Thursday 22 May 2014

Luton: noise on Silent floor

I want to raise my concerns to the 'silent' area that you have on the second floor. I am trying to revise for my final year exam which is on Friday but I can't because it is so loud. Students do not follow the rule of not talking, and I am constantly surrounded by people on their phones and talking to their friends. It sounds like I am in the LRC downstairs. The librarians do not help because they are hardly in the library. I have been here since 9am and I have not seen one librarian. This is really not helping my revision and I would like to be able to come to university and know that I will be able to have a successful day of revision. Please can you do something about this.

Thank you for bringing your concerns to my attention. First of all I would like to apologise for the inconvenience caused by these problems.
Secondly I would like to be clear that we take care to ensure that important matters such as this are properly managed and dealt with. It is most appropriate to speak to staff about this so they could do something about this on the spot. Overnight this would mean asking security for support. Otherwise please raise your concerns with staff at the level 1 Customer Service desk

Levels 2 & 3 of the Luton LRC are silent floors. No amount of talking is acceptable. All  conversations are supposed to take place on the landing outside the lifts. When library staff are on duty please report noise problems directly to them. During staffed hours there are staff patrols approx every half hour and the area is electronically monitored for noise.

http://lrweb.beds.ac.uk/libraryservices/availableservices/study-env

Level 2 & 3  were made Silent Study areas at the request of the student body. Provision is made for group and social learning elsewhere in the LRC so there is an expectation for students to choose their preferred study environment and abide by the requirements of that space. This is harder to monitor overnight as the building is patrolled by security. Any student caught breaking the Silence requirement is allowed one verbal warning after that Library sanctions come into effect. Student behaviour was a key theme at the Student Union conference November 2013. This is a university concern which is being looked at by staff, students themselves and the Student Union. Action is taken towards anyone who disregards the silence requirement.