LIBRARY BUILDING RENOVATIONS – CRUCIAL COLLABORATIONS

This paper shares how important cross-sectional collaboration is to ensuring the successful planning of academic library buildings and facilities. The focus is on the nature of collaboration with internal stakeholders in the various stages of the process. It highlights the purpose of the collaboration in and at each stage, lists the relevant stakeholders and their roles, highlights the challenges and ultimately concludes with the benefits of the collaboration. The specific relationships and agreements with internal stakeholders such as library staff, students, academics, Information and Communication Technology, Procurement and University Estates are presented. The paper briefly refers to collaboration with external stakeholders (architects, other librarians, the project manager and vendors). The nature of the collaboration during the initial research phase, consultation, establishment of requirements, compilation of specifications, determination of costs, compiling of proposal, presentation and motivation are discussed. The paper is based on a practical project, but refers to valuable research which informed the planning, contracts, tender process, procurement, relocation process, etc. Attention is given to technology requirements in an Open Distance e-Learning Library. Although the focus is on the comprehensive renovation project of the libraries at the University of South Africa, the information is relevant for residential institutions that plan to renovate their online teaching and learning environments. Unisa is a comprehensive higher education institution that offers an extensive selection of courses that range from first degrees to diplomas, certificates, postgraduate degrees and professional qualifications. Unisa offers Open Distance e-Learning to students in South Africa and abroad, and enrols over 350 000 students which positions Unisa as one of the world’s 10 mega universities. Within the scope of its strategies to improve throughput and retention, to enhance service levels to students and to establish Unisa as the leading provider of ODeL teaching and learning, the University saw the benefits of investing in the renovations of the Muckleneuk and Florida Campus libraries