RGU Library
Workshops and Appointments
The library offers a comprehensive programme of workshops throughout the academic year to help support your studies, covering topics such as academic searching, Harvard referencing and RefWorks. We can also support you on a 1-1 or small group basis.
Academic success is more than just mastering your field of study. Developing key library-related skills will enhance your academic pursuits, research and lifelong learning. We support this through workshops, drop-ins, individual and small group appointments. These take place online (via MS Teams) or in-person, at the library.
We would like to encourage students to sign-up to our workshops, as they are great for learning something new, upskilling, or having a refresher.
Questions? You can get in touch at library.support@rgu.ac.uk.
Timetable and Bookings
Ready to boost your library skills? Explore our timetable to find a session.
Events' days and times vary each week! So, if you can’t make it this week, explore future weeks for more suitable sessions.
Booking a session is easy – just click on it and fill in the registration form.
Workshops
Using library tools, developing effective search strategies to retrieve relevant academic literature, prioritising sources of information, and referencing correctly. It’s all included in our workshops! Our sessions are designed to empower you with essential skills needed for elevating academic success.
Explore our timetable to book a session!
You need to find literature to inform your writing. But where do you begin? What sources of information are most credible? How can you trust any of it?
If you feel lost about where to begin your research this session is for you!
This class includes:
- prioritising sources of information when conducting research
- differentiating academic and non-academic sources
- evaluating information sources
- spotting untrustworthy sources of information
RGU Library supplies access to millions of materials (books, e-books, journals, and more). LibrarySearch is our information discovery tool, and the first point of contact with our vast collection.
Join this short session to get to grips with how to use LibrarySearch to enhance your literature search and support your academic journey.
Literature searching is much more than a Google search! So, it's important to be aware of the academic searching tools available to you, and how to make the most of them.
This class includes:
- using key discovery tools
- developing effective search strategies to find relevant resources
- keeping up to date with latest information
- retrieving full text documents
Need help with referencing? Referencing is a vital part of academic writing but it’s not immediately intuitive. We will practice citing and referencing, answer your questions, and set you up with a range of tools to make referencing easy and accurate.
This is a hands-on practical session that builds upon the guidance provided in our new Harvard Referencing Learning Pathway.
During this session you will have the opportunity to:
- work individually or in groups to construct references an identify common mistakes
- discuss some of the most common referencing challenges
- ask questions about tricky references you have encountered (bring your examples!)
Please note that this is not a lecture on the principles of referencing. Before attending, please make sure to complete the Harvard Referencing Learning Pathway and familiarise yourself with the Harvard Referencing Templates.
How do you keep track of all the literature?
RefWorks is a citation manager that allows you to store reference data and generate reference lists in a chosen style (including RGU Harvard). This can be a huge timesaver for your research!
Join us for this practical masterclass where we will show how to use RefWorks! We will cover basic and advanced features and show you how to generate a reference list (using RGU Harvard referencing style).
Appointments
Our workshops and online guidance provide a good introduction to upskilling your academic skills. Still, you may need more tailored support, or have complex questions covering more advanced topics. We can meet with you individually or as a small group appointment.
How we can help
We are here to support your academic skills including literature searching, databases, search techniques, referencing and more. We will:
- Clarify aspects of referencing that you're finding difficult. However, we can't check an entire reference list at an appointment, carry out a full proofreading service, or write references for you. If you require feedback on some of your references, please submit them using our feedback request form only. Please make sure you have read the terms of service on the form before submitting your request.
- Support you to use RefWorks. If you’re a beginner looking for RefWorks training, we recommend you sign-up to a workshop instead.
- Advise on your search strategy, guide you towards searching more effectively and offer suggestions on where to search. We don't carry out searches on your behalf or create search strategies for you.
Drop-In Sessions
Do you have a quick question? You can spend up to 15 minutes with a librarian by attending one of our drop-in sessions! Look out for details of drop-in sessions appearing soon.
You can ask us anything Library related (references, research skills, RefWorks). Our Study Skills colleagues will also be available for support with academic writing.
If your query is more complex, it’s best to book a 45-minute appointment instead.