Meeting with Library IT support (Continue from July 9, 2009)

After meeting with Bob, I met with with Jason the Library's IT support. His job is to help anyone who has computer issues and fixes the computer's hardware and software. Ever since he was young he was always interested in Computer Science especially because his Uncle was involved with creating the standard protocol for the Internet. In the future he hope to be more involved in information security to protect personal information from identity theft and the protection of computers from viruses. He also is involved with staff training and during August and September he orientates new medical students for IT. He's been working since he was 18 years old but has been working at the medical library for about a year and a half. Things that he enjoys about his job that it's less stressful than other jobs, less management involvement, more freedoms to get things done, and the way he can be apart of making technology easier to use. Things he hopes could be improved are the processes to managing all the machines, the operating systems, and the accessibility to information. the future goals that Jason has involves going back to school and doing something in science like Chem. or Biochem. Some things that have changed is how the staff's machines have upgraded. Their computers run faster, they're newer, and the way they can get work done more efficiently because now each staff member has two monitors. Overall Jason really enjoys being able to do something he loves.

Learning about Library Business (Continue from July 9, 2009)

After getting to know more about Charlie I met with Bob who with three main things for the library that are 1-The Budget 2-Security 3-Facility. The budget consist of making sure bills and employees are paid as well as enough money for other programs like the Chili program. Also with the budget comes the responsibility to not go over, doing the pay roll, being involved and working with Betty to get work done, and the proper handling of the money that is coming in. For security Bob makes sure that proper policies are in place and that books and other important and valuable things have enough security to not be stolen. He does this by working with Yale police. With facility, this involves the construction or reconstruction of parts of the library, with includes a lot involvement with the constructors/builders. Bob's career experiences have been pretty interesting because first he wanted to be a running back for the Buffalo Bills but seeing that, that may not happen he then wanted to be a teacher or manager of a business. Later he worked as an insurance underwriter and lastly he started working at the medical library, where he got the motivation to work by his wife who already worked there. Other things that Bob works with are construction programs and grant programs. He says that his job involves a lot of Math and work with spreadsheets and would tell younger people that only if they have a strong interest and are strong in each one, that they should have and work to be in a business field. A memorable experience that he has was during his work time in AETNA and insurance company where he got to travel and teach a lot of his co-workers. Some future goals that he has that is a great one for his personal life and that is very important to him is to be a great Dad, to his two sons, and husband.

My Third Day (July 9, 2009)

Today I got the chance to interview and find out more about Charlie Greenberg, himself. He coordinates a group of specialist like Jan, Judy, Holly, Denise, Lei, etc., so that they can accomplish their goals or missions. He also is the grand coordinator and manages the Chili project as well as for intern supervision. Charlie also works in Liaison for the surgery and emergency medicine. He also manages all the medical students theses so that anyone in the world can be able to see them. In the past he also worked for 10 years managing the information desk and then passed it on for others to work there too. Not only has he been apart of the Chili program but he also has worked in a program called Librarians without borders and with the Medical Library Association and is a supporter of Global Health that involves statistics. Overall he has been working as a librarian for 28 years, 4 of them supervising and managing the Chili program. Charlie enjoys the constant interaction, educational role, and the new resources that the library offers. He also enjoys traveling for conferences and as a matter of fact his first airplane flight was during on of the conferences. Some memorable experiences that he has were teaching in a foreign country for 2 weeks in Armenia where you can find out more about at http://ysmuvisit.blogspot.com/. Another experience he enjoyed was when about 5 years ago he listened to a lechers at the historical library where a man talked about the future of genetics. Things that he feels have changed during his time at the medical library are how his department has become a closer working team, how the importance of social networking has allowed more ways of communicating among his co-workers, and how now there is a network of library leaders to talk with and consult about different issues and concerns. In the future he hope to be either an associate of Libraries or a Bully Pulpit at YALE. He also can see himself writing for personal and scholar use.

Meeting Instructional Design

Today I met with Lei, the instructional designer for the library. As a designer he manages audio engineering, screen capturing programs, setting up tutorials online, producing videos for classes online, and teaches others how to connect to the Internet and to the programs he manages online. To do the videos as classes he works with Jan who gives him the script, all the writing part of the class, so that Lei can record it and put as a video online. He enjoys his job because he makes resources more available online, he can serve as a consultant for questions about the library or online sources, he's getting to do something he likes, he can express his creativity, and by the script that Jan gives him he can learn in the process of creating the video. You can actually see a video at http://www.med.yale.edu/library/education/guides/screencasts/finditfast/finditfast_1/ or by going to the Yale medical library website and go to Guides and Tutorials and click on any video there. Things that he feels could improve is to be able to learn as fast as new technology comes out and easier technology could be created that would allow for him to do his job in a shorter amount of time. For example, right now it takes Lei about 45 days to get a whole session of video classes done. With easier technology he could hopefully get the whole session done in less time.

Meeting with Educational Services (Continue from July 8, 2009)

Today I met Jan who is an educational services librarian. She mainly organizes educational experiences that have to do with the library and teaches about the use of the library. Jan also does 3 hour classes to medical students to get resources for their theses. She has seen that her most busiest time of work is during June, July, and August because of summer programs and the process of new medical students coming to the library. Other programs she is involved in are mentoring new librarians, liaison program with psychology (children's mental health), clinical scholar (people who are physicians who do in depth research on health), and dentistry. She also does systematic reviews on literature for studies and works with the Personal Library Program with Judy to divide around 300-600 students among the reference librarians. Another program that she did that she really enjoyed was a Pilot Program. The director of the library, Kenny, rented her out for three years to where she helped kids to cope with domestic violence and other traumatic events. What she hopes to improve or hopes could be improved is for the improvement of the way younger kids and teens learn, more ways of learning and teaching on an online world, working with search engine producers to help organize the information for easier ways to search information, and that certain information and resources should be organized according to the different age groups. In other words look at the different age groups and adapt the resources to them, like for example younger people should be able to access more online or electronic resources.

Preservation Tour (Continue from July 8, 2009)

After meeting with Claudia Merson, I met with Sarah, who gave me a preservation tour. Her occupations deals with preserving and exhibiting historical items, like books. She works with two other students from Yale, trioging over 140 thousand books. In other words working to fix historical books, from the 13th century to the 19th century, that might have gotten damaged either during travel/transport or aging, by the ones who are the most damage to ones that can last longer without being fixed. Some of the books she has and tries to preserve were made with materials that over time have become deteriorated, like for example books with paper made of wood pulp have deteriorated more than paper made with cotton. Sarah really enjoys her job because she's doing a lot of hands on work and also being a part of preserving historical items and some of the world's finest items in the world, so that others in the future can see and learn about the history of medicine and of science. During the tour I also learned some fun fact like the first paper was made of cotton, then later with wood pulp and also with animal skins, like calves. I also learned that it wasn't until the 1950s or 1960s that women were allowed to come to Yale to work and get an education.

July 8, 2009 (My Second Day)

My second day began with a walk to Claudia Merson's office. Claudia is the director of partnership between Yale University and public schools. She works with school principles, administrators from Yale, and librarians (because they have a lot of information on different topics) to set up different activities for students to expand their knowledge beyond the education they learn in school. She has a partnership with Hill Regional Career High School and COOP where she's been apart of for 10 years and has set up programs like SCHOLAR, tutoring programs, and many other programs, in hope of letting students experience and learn more educational things. Claudia really enjoys her occupation and says "It's the best job in the world" because she loves being able and being a part of giving more opportunities for students and extending and enriching the public school curriculum. What she is most excited about is the SCHOLAR program that is now reaching its 11th year. She loves how this program allows high school students be able to experience how their lives might be during their college years. What I found most interesting about Claudia was that she had first majored in the college of NYU in a theater major and later in Georgia State as an English major and Linguist minor. What also was interesting was that when she was young she wanted to be an actress and she says that when she retires she wants to be a world famous cartoonist.