News: Director's Blog
Change!
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May 3, 2013 If you’ve been following the AHSL on Twitter or on Facebook or reading our email notifications or seen the signs on several floors or AHSC Memos or you have been up to the third floor this may be old news to you. As of today (May 3rd) we now have 42 new “study cubes” on the third floor. Twelve are in the south corners and were installed last month. The other thirty were installed yesterday and today at the west end and will soon have electric power available. Next week our 4th floor project should be completed so that the eight group study rooms and twenty-two study carrels will be available to you. In another week or two the scaffolding at the north and south ends of the third floor will be removed, making room for more study space. New water fountains with water bottle fillers have been installed on floors two through four. |
The Future of Libraries?
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Jan 3, 2013 Last summer and early fall the "Library of the Future Task Force" met to discuss roles and models for librarians and libraries on the future health sciences campus. Here is their final report. It's not long nor technical. I'd be interested in your reactions and comments. - Gary Freiburger, Director, Arizona Health Sciences Library
Final Report Library of the Future Task Force October 1, 2012 Member List Gary Freiburger-Chair-AHSL-Tucson Janis Burt-Physiology |
Changes coming to the Fourth Floor!
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Nov 27, 2012
The Fourth Floor By mid-February, if not sooner, the fourth floor of the library will take on a whole new look. Over fifty individual study cubicles will be installed in the area in front of the group study rooms. A large portion of the room will remain available for group events such as the interprofessional training sessions. Signs will be posted limiting the use of the floor to AHSC students only. Library staff will respond quickly to any concerns about noisy or inappropriate use of the space. Already the “purple” silent study room on the fourth floor has had card readers installed. Access is limited to AHSC students. We believe that these changes will create a better study environment for our students and we thank the College of Medicine for funding this project! |
Moving the library?
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Sep 4, 2012 Early planning is underway for a possible education building on the health sciences campus in Tucson (AHSC). Although only at the conceptual stage right now, the thinking is that this building could contain classrooms available to all of the AHSC colleges, thus encouraging interprofessional education. The building would probably also contain meeting rooms and would provide space for a variety of student services. A probable location would be in the parking lot between the current library and the Medical Research Building. Should the library move into this new building? |
Welcome (back)
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Aug 1, 2012 Welcome to our new students, residents and faculty and welcome back to those who are returning! A few changes have occurred over the summer. Our Phoenix library has moved into the new Health Sciences Educational Building. If you’re on the Phoenix campus be sure to stop by and see this beautiful new facility. The Tucson library entrance has changed. We now have a single point of entry with actual doors! Students have been asking for this in order to keep noise out of the library. In addition, our 20 year-old sliding gates that were used to close the library were worn out and barely useable. Finally, our library security system needed replacement and it was more economical to have a single set of doors than two. |
The Library of the Future?
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Jun 22, 2012 Some people think of summer as the “slow time.” But that never seems to be the case on an academic health sciences campus! It’s certainly not true for the members of the Library of the Future Task Force.
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Preserving Print
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Apr 24, 2012 What should the role of the library be in preserving print copies of journals, books and unpublished or “rare” materials? Different libraries at different institutions will give different answers for each of these kinds of printed information. I’d like to give you some background that we might use to make these judgments and present some of the questions we face. |
Our liaison model
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Mar 19, 2012 Libraries and the way librarians do their jobs are changing as rapidly as any unit on campus. Yes, researchers have access to better and different equipment each year, clinicians enjoy the benefits of new treatments and pharmaceuticals, and even our business managers have access to powerful new computer programs. However the very nature of our libraries is changing. The image of the library has historically been tied to the library building and the collection of printed books and journals. When people had to visit the building to consult the collection, there were many opportunities for librarians to help find information that might be buried in some obscure title. |
The end of journal subscriptions?
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Feb 20, 2012 There is a crisis in the world of scholarly journal publishing. The transition of most STM (scientific, technical, medical) journals from print to electronic format is resulting in a loss of revenue for most publications. With electronic subscriptions available, one subscription can serve an entire campus; there is no longer a need for individual departments to buy subscriptions. While many STM journals were filled with revenue-generating ads for lab equipment and pharmaceuticals, the digital world does not lend itself to advertising – at least not in serious academic journals and not to the degree that it was present in print. |
Do we need a library building?
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Jan 20, 2012 You may have heard that the Director of the Welch Medical Library at Johns Hopkins University announced in October that the library building would be closing in favor of study areas all across the campus and librarians “embedded” in the schools. However, some weeks later an announcement was issued stating that the decision is being temporarily rescinded until a large representative committee can study the plan and make recommendations. |
