NNLM R4 Connections: First Meeting (September 2021)

Posted in: #CC/Academic List, #Health Interest List, #Health Sciences List, #Public/K-12 List, All Members

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Thank you to all that attended our first bi-monthly “NNLM R4 Connections.” It was a wonderful meeting where we, the NNLM R4 Team, had the opportunity to share with the region our plans as we move forward. The first presenters were our Communications Team, revealing methodology that will be utilized to communicate out to the region and methods to gather input. A multimodal approach was presented, covering emails, social media, etc…  

Dana Abbey, our Community Based Health Organizations (CBHO’s) Engagement Coordinator, talked about plans she has moving forward and activities she is planning with partners throughout the region. A Jam board (https://tinyurl.com/NNLMR4FirstFeedback) was shared to gather feedback from participants to learn more about other partners and methods that she could use to reach CBHO’s throughout the newly designed region. The same Jam board was utilized to gather information about preferable methods of communication. 

David Brown, our Public Health Organizations (PHO’s) Engagement Specialist, talked about programming that he was also planning, communication he has had with entities in our region, and was very open to learning more from participants about what other methods they recommend he use to reach our region, in particular the new states that we have. He created a Mentimeter, to gather more information about what he could do, and what participants thought he should do as the Engagement Specialist for PHO’s in the region. He will be analyzing the results and working to improve his work in this area taking into consideration the feedback that was gathered.  

George Strawley, our Libraries Engagement Specialist, presented his plans in this area. He also mentioned the awards that we currently have available encouraging participants to apply. (https://tinyurl.com/NNLMR4Awards). The same Jam Board used for both Communications and CBHO’s was used to collect more information for him to consider in his program areas. 

John Bramble, our Executive Director, presented to us his responsibilities and how he saw us moving forward as a team. He also talked a little about Catherine Soehner’s responsibility as the Principal Investigator of this project and the plans they had to help mentor the specialists and oversee the projects throughout the region.  

All Engagement Specialists were super excited about this meeting and the feedback that was gathered. They are looking into it to learn more about how they can improve and tweak programming in their areas to help increase programming within the region and compliment current programs.  

The meeting was recorded and is available at: https://youtu.be/IS-tQk9L81Q  

Stay tuned for our next “NNLM R4 Connections” meeting taking place November 11th 2021. See you then! 

Do not forget to join our listserv to learn more about activities in our region: https://tinyurl.com/NNLMR4-Listserv  

 

Yamila M. El-Khayat, MA serves as Communications and Citizen Science Specialist at NNLM (Network of the National Library of Medicine) Region 4. She has a passion for health information and working with all communities in particular traditionally marginalized communities. Yamila is a medical librarian at the University of Arizona. In working as a Librarian, she has been determined to increase health literacy to better serve the needs of the Latino and Native American populations, improving access to information related to the health of Native American, Hispanic, Border, Evidence-based, intercultural, bilingual and culturally appropriate. She has experience training information for clinicians, students, and community members, including health promoters/ “Promotores de Salud”.