UBC Library is introducing a new pilot program that expands service for knowledge synthesis consultation and collaboration, now available to UBC researchers on both UBC’s Vancouver and Okanagan campuses.

While the library has supported researchers involved in systematic, scoping and other knowledge synthesis review projects for decades, the demand for expert consultation services in a variety of disciplines rose steadily in recent years. Librarians on both campuses saw the opportunity to provide a more comprehensive solution.

“We want to elevate the quality of these research projects that are being done on campus because we know that when a librarian is involved, the search quality and the research methods are better,” says Ursula Ellis, Reference Librarian at Woodward Library.

“Historically, it’s more common for health sciences to do systematic reviews. But slowly, it’s becoming more popular in other disciplines as well,” says Jane Jun, Southern Medical Program Librarian at UBC Okanagan Library, adding that she has seen requests from fields like forestry, ecology, social work and education.

Learn more about the two tiers of support available and the value of librarian consultation. 

UBC Library Article

For general inquiries about the Knowledge Synthesis Service, please contact library.ksst@ubc.ca.

UBC Okanagan Library is excited to have acquired a new series of books to their collection: Kingdom Guardians: The Silver Key, Kingdom Guardians: Shadows of Demons, and Elijah and Sabrina. One thing that makes this acquisition so unique is that the Kingdom Guardians series is written by UBC Okanagan student Philip Patrick.  

Kingdom Guardians includes books one and two as well as a prequel to the series. Click on the titles below to learn more about the story and how you can borrow a copy.

• Kingdom Guardians: The Silver Key (Book 1)
• Kingdom Guardians: Shadows of Demons (Book 2)
• Elijah and Sabrina (Prequel)

About the author: Philip Patrick

Philip Patrick is from northern BC and grew up in Burns Lake. An avid writer for almost twenty years, Phil is in the Bachelor of Fine Arts program at UBC Okanagan where he gets to explore other artistic mediums, like painting, digital media, sculpting, and photography. Being a visual artist as well as a writer, it’s impressive to note that Phil also designed the covers of the first two Kingdom Guardian books.  

Author and UBCO Student Philip Patrick standing with Library Service Assistant Karin Haug who is holding the Kingdom Guardians book series.

Philip Patrick describes his series as adventurous and imaginative. “It is the classic good versus evil concept but with strong storytelling and character-based narratives that match modern epic superhero tales. The series centres around teenagers without romanticizing the dominance of youth, and without being sexualized. I wrote it for everyone to read.” 

Phil hopes that his books reflect the movies and tv shows that he grew up watching where the ordinary meets the extraordinary and that have strong themes of imagination and friendship.  

When asked how it feels to have his books available through the UBC Okanagan Library, Phil says it feels great to have a part of his legacy at UBCO. Phil is hoping to write book three of the series next. 

This acquisition was organized by Indigenous Initiatives Librarian Christian Isbister. When asked about the acquisition, Christian spoke to the importance of building a collection that both reflects and supports the brilliant students on our campus. He’s absolutely thrilled to be able to see Phil’s books on the library’s shelves and can’t wait to read them himself. 

May is Asian Heritage Month and to celebrate UBC Okanagan Library is showcasing books written by people of Asian origin. Reading is a great way to learn more about Asian communities, experiences, and stories. Check out one of the books from the display on the main floor of the library until May 30, or click on one of the titles below to learn how to borrow a copy.

The double life of Benson Yu : a novel by Kevin Chong	Where the jasmine blooms : a novel by Zeina Sleiman.
A history of burning : a novel by Janika Oza	The covenant of water by Abraham Verghese
Afterland : poems by Mai Der Vang	Dandelion by Jamie Chai Yun Liew
Good talk : a memoir in conversations by Mira Jacob	We measure the earth with our bodies by Tsering Yangzom Lama

American dervish : a novel by Ayad Akhtar

Travels in Manchuria and Mongolia : a feminist poet from Japan encounters prewar China by Yosano Akiko

The weight of our sky by Hanna Alkaf

The boat people by Sharon Bala

Beauty plus pity by Kevin Chong

Mural by Mahmoud Darwish

A river dies of thirst : journals by Mahmoud Darwish

The forest of enchantments by Chitra Lekha Banerjee Divakaruni

The garden of evening mists : a novel by Tan Twan Eng

The daughter who walked away by Kimia Eslah

The Syrian Ladies Benevolent Society by Christine Estima

Dim Sum Palace by X. Fang

River of smoke by Amitav Ghosh

Sea of poppies by Amitav Ghosh

Exit west : a novel by Mohsin Hamid

Me by Tomoyuki Hoshino

The kite runner by Khaled Hosseini

A thousand splendid suns by Khaled Hosseini

Indigenous Pacific Islander eco-literatures edited by Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner, Leora Kava, and Craig Santos Perez

Babu fictions : alienation in contemporary Indian English novels by Tabish Khair

Salt fish girl : a novel by Larissa Lai

Drawn together written by Minh Lê ; illustrated by Dan Santat

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

The conjoined : a novel by Jen Sookfong Lee

Free food for millionaires by Min Jin Lee

Farewell, my concubine by Helen Hok-Sze Leung

Dandelion by Jamie Chai Yun Liew

A very large expanse of sea by Tahereh Mafi

Kafka on the shore by Haruki Murakami 

Hotline : a novel by Dimitri Nasrallah

The refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen

The sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

Race & resistance : literature & politics in Asian America by Viet Thanh Nguyen

Revenge : eleven dark tales by Yoko Ogawa 

Anil’s ghost by Michael Ondaatje

The book of form and emptiness by Ruth Ozeki

A single shard by Linda Sue Park

Aurat durbar : writings by women of South Asian origin edited by Fauzia Rafiq

The god of small things by Arundhati Roy

Orientalism by Edward W. Said

Evening is the whole day by Preeta Samarasan

Story-wallah! : a celebration of South Asian fiction edited by Shyam Selvadurai

Honor by Elif Shafak

God loves hair by Vivek Shraya

Latitudes of longing : a novel by Shubhangi Swarup

They called us enemy written by George Takei, Justin Eisinger, Steven Scott ; art by Harmony Becker

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan

Em by Kim Thúy

Suki’s kimono by written by Chieri Uegaki

Afterland : poems by Mai Der Vang

American born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

A woman in the crossfire : diaries of the Syrian revolution by Samar Yazbek

Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

The Moose Hide Campaign is a grassroots movement co-founded by Raven Lacerte and her father Paul Lacerte to engage all Canadians, especially men and boys, in ending violence towards Indigenous women, girls, and Two-Spirit People. This year, Moose Hide Campaign Day is on May 15.  

Moose Hide Campaign at UBC Okanagan: May 15  

Livestream May 15 | 8:30 to 11 am in ART 114  

Join Indigenous Programs and Services, the Sexual Violence Prevention & Response Office, the Centre for Teaching and Learning, and the UBCO Library on May 15 for a livestream of the 2025 general plenary and learn how we can all work together to end gender-based violence in Canada.  

The plenary will feature keynote speakers Elaine Alec and Michael Kaufman, as well as messages from the co-founders Raven and Paul Lacerte. 

There will be coffee and refreshments available. No registration necessary.    

Moose Hide Campaign Day Livestream

Other events on campus:

• May 12 and 14: Stop by the Sawchuk Family Theatre from 10 am to 1 pm to learn more about the Moose Hide Campaign, pick up your Moose Hide pin, and make a pledge to end colonial and gender-based violence.
• May 13: Attend an information session from 11:30 am to 12:30 pm in LIB 111 to learn more about the Moose Hide Campaign.  

To find out more about the Moose Hide Campaign Day and livestream schedule, click on the link below.

Moose hide campaign Day events

Moose Hide Campaign Day Book List

Featured books written by the keynote speakers from this year as well as 2023 and 2024 are included below. Click on the link to borrow them from the UBC Okanagan Library.  

Books by 2025 Keynote speaker: Elaine Alec  

Calling My Spirit Back by Elaine Alec   

Other books by Elain Alec
Coming of Age: On order 

Learn about Elaine Alec 

Books by 2025 Keynote speaker: Michael Kaufman 

The time has come: why men must join the Gender Equality Revolution by Michael Kaufman 

Other books by Michael Kaufman:
Cracking the armour: power, pain and the lives of men by Michael Kaufman 

Beyond Patriarchy: essays by men on pleasure, power and changes edited by Michael Kaufman 

Theorizing Masculinities edited by Harry Brod and Michael Kaufman 

The possibility of dreaming on a night without stars a novel by Michael Kaufman   

Learn about Michael Kaufman

Books by 2024 Keynote speaker: Marie Wilson 

North of Nowhere: Song of a Truth and Reconciliation Commissioner by Marie Wilson 

Books by 2023 Keynote speaker: Brandi Morin

Our Voice of Fire: A Memoir of a Warrior Rising by Brandi Morin  

My name is Nemo Xu and I’m a first-year student in the dual master’s program at the iSchool. In September 2024, I started my position as the UBC Okanagan Academic Operations & Services: Student Digital Records Manager, remotely from UBC Vancouver. Back then, I had just moved to Vancouver to start my program. While I was very excited to take on my first records management project, I was mildly terrified because—what is a record?!

My work entailed implementing the Digital Readiness Project for the Continuing and Professional Education (CPE) unit at UBC Okanagan. CPE is a rather new unit that partners with UBC Okanagan faculties and schools to offer non-credit courses and programs. Because CPE is still in a “start-up” phase, we took a forward-looking approach to build a sound records management foundation. CPE performs a combination of functions similar to faculty and enrollment services; its operation is often collaborative, working with various faculty/school partners to develop and deliver courses. The complexity of the project unfolds in three areas: CPE’s dynamic relationships with partnering units, the challenge in gauging recordkeeping and workflow problems, and the involvement of different online systems and tools.

Since CPE isn’t currently concerned with an overwhelming shared drive, the assessment of recordkeeping practices took place in the unit’s MS Teams files. I conducted analysis on the inventory by classifying the records based on the university retention schedules. Moreover, I held weekly meetings and workshops with CPE to gain more insight into the processes and activities that support the unit’s functions. As a result, we identified two sites that map to different stages of records: one being the active, collaborative workspace (Teams, SharePoint) for records creation, and the other being semi-active storage space (shared drive) for recordkeeping. Mirroring the records lifecycle, a sequential relationship exists between the two spaces: records move from collaborative space to storage space as they transition from an active to a semi-active stage.

From this analysis I developed a tailored file plan that blends function and provenance with an internal block that captures the unit’s administrative functions and a collaborating block that accommodates its unique operational functions. The collaborating block is a modular design with flexibility for expansion as the unit grows its partners and course and credential inventory over time. The file plan further guides the development of a security matrix, naming conventions, and governance policy. The project received positive feedback from CPE and the team is excited to implement these governance documents and tools.

This project has been a learning journey for me. Working across two campuses, I learned records management in practice and developed an understanding of the university’s administrative context. Navigating different systems within the institution could be confusing at times, but my supervisors, Paige Hohmann and Barbara Towell, provided great support and mentorship throughout the process. I’m constantly inspired by their expertise, knowledge, and patience. The journey of designing records management solutions involved a lot of active listening and collaboration; the lovely team from CPE made this a rewarding and empowering experience. Thanks to everyone for their support!

You might have noticed a new addition to the Library space. Located on the left side of the Service Desk on the main floor of the library and near the entrance to the Commons building, you’ll find the UBC Okanagan Seed Library!  

Our Seed Library is a free program where you can select unique seeds for free to grow at home. When your plant goes to seed, you are invited to return some of the seeds to the seed library. You can also access workshops and opportunities to learn about growing and caring for plants, including transplanting, harvesting, and seed saving. 

SEE THE UBC SEED LIBRARY info GUIDE

Interactions with nature, no matter how small, can help boost our wellbeing. And growing a small amount of your own food can build health and confidence! 

The Seed Library operates on the honour system and members are encouraged to learn about seed saving and return high quality, open pollinated, clean seeds at the end of the growing season to help keep the Seed Library stocked. Please take only what you need for the current growing season, with a maximum of six seeds per type, and no more than 75 seeds in total for any given year. 

For non-expert seed savers, we recommend starting with beans, lettuce, peas, or tomato seeds. You can learn more about seed saving through the available guides, workshops, and books. If you are unable to save your own seeds, please consider donating a packet or two of commercially grown, open pollinated seeds at the end of the season. 

To become a member, fill out and submit a membership form to the Service Desk at the UBC Okanagan Library. You can find these forms at the Seed Library and can complete it while selecting your seeds.  

Once you are a member, here are the instructions:  

• Choose a seed pack and put 2-3 seeds in a take-home envelope.  
• Copy the growing information from the seed pack onto your take-home envelope. 
• Write your name and seed info on the sign-out form and bring the form to the Service Desk. 
• Let your plant go to seed and bring some of the seeds back to the seed library!

Questions? Contact: libquestions.ok@ubc.ca

Coming soon: we will have a donation form if you want to donate unused seed packs from last season.  

The idea for this book list came to us from Tendai, who is studying Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Social Justice with a Minor in Theatre at UBC. The books on this list have been compiled by Tendai and staff and faculty at UBC Okanagan Library.

About the booklist:
“African and Diasporic mythos have long been taught to be ‘demonic’ (for lack of a better word). There has been an uptick in African mythos (primarily West African) in fantasy spaces, which I find to be an amazing way of not only teaching people about these mythologies and traditions but also normalizing them.”
– Tendai, Bachelor of Arts student at UBC

Tendai’s Top 3 books on the list

Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko

Quotation from Raybearer:
“Only one thing is more powerful than a wish, and that is a purpose.”
― Jordan Ifueko

Why you should read it: 

“Raybearer, with its incredibly diverse cast of characters and personalities is a book that is going to stay with me forever. The world and magic are so beautifully described and carefully thought out that it completely immerses you in the story and keeps you emotionally invested in the characters.”
― Tendai, Bachelor of Arts student at UBC

Borrow Raybearer

Skin of the Sea by Natasha Bowen

Quotation from Skin of the Sea:
“Listen to me. I know you will make things right. What is done is done. We cannot change the past, only learn from it. What happens next is up to you.”
― Natasha Bowen

Why you should read it: 

“Anyone who knows me knows that I am obsessed with mermaids. In a sea of The Little Mermaid retellings, Skin of the Sea stands apart with its inspiration from West African mythos and unique storyline providing a new perspective of the enslaved African people thrown off slavers’ ships.”
― Tendai, Bachelor of Arts student at UBC

Borrow Skin of the Sea

The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter

Quotation from The Rage of Dragons:
“He told himself he could stop when he could no longer make the next step. He also told himself he could always make at least the next step.”
― Evan Winter

“I’ve found that most fantasy novels inspired by African mythos are rooted in West African traditions, and The Rage of Dragons was a treat to my Zambian heart. South African inspired, this fantastical revenge story is full of attention-gripping action and succeeds at being a wholly heart-wrenching and distinctive story in the fantasy genre.”
― Tendai, Bachelor of Arts student at UBC

Borrow The Rage of Dragons

African and Diasporic Fantasy Booklist

Click on the links to see how you can borrow the books below from UBCO Library. 

Fiction

A Song of Wraiths and Ruin by Roseanne A. Brown

Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor

Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor

Akata Woman by Nnedi Okorafor

An unkindness of ghosts by Rivers Solomon

Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

Blood Scion by Deborah Falaye

Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi

Children of Virture and Vengeance by Tomi Adeyemi

Crowned: Magical Folk and Fairy Tales from the Diaspora by Kahran Bethencourt and Regis Bethencourt

Forged by Blood by Ehigbor Okosun

Goddess Crown by Gabi Burton

It Waits in the Forest by Sarah Dess

Kindred : a graphic novel adaptation by Damian Duffy and John Jennings

*see other Octavia Butler titles in the Available Online section

Lilith’s brood by Octavia E. Butler. (originally Xenogenesis Trilogy: Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago)

Misoso : once upon a time tales from Africa retold by Verna Aardema; illustrated by Reynold Ruffins.

Nelson Mandela’s favorite African folktales. 

Raybearer: A Novel by Jordan Ifeuko

Skin of the Sea by Natasha Bowen

Son of the Storm by Suyi Davies Okunbowa

The House of Rust : a novel by Khadija Abdalla Bajaber

The Mermaid of Black Conch by Monique Roffey

The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter

The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor

Non-Fiction

At the crossroads of culture and literature edited by Suchorita Chattopadhyay, Debashree Dattaray

Blackening Canada : diaspora, race, multiculturalism by Paul Barrett

Conscripts of migration : neoliberal globalization, nationalism, and the literature of new African diasporas by Christopher Ian Foster

Contemporary speculative fiction edited by M. Keith Booker

Humor in the Caribbean literary canon by Sam Vásquez

Witches, goddesses, and angry spirits : the politics of spiritual liberation in African diaspora women’s fiction by Maha Marouan

Available online :

African American adolescent female heroes : the twenty-first-century young adult neo-slave narrative by Melanie A. Marotta

African migration and the novel : exploring race, civil war, and environmental destruction by Jack Taylor

African migrations : traversing hybrid landscapes edited by Sarali Gintsburg and Ruth Breeze

Afro-Centered Futurisms in Our Speculative Fiction edited by Eugen Bacon

Alchemies of blood and Afro-diasporic fiction : race, kinship, and the passion for ontology by Nicole Simek

Coloniality and migrancy in African diasporic literatures by Peter Moopi and Rodwell Makombe

Fantasy and myth in the Anthropocene : imagining futures and dreaming hope in literature and media edited by Marek Oziewicz, Brian Attebery and Tereza Dedinová

Futurism and the African imagination : literature and other arts edited by Dike Okoro

Kindred by Octavia E. Butler

Madness in Black Women’s Diasporic Fictions: Aesthetics of Resistance (Gender and Cultural Studies in Africa and the Diaspora) edited by Caroline A. Brown, Johanna X. K. Garvey.

Millennial style : the politics of experiment in contemporary African diasporic culture by Aliyyah I. Abdur-Rahman

Mumbo jumbo by Ishmael Reed

Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the sower by a graphic novel adaptation by Damian Duffy and John Jennings 

Recovering black storytelling in qualitative research : endarkened storywork by S.R. Toliver.

Routledge handbook of the new African diasporic literature edited by Lokangaka Losambe and Tanure Ojaide

Spatialities of speculative fiction : re-mapping possibilities, philosophies, and territorialities by Gwilym Lucas Eades

Speculative & science fiction by guest editors Louisa Uchum Egbunike, Chimalum Nwankwo.

Speculative fiction as a rehearsal for decolonization by Liahnna Stanley, Jenna N. Hanchey

Teaching Black speculative fiction : equity, justice, and antiracism edited by KaaVonia Hinton and editor Karen Chandler

The things that fly in the night : female vampires in literature of the Circum-Caribbean and African diaspora by Giselle Liza Anatol

Uneven futures : strategies for community survival from speculative fiction edited by Ida Yoshinaga, Sean Guynes, and Gerry Canavan

Example titles available to order from Vancouver:

Changing bodies in the fiction of Octavia Butler : slaves, aliens, and vampires by Gregory Jerome Hampton

Migrating the Black body : the African diaspora and visual culture edited by Leigh Raiford and Heike Raphael-Hernandez

Black Panther by Scott Bukatman

Afrofuturisms : ecology, humanity, and francophone cultural expressions by Isaac Vincent Joslin

Janelle Monáe’s queer afrofuturism : defying every label by Dan Hassler-Forest

Afrofuturism rising : the literary prehistory of a movement by Isiah Lavender III

What are records and why do we need to manage them?  

As a public institution UBC has specific policy-driven responsibilities to manage its records effectively and appropriately. Regardless of format, a record is any document that captures a business transaction. When you write an email, order materials for your unit, write a guideline, or propose a new project for the department, you are generating, using, and storing UBC records. UBC needs to keep these records for future reference or action in a variety of contexts; for instance, if a unit needs to show that they paid for office supplies, a purchase order or receipt could be used as documentation.  

How long should records be kept? 

Depending on their type, records need to be kept for various lengths of time. Many records fall into the following broad categories: 

Transitory: Important temporarily, kept only for as long as they are important. 

Operational: Important for years to satisfy administrative, government, audit, or legal commitments and kept long enough to act as appropriate support to operational decisions. 

Archival: Important to the history of the institution and kept permanently at the Okanagan University Archives.  

Very few records are kept permanently. All records are kept for a length determined by UBC’s Retention and Disposition Schedules (RDS).  

Mandated by Board of Governor’s Policy GA4, in 2022, professionals from the  UBCV Records Management Office and the UBCO Records Management Program created the UBC Records Retention Schedules to guide units on how long they should keep records and what to do with them after they reach the end of their retention. These schedules have been reviewed and approved by the UBC Office of University Counsel. 

Where can records be kept? 

The UBC Okanagan Records Management Program is associated with the Campus Archives, and forms part of the UBC Okanagan Library.  

Paper records can present space management and security challenges, and we are here to help! To inquire about storing your records, please contact Graeme Clarke, Library Services Assistant—Records Management: graeme.clarke@ubc.ca. 

Following the creation of an account, records can be scheduled for pick up and placed in managed storage in our secure vault shared with UBC Okanagan Special Collections and Archives, located in the Commons building.  

Who’s responsible for disposition?  

According to Section 2.5 of the BoG Policy GA4, “responsibility for Records Management rests with the Vice‐Presidents and administrative heads of unit.” Regardless of retention length or final disposition action, the head of the unit that created the record has responsibility for the destruction or archiving of the record.  

The UBC Okanagan Records Management Program can provide services at the conclusion of the records lifecycle. When records are placed into storage with us, we can notify you when records reach their scheduled retention period and can oversee the disposition of these boxes of records. With your approval, we can organize the deletion of electronic records and schedule the destruction of physical records via a secure third-party destruction company. In the latter case, we would observe the records being destroyed on your behalf. We can also organize the transition of records to archival custody for permanent retention.  

What else can Records Management help with?  

Digital Readiness Projects 

The Records Management team at UBC Okanagan can assess and provide advice on improvements to the management of electronic records in departmental shared drives, as well as installations of OneDrive, SharePoint, and MS Teams.  

Using the UBC Records Retention Schedule to inform a functional folder structure, this process can result in the development of customized documentation that supports clear naming conventions, filing and disposition rules, and established security profiles.  

Community of Practice 

If you are involved in recordkeeping as part of your position or are generally interested in records management topics, consider this an invitation to join our Records Management Community of Practice! The RMCoP is hosted via a dedicated MS Teams channel. It provides a space to discuss recordkeeping challenges and successes on the UBCO campus. We host regular meetings throughout the year and keep everyone up to date via an internal newsletter.

For more information on how to join our Community of Practice, please email Graeme Clarke at: graeme.clarke@ubc.ca. We look forward to welcoming you! 

Advocacy, projects, and policy development 

UBC Okanagan Library participates in the Records Management Steering Committee, which designs and monitors recordkeeping strategy at the University level. As well, the UBCO Records Management Program participates in the Retention Automation Working Group (RAWG), scoped “to develop, operationalize and automate records retention policies for UBC’s systems and applications.”

UBCO Records Management Services

Get to know the human side of virtual reference at UBC Library. Donna Langille, Open Education Librarian and AskAway coordinator at UBCO Library, is one of the three library professionals featured in this article. 

Read the article

UBC Okanagan Librarians Donna Langille and Christian Isbister are featured along with Erik Beardmore, Programming Associate at Kelowna Museums in the latest episode of the “Stories of Partnership” podcast series by the Community Engagement Network.

In the podcast they share the challenges of maintaining momentum in community partnerships and the creative solutions they found to keep their projects thriving. From organizing live podcast recordings to overcoming funding limitations, Erik and Donna emphasize the importance of flexibility, trust, and communication in their work.

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