Pupil use of a school intranet's library pages

The purpose of this paper is to investigate pupil use of a newly‐created section of a school intranet established to promote greater interest in the organisation's library.

In October 2006, data collected over a two‐week period via Microsoft SharePoint, the software which supports the intranet, were examined in order to explore overall levels of use of the library pages, differences in interest between girls and boys, variations in use among youngsters in the particular year groups and the extent to which use changed over time.

Although an equal number of girls and boys visited the library pages, the former recorded more hits. Use was greatest among Year Eleven females but few youngsters of either gender or any age returned to the library section on a day subsequent to their initial visit. Interest fell away rapidly within days of the principal phase of data collection commencing.

The data employed were limited to the usage figures provided by the SharePoint log. Future research should, if possible, address whether the new intranet section has led to greater use of the actual library.

To ensure that consultation of library pages is sustained over a prolonged period, much needs to be done to tie their content into wider school activities.

This is the first paper devoted to pupil use of a section of a school intranet specifically developed to publicise the organisation's library, and it will interest both academics studying young people's information behaviour and school librarians considering ways of promoting their libraries.