The Carey Library has been recently redesigned with comfortable seating, functional work spaces, bright lighting, and fun colors.
On June 8th, the James B. Carey Library at School of Management and Labor Relations (SMLR) hosted librarians from the Martin P. Catherwood Library of the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations (ILR). As part of a “Liaison Exchange Travel Award” program, Suzanne Cohen, collection development librarian, and Aliqae Geraci, ILR research librarian, were given the opportunity to visit liaison universities in order to connect with and learn from institutions with similar programs and public mission. The program focused on liaison roles in the areas of collection development, reference, instruction, outreach services, scholarly communication, and assessment.
The agenda for the day consisted of a tour of the Labor Education Center on the Cook Campus, followed by lengthy discussions covering Carey Library projects, the structure of the Rutgers University Libraries, and information about the library’s collection development, reference, and instruction services. Meetings were arranged to provide more insight on Carey Library outreach services with SMLR’s director of undergraduate & master’s programs in labor education and employment relations, with SMLR’s career management specialist, and with the director of assessment, research, and writing support from Rutgers University. These key positions were selected in order to showcase the Carey Library’s involvement in student and faculty success, career services, and the writing centers.
Suzanne summarized the Cornell visit stating that “We were excited to visit the James B. Carey Library, which has many parallels to the Martin P. Catherwood Library at Cornell University’s ILR School. Both libraries serve the academic missions of schools studying and teaching management and labor relations; both have faculty, staff, and students distributed across multiple locations; and both have public missions, serving labor relations and human resource management professionals, working people, employers and government agencies of their states. We came away from our visit with a lot of great ideas related to library spaces, services, and potential partnerships with other school/library departments. One of the most important outcomes was developing a stronger relationship with Julie. As there are fewer librarians specializing in the subject areas served by our libraries, it is more important than ever that we create a network of ILR information professionals. It was a great day!”
Overall, the visit was a success. It not only built a stronger relationship between the James B. Carey Library and the Catherwood Library, but opened the lines of communication between the two libraries and sparked many new ideas for future collaboration. A standing invitation to visit Ithaca was offered, which I will gladly take advantage of.
