Randi-Marie Gonsalves

SLO 4 states that we must meet the information needs of all users and communities. We cannot limit our selves, our collections, the information that we provide to a limited public. We must be inclusive of all people and all communities. These artifacts will demonstrate two ways that we can do just that. 

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This was another favorite SLO of mine to work on as it opened the doors up to the community  outside of the library. Often, we think of a library's community involvement strictly with bookmobiles or classes for the public. The assignments above, a website created for a fictitious medical library for my LIS 610 class, and a LibGuide on service dogs for my LIS 620 class, were really rewarding both in creating them as well as seeing the possibilities for future ways a library could be involved in their community. 

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The website created for the medical library was a really fun exercise, not only in having to have the ability to create a website (remember I was now embracing technology and trying to become well versed in all the resources that I could) but also in looking into the inner workings of a special library. My experiences were in a school library and this delving into a special library was very exciting for me. I never knew special libraries existed before my MLIS experiences and now I was going to help in creating a website where doctors, nurses, patients, and even the general public could go for information and resources.

 

While this was done around a fictitious special library, the research done to find out what would be useful to include in a website for a medical library was real. We retreated many medical libraries and their websites to see what was deemed as valuable enough to be included. It was a learning experience in both the search that we performed but also in the viewing of these websites in comparison to traditional library websites. They were similar in many instances such as with classes offered, where additional information could be found, points of contact, lib guides, databases of materials, archives. It seemed the only real differences between the medical library websites and the traditional library websites was that of the information accessed in each. 

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The purpose of the website was to help the community accessing the medical library gain knowledge into things they were researching such as diseases and illnesses, textbooks and other medical materials, doctors and other medical staff available, etc. Medical websites such as ours turn out to be a valuable tool that people can access even in the after hours. They don't always have to make an appointment to see a doctor or visit the physical library to gain access to needed materials. The website made for easier and more convenient access for the public and the medical staff of the hospital the library was affiliated with.

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For the next artifact that I included, the LibGuide on Service Dogs for my LIS 620 class, I really see this as something that could benefit the community, especially the military community that I live in. Fort Bragg sees many deployments of its soldiers every year and every year, soldiers come back in need of a service dog. This LibGuide acts as a one-stop shop for locating information on service dogs, from which dogs are considered service dogs, to the training needed to become certified as a service dog/ service dog trainer, books and other literature on service dogs, and organizations that are recognized as service dog trainers and breeders. This was an extensive project to incorporate information for soldiers who might need service dogs, but in completing this assignment, I found that service dogs were used in many other areas and for many other individuals other than military members.

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Often, the disabled or elderly are left out of the members of a community whose needs should be met. This LibGuide includes these distinct members of the community, and others as well, in putting out information that might typically not be seen as a need to others. Included in the LibGuide is information about the traditional service dog as well as a list of other newer service dogs such as companions for the elderly, dogs for timid children to read to, companion dogs for people who don't do well in social areas, dogs that are able to sniff when a diabetic has low insulin, and the like. So this LibGuide goes beyond the traditional service dog and introduces the user to a whole new breed of service dog. 

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Libraries need to include every member of the community, and give a voice to those often looked over in the community. Material and information should be accessible to all members of the community and it was my intent to include the looked over members of the community in this project. A library should exist for ALL members of its community, otherwise it is not a true public municipality.