RML Staff Attend MLA
Several New England Region staff attended the Annual Medical Library Association Conference in Dallas, TX on May 15-22, 2002.
Donna Berman, Javier Crespo, Mark Goldstein and Debbie Sibley attended a half day class on working in the exhibit booth at conferences. We traveled to Dallas to be taught by Mime Goldberg, a consultant who lives in Massachusetts! Mime class was lively and informative; we picked up lots of pointers for booth seat as well as how we should prepare and work in the booth.
On Friday, the annual RML Directors meeting was held. This day long session gives the staff from all eight regional medical libraries an opportunity to interact with each other and to hear the news and activities from National Library of Medicine staff. Donna, Javier, Mark, Debbie and Elaine Martin attended this all day session. Highlights of the day included updates from Betsy Humphrey and Angela Ruffin of NLM and a discussion on evaluation of outreach projects led by Cathy Burrows of the Pacific Northwest Region. We also participated in smaller group meetings with our counterparts.
Before the conference began on Sunday, Donna Berryman and Mark Goldstein attended CE courses. Donna chose "Molecular Biology and Genetics for Librarians" taught by Michelle Tenant, PhD in Molecular Biology. Donna reports that it was an excellent class in which the instructor knew the material but was able to make this very complex subject understandable for people who don't have a background in molecular biology. Mark attended the class "Library Website Architecture and Design". He reports that it was a very helpful and instructive class.
Staff members were seen everywhere during the conference. Elaine Martin, RML Director participated in a panel discussion on mentoring, sponsored by the Leadership and Management Section of MLA. She was later elected to serve as the section's chair for the coming year. On Wednesday, Elaine coordinated and chaired the post-MLA symposium "Leadership Reconsidered : Developing a Strategic Agenda for Leadership in Health Sciences Libraries."
Debbie Sibley attended the day-long Chapter Council meeting on Saturday and assisted at the Chapter Sharing Roundtables luncheon on Sunday, facilitating one of the PDA discussion tables. She also attended the Membership Committee meeting as the Chapter Council Liaison to the committee. Debbie was a participant in the post-MLA symposium "Leadership Reconsidered".
In another story, the NLM Update, given by Donald Lindberg, Director of NLM is summarized.
Meetings and lectures were taped and are available for borrowing from the NER office. The program highlights and schedule can be found at http://www.mlanet.org/am/am2002/. Please request program tapes by contacting Rebecca Chlapowski at Rebecca.chlapowski@umassmed.edu or Debbie Sibley at Deborah.sibley@umassmed.edu.
MLA 2003 will be held in San Diego from May 2-7. We hope to see you there!
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