Loughborough University
Department of Information Science

Loughborough University has once again for the fourth year running been awarded the top place in the Time Higher Education Student Experience Survey.

Loughborough is one of the country's leading universities, with an international reputation for excellence in teaching and research, strong links with industry and unrivalled sporting achievement.

It is a member of the esteemed 1994 Group - a set of internationally recognised, research intensive universities - and has a reputation for the relevance of its work. Its degree programmes are highly regarded by professional institutions and businesses, and its graduates are consistently targeted by the UK's top recruiters.

Loughborough is also the UK's premier university for sport. It has perhaps the best integrated sports development environment in the world and is home to some of the country's leading coaches, sports scientists and support staff. It also has the country's largest concentration of world-class training facilities across a wide range of sports.

The Department of Information Science

The Department of Information Science is an active and highly regarded Department, which, since its creation in 1972, has established a national and international reputation in its field. The Department is equipped with teaching and office space as well as laboratories for computer-based research and teaching.

There are currently 19 academic staff in the Department, of whom three are Professors, and one is a Reader. A number of external professors, lecturers and contract research staff play a full part in research and teaching activities in the Department. A team of support staff and laboratory assistants complete the Department's staff complement.

The Department provides programmes for an intake of approximately 110 undergraduate students each year and 40 postgraduate students. In addition, about 50 students are currently undertaking full or part-time PhD research in the Department

The Department contributes to many areas of research in information science and 85% if its research was rated as of international standard in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise. Research interests range from the use of Web 2.0 technologies and effective use of e-mail through to scholarly publishing models, social networking analysis, to legal and economic issues related to the digital library. Research funding has been attracted from a variety of bodies, both national and international.

LISU is a national research and information centre and is part of the Department, LISU is involved in many aspects of its work. The Department has a strong research culture and attaches considerable importance to the use of computer facilities to support its teaching and research in all fields, and is committed to the ongoing development of appropriate resources.

December 2009

LIRG is a special interest group of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professions that promotes the value of information research and links research with practice awarded Hartmut Schwamm, a student on the Information and Library Management programme 2007-8, the 2009 Library and Information Research Group (LIRG) postgraduate prize for his dissertation "An evaluation of marketing orientation in European national libraries.' This innovative work was supervised by Dr. Derek Stephens. The Department are delighted with Hartmut's award which completes a hat-trick for the Department in winning this prize for the third time in a row; Hartmut's success follows that of Jo Bryant in 2006-7 with 'An ethnographic study of user behaviour in Open3 at the Pilkington Library, Loughborough University', this work was supervised by Professor Graham Matthews and Dr Graham Walton and in 2005-6  Catherine Parkinson studied  "Website accessibility statements: a comparative investigation of local government and high street sector" supervised by Wendy Olphert.

Three postgraduate programmes are on offer :

• MSc/PG Dip in Information and Knowledge Management.
• MA/MSc/PG Dip in Information and Library Management.
• MSc/PG Dip in Information Management and Business Technology.

The Entry Requirements

Academic: a good honours degree or equivalent If you are an international student, the University provides more specific information for some countries.

Information Management and Business Technology - degree should be in a relevant subject, e.g. information science, computer science, information technology or a business-related subject.

Work experience

Information and Library Management - ideally one year's work experience working in a library / information-service jobs. The length of LIS experience is negotiable. If you are not sure if your experience is acceptable, please contact us at dis@lboro.ac.uk.

English: if you are not a native English speaker, you will have to provide evidence of your English language competence. All applicants are required to have either:

• a minimum IELTS of 6.5, with a score of 6.5 in listening and 7.0 in writing
  or a minimum TOEFL score of 600 (paper-based)/250 (computer-based) with a TWE score of 4.5.
  
• Alternatively, applicants with a minimum IELTS score of 6.0 or TOEFL 570/230 may be admitted to a 10 week pre-sessional English language course.
  Applicants who obtain an IELTS of 6.5 but NOT a score of 6.5 in listening and 7.0 in writing may be admitted to a 5 week pre-sessional course.

If you are interested in any of the Postgraduate Programmes on offer in the Department of Information Science please do not hesitate to get in touch with us.
Postgraduate Admissions Team:

Email:dis@lboro.ac.uk
Tel: +44 (0)1509 223052