLUKDSF mailing list

Sign up to the RLUKDSF mailing list to be kept informed about upcoming events.

RLUKDSF on demand

You can view recordings of previous RLUKDSF events at the link below.

OCTOBER 2023

Tiina Hill, Head of Delivery, LibraryOn at the British Library

Edward Jewell, President Elect, Libraries Connected

Digital Inclusion by Universal Design

Wednesday 4 October 2023, 14:00 – 15:30 (BST), 15:00 – 16:30 (CEST/SAST), 16:00 – 17:30 (EEST), 09:00 – 10:30 (EDT), 21:00 – 22:30 (AWST/CST)

This event will focus on Digital Inclusion by Universal Design with talks by Edward Jewell, President Elect of Libraries Connected and Tiina Hill, Head of Delivery, LibraryOn at the British Library. It will highlight broader digital inclusion challenges, and opportunities across both libraries and society which can inform and inspire the audience on how they can best support digital inclusion and provide a forum for wider discussion.

Tiina Hill is Head of Delivery of LibraryOn at the British Library and leads the development and delivery of a £3.4million ‘Single Digital Presence’ project, an innovative new online platform that will drive wider digital transformation of public libraries across UK and beyond. The project has a local, national and international impact, and it will invest £1.1m in local library websites to transform the reach and impact of public libraries across the UK.

Part of Tiina’s remit is also to provide a strategic contribution to development of British Library corporate strategy and strategic work with public libraries.

Ed Jewell is the Chief Librarian at Jersey Library and the President Elect for Libraries Connected. During the last nine years he has created a new model for Jersey’s public libraries that delivers services that are practical and relevant to the needs of the public.  Ed believes libraries should be engines for opportunity at the heart of their communities, enabling people to engage with and access learning, information, health & wellbeing, creativity and enterprise.

As President Elect for Libraries Connected, Ed is working with colleagues, national Government Departments and key funders across the British Isles to build the profile of and support for public libraries.