Cambridge University Libraries course timetable

A course to take you through conference poster design, with tips and resources to help with the content and presentation in order to ensure you communicate your research effectively. The course will cover where to source good quality, free graphics, how to include references in your poster, and advice about how best to present it at a conference. The session will NOT involve hands-on creation of a poster.

UPDATE: Please note that this session is taking place remotely, not in the Medical Library as previously advertised. Please do not go to the Medical Library training room. You will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.

This session will introduce participants to different methods of communicating research before moving on to a discussion around best practice and techniques when preparing a presentation. Participants will be introduced to concepts around good design, accessibility, data presentation, and accessing Creative Commons licensed materials for their work.

The session will conclude with an exploration of good delivery techniques with additional advice on what to do if it all goes wrong.

A course designed to take you step-by-step through academic writing and publication, with tips and resources to make writing up as simple as possible. The course will demystify the peer-review process, and help you to improve the precision and clarity of your academic writing.

Please note: This session will be offered, either online or in person, in Michaelmas, Lent and Easter terms.

Congratulations – you’ve published your research! But what are you going to do now? Although it might be tempting to move onto the next project you need to ensure that people are able to find, read and use your outputs. Not only can this help to increase the readership of your output but it can enhance your reputation and lead to more opportunities.

This session will guide you through the decisions you need to make to create a promotional strategy that works for you. We will look at how to build a successful online profile, where to (legally) share your work and where to spend time creating a targeted output.

Learn how to build a personalised promotional strategy and book your place now.

Drop in for a chat with a member of the Biological Sciences Libraries Team:

We can help you with lots of things including:

• referencing
• getting to grips with critical reading
• understanding your recommended reading
• finding books and digital content
• successfully executing a literature search
• and much more!

If we can't answer your question in the session, we'll take your details and investigate it further for you!

Publishing journal articles is a key element of a successful research career. As you are starting on this journey, you may have a lot of questions, for example:

• Where and how should I publish my research?
• How do I maximise the number of readers and citations?
• How should I respond to reviewers?

Please note: This session will be offered, either online or in person, in Michaelmas, Lent and Easter terms.

Conference posters are a simple, visual, and effective way of sharing your research. They may be presented at academic or professional conferences, Departmental events, or educational events for the general public. A well-designed poster allows you to communicate information about your work in a concise and appealing manner, and engage with colleagues, peers and others in a conversational setting.

Creating a conference poster is a balancing act between including enough detail to effectively describe your work, and keeping it visually attractive and minimal enough that people can understand at least the main points at a glance.

This session will help you create effective conference posters and introduce key design principles.

Finished your PhD thesis? It’s time to submit.

Unsure of your access level options? Confused about any third-party copyright in your thesis? Then this session is for you.

The final step after completing your thesis is to deposit an electronic copy into the University’s Repository, Apollo. This training session will cover how to ensure you meet all the requirements for submission, how to decide on the access level for your thesis and finally a demonstration of successfully depositing your work using Symplectic Elements.

Please note: This session will be offered, either online or in person, in Michaelmas, Lent and Easter terms.

This session discusses the benefits and challenges of maintaining an online presence as a researcher. Part of two sessions on this topic, this second session looks at using social media as a researcher. We will look at the practicalities and pros and cons of online engagement through tools such as Twitter, Mastodon, YouTube and LinkedIn.

Participants should expect to have the opportunity to critically evaluate the various options presented in this session with the overall aim of being better informed when deciding where to invest their time and efforts when building an academic presence online.

From fair dealing to sharing your research online it seems that nothing with copyright is ever simple. There are few simple rules about copyright but there can be serious consequences for getting things wrong! This session will cover the basics of UK copyright law and how these impact researchers such as dealing with third party materials, seeking permissions and how to manage risk.

Please note: This session will be offered, either online or in person, in Michaelmas, Lent and Easter terms.

A course specifically for NHS staff. Attendees will learn how to search databases accessed with an Athens login (such as Medline, Embase and Cinahl) effectively and efficiently, to learn how to save searches and references, and to create and maintain a bibliography.

All attendees are required to have an NHS Athens login. University of Cambridge staff and students wanting to learn similar material should book onto the Introduction to Literature Searching (for University) course instead.

UPDATE: Please note that some Medical Library sessions are taught in person, and some are taught online. Please ensure you check the venue details before booking a place. If it is an online session you will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.

Drop in for a chat with a member of the Biological Sciences Libraries Team:

We can help you with lots of things including:

• referencing
• getting to grips with critical reading
• understanding your recommended reading
• finding books and digital content
• successfully executing a literature search
• and much more!

If we can't answer your question in the session, we'll take your details and investigate it further for you!

An introductory session showcasing how to manage your references using Zotero.

UPDATE: Please note that this session is taking place remotely, not in the Medical Library as previously advertised. Please do not go to the Medical Library training room. You will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.

Conducting research is an important part of the university experience.

It provides students with practical skills needed to learn how to search using complex databases, critically appraise sources and evaluate materials.

We are running a BoB and TRILT for Academic Research online training session aimed at academics, students, librarians and researchers.

Box of Broadcasts (BoB) is Learning on Screen’s on demand TV and radio service for education. The academically-focused system allows staff and students, to record programmes from over 75 free-to-air channels; and search the archive of over 2.2 million broadcasts.

Box of Broadcasts (BoB) is currently used by over 120 universities and colleges to enhance teaching and learning. Features include:

• A platform working across desktop, iOS and Android devices
• Media records based on our TRILT metadata, supporting powerful searching capabilities
• A permanent archive of content from nine channels: BBC1 London / BBC2 / BBC4 / ITV London / Channel 4 / More4 / Channel 5 / BBC Radio 4 / BBC Radio 4 Extra
• Preview clips before saving
• Label your own clips
• Personalised email alerts when programmes are ready to view
• Detailed citation data

An introductory session showcasing how to manage your references using EndNote desktop and EndNote online.

UPDATE: Please note that this session is taking place remotely, not in the Medical Library as previously advertised. Please do not go to the Medical Library training room. You will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.

Once you have shared your research you need to know about what type of impact it’s having. How many people are reading it (or not) and what does this tell us about our future plans? And should we just rely on numbers anyway? (spoiler alert: nope!).

This session offers an introduction to modern metrics as one element of a wider system to measure success. Learn about traditional metrics, newer methods such as Altmetrics and why there is more to impact than just numbers. We will also discuss the move towards the responsible use of metrics and how research active staff at any level can get involved.

Learn about which measures really matter and book your place now.

This course will help you understand how to critically evaluate medical research articles, with a particular emphasis on evaluating the reliability, trustworthiness, and applicability of an article in informing evidence-based practice and decision-making in a healthcare context.

We will send you the article in advance, and it is a prerequisite that you read it before attending the session, and bring a copy with you to class.

UPDATE: Please note that some Medical Library sessions are taught in person, and some are taught online. Please ensure you check the venue details before booking a place. If it is an online session you will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.

This course will help you understand how to undertake a risk of bias assessment of a systematic review, assessing its reliability, trustworthiness, and applicability. The session uses the ROBIS tool to assess a preselected published systematic review.

We ask that you read a paper that will be provided before you attend the session, in order for us to make the best use of the time together.

UPDATE: Please note that some Medical Library sessions are taught in person, and some are taught online. Please ensure you check the venue details before booking a place. If it is an online session you will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.

A course to take you through conference poster design, with tips and resources to help with the content and presentation in order to ensure you communicate your research effectively. The course will cover where to source good quality, free graphics, how to include references in your poster, and advice about how best to present it at a conference. The session will NOT involve hands-on creation of a poster.

UPDATE: Please note that this session is taking place remotely, not in the Medical Library as previously advertised. Please do not go to the Medical Library training room. You will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.

Before undertaking any piece of primary research it’s important to be aware of as much of the existing literature as possible. A systematic literature review can also be a research end in itself. And it’s not something to be taken lightly. But how can you be sure you’re being as rigorous as necessary? How can you manage the references you find, document the process, and also know when to stop searching?

This session assumes attendees have already had prior introductory training in literature searching. It is a prerequisite that you have attended either Introduction to Literature Searching (if you are a University of Cambridge staff member or student) or Getting the Best Results - Improving Your Database Searching (if you are an NHS staff member). Exceptions will be made if you received similar training from another department or university - please contact us if you have any questions about prerequisites.

UPDATE: Please note that this session is taking place remotely, not in the Medical Library as previously advertised. Please do not go to the Medical Library training room. You will be contacted by the training team with information about how to join the session remotely.

Please note: this session may be recorded. By signing up for the session, you register your consent for recording to take place. Please email librarytraining@medschl.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions about this.