iSchool Chat Report: Health Sciences

The last Chat of the fall semester was held on November 10 at the iSchool. This Chat was devoted to Health Sciences/Medical fields and was represented by three extremely experienced and dynamic Chatters. They were MJ Tooey, Associate VP Academic Affairs; Exective Director, HS/HSL Library, UMD, Baltimore; Janice Kelly, Executive Director, National Network of Libraries of Medicine/AtlanticRegion, also from the HS/HSL Library at UMD, Baltimore; and Joyce Backus, Acting Head, Collection Access Section, Deputy Chief Public Services Section at the National Library of Medicine. Heavy hitters all and we were grateful that they took time out of their schedules to come and talk to the students.
 
The Chat was terrific.  The Chatters each described their evolving careers, MJ and Joyce had several different positions at the same place while Janice was at a different location and typeof institution every few years.  They were enthusiastic and passionate about what they do and may have converted some students into thinking about healthsciences libraries.  There is no course at the iSchool on these libraries so this was an eye opening experience for the 15 or so students who attended, and prospects are apparently better also for jobs in healthscience libraries.  Because of the Chatters wide and broad experiences, the students could see all the different kinds of opportunities, not just a hospital librarian, but outreach, and all the informatics issues that have arisen with medical records, large data sets etc. To my question about whether they had interns, MJ Tooey said she would try and develop a program to bring them in.
 
Thanks go to Kat Cook, who stepped in on behalf of the SLA Student Group to set up and introduce the speakers. The two co-chairs of the group, Jamie Peacock and Kate Lanahan had classes scheduled at the same time, and were unable to attend - although Kate did come in briefly.

In photo: (L to R) Janice Kelly, Joyce Backus, MJ Tooey

--Judy Tapiero

Comments

[Paula Raimondo]

Wanted to let everyone know that the Health Sciences/Human Services Library of the U. of Maryland has instituted an internship program for library school students. Also, the iSchool may be offering a health sciences class for the Fall 2010 semester.
For additional information please contact me.
Paula Raimondo
Head, Liaison and Outreach Dept
HS/HSL
University of Maryland, Baltimore
praimond@hshsl.umaryland.edu