Stephen Town served as Director of Information at the University of York from 2007 to 2015. During his tenure, he oversaw numerous strategic projects that modernized the university's information systems and services. This included expanding digital collections, upgrading technology infrastructure, and renovating library spaces. Student and faculty satisfaction with the university's libraries and IT services increased substantially over this period. An external consultant noted that the Directorate's excellence and achievements served as a model for other universities. Town helped guide the transition to more digital information services while maintaining the highest quality resources and user support.

1. Valedictory
Stephen Town
Director of Information
University of York

2. WHAT WERE THINGS LIKE?

3. 1975-2015: forty years of employment
Pre-professional
• Industrial research
• Service industry
• University Libraries
– Cambridge
– Leeds
– Salford
Professional
• NHS
• Cranfield
• York
• Bristol, Sheffield, Oxford, Pompeu
Fabra (Barcelona),

4. Enduring paradoxes
• Change and continuity
• Documental and digital communication
• Devices, dependency and freedom
• People and technology networks
• Optimism and doom-mongering

5. First major IT project (1980)

6. The communications revolution?

7. The end of coherence: 1984-
… or the beginning
Lynne Brindley (The wired campus)
• A ubiquitous and capacious network
• Comprehensive data and information
• Transformed teaching & learning

8. 90’s technologies …

9. The quality revolution 1994-
• TQM
• Benchmarking
• Statistics
• User surveys
• Information literacy

10. 2000s: E-Learning transformation?
• E-learning
• Distance learning
• Blended learning
• Pedagogy
• Instructional
design
• Multimedia
– Development
– Design

11. 2007: New world?

12. 2007: Farewell to Arms?

13. 2007: York Ranking
• Sunday Times UK Ranking: 8th
• THE/QS World Ranking: 74th

14. 2007: Heslington East Planning Approved

15. 2007: New Departments

16. 2007: University Website

17. 2007: Library & Archives Website

18. 2007: Computing Service Website

19. 2007: University Library building

20. 2007: University Library building

21. 2007: IT Classrooms

22. WHAT WAS THE OFFER?

23. TWA: The new Director visits
Visit of Stephen Town, the new Director of the
Library & Archives
“Last week Stephen Town visited us for a day
and a half. He had intended to come on Monday
and spend three days with us, but, having lost
his car in the floods at Shrivenham, he did not
arrive until Tuesday lunchtime. He managed to
meet and speak to almost everyone who was in
the Library and Borthwick that afternoon…”
Elizabeth [Heaps]

24. TWA: From the same edition
Summer visit of the Vice Chancellor, Deputy Vice
Chancellor and Registrar
“The Vice Chancellor paid his annual Summer visit
to the Library & Archives…along with the incoming
Deputy Vice Chancellor, Trevor Sheldon, and the
Registrar, Sally Neocosmos. This year, at very short
notice, we were asked to share our meeting with
the Computing Service, and given just an hour and
a half between us, which rather constrained what
we could do and limited our ability to include any
other staff. We decided on a joint theme of
information services for the world class university,
which Information Strategy Group is working on…

25. TWA: From the same edition
...overall we felt it was a reasonably successful
visit. I think the Vice Chancellor will wish to
continue having a joint meeting of Library &
Archives and Computing Service. While it makes
it more difficult for either service to showcase
what we are developing, it has the advantage of
demonstrating to the VC, DVC and Registrar how
we are working together, and might even help
us to forge closer links.”
Elizabeth [Heaps]

26. TWA: From the same edition
Electronic diaries
Planning Group members and the Office Team
have just started piloting the use of Sun
Calendar for diaries. This allows people, if given
the appropriate permissions, to view other
people's diaries to see when they are available
for meetings, and also to book/change delete
diary commitments.

27. TWA: First “From the Director”
From the Director
“Thank you to everyone for making me so welcome this week. I look forward
to getting to know you all better in due course. I have started to amend some
of the text on the Library & Archives web site to recognise my arrival, and I
would be pleased to have any comments on the changes as I would like
everyone to be comfortable with how we present ourselves.
I had a helpful induction meeting with the Vice Chancellor on Wednesday,
and he stressed what a good time this was to join the University given the
various new developments in progress. I will want to listen to any ideas you
have for how we respond to these opportunities, although I recognise that
much thought has already been given to this by many of you.
On Thursday and Friday this week I will be attending a Symposium in
Edinburgh on 'Sustaining the Digital Library'. I hope this will provide some
useful thoughts to add to the various projects we are undertaking in this
area.”
Stephen (jst504)

28. Vision from interviews
• “Competitive”
• “Engaging”
• “Integrating”
• “Fitting”
• Competing on quality not
size
• In leading sector groups
• A sector leading digital
library
• Information literacy
• Archives exploitation
• Unique space
• Staff demonstrating their
class in the wider world

29. Information Strategy Vision 2008
“The overall aim of the information systems and
services in the University of York is to create an
information environment that supports,
facilitates and enhances the teaching, research,
business and community activities of a world
class University.”

30. WHAT HAPPENED?

31. Strategy

32. Systems

33. Content

34. IT Infrastructure

35. Spaces

36. Spaces

37. Funding and Grants

38. Awards and recognition

39. Information Directorate SMT: 2011
Deputy Director
of Information
(IT Services)
Deputy Director
of Information
(Information
Services)
Director
of
Information
Assistant Director
(Infrastructure)
Assistant Director
(Systems)
Assistant Director
(Services)
Assistant Director
(Content)
Assistant Director
(Borthwick)

40. Information Directorate SMT: 2015

41. WHAT HAS BEEN ACHIEVED?

42. Strategic projects
• 286 projects (and counting) on our 2013-2018
Information Strategy list
• Over 220 projects completed as part of 2008-
2013 Information Strategy

43. Library study places

44. Workstations

45. Printed books

46. E-book purchases

47. Archives and manuscripts

48. Departmental Library NSS 2009-15
Green: 90%+
Yellow: 80-90%
Red: Below 80%
2009 2015
Archaeology 71 93
Biochemistry (UBIOCHE) 80 90
Biology (UBIOBIO) 83 92
Chemistry 87 93
Computer Science 88 97
Economics & Related Studies 81 92
Education 75 92
Electronics 95 91
English & Related Literature 72 92
Environment (UENVENV) 83 95
Health Sciences (UHEANUR) 95 91
History 72 88
History of Art 78 86
HYMS 86 94
Language & Linguistic Science 79 85
Mathematics 85 89
Music 71 88
PEP 79 95
Philosophy 83 90
Physics 91 90
Politics 71 90
Psychology 79 80
Social Policy 79 97
Social Work 100 55
Sociology 78 92
Theatre, Film & Television (Drama) - 92
York Law School - 90
York Management School 88 94

49. Departmental IT NSS 2009-15
Green: 90%+
Yellow: 80-90%
Red: Below 80%
2009 2015
Archaeology 93 96
Biochemistry (UBIOCHE) 96 100
Biology (UBIOBIO) 93 98
Chemistry 96 98
Computer Science 93 95
Economics & Related Studies 95 92
Education 88 84
Electronics 98 97
English & Related Literature 87 95
Environment (UENVENV) 86 97
Health Sciences (UHEANUR) 91 92
History 86 93
History of Art 89
HYMS 97
Language & Linguistic Science 92 96
Mathematics 91 96
Music 89 90
PEP 96
Philosophy 94 92
Physics 95 96
Politics 91 92
Psychology 89 95
Social Policy 100 97
Social Work 90
Sociology 91 95
Theatre, Film & Television (Drama) 88 81
York Law School 97
York Management School 97

50. York NSS: 2009-2015
IT: Blue
Library: Pink
Overall University: Green

51. CLP Consultant’s View
“… embedded excellence marks this Directorate
out from other parts of the University, and from
other Universities, and this achievement is
unusual. The University has much to learn from
what has been done here, and it provides what
should be a model …”

52. WHAT HAVE WE LEARNT?

53. Suggestions for the future
• Find out what people want and deliver it
• Work together
• Don’t wait for permission
• Read, write and share broadly

54. WHAT’S NEXT?

55. Choices?

56. THANK YOU!