2017 ULS Candidate for Member-at-Large: Nancy Garmer
Nancy Garmer is one of three candidates this year for ULS Member-at-Large. She is the Acting Assistant Dean of User Experience and Learning at Florida Institute of Technology. Read this interview to learn more about Nancy and what her goals would be if elected as Member-at-Large.
Tell us more about yourself and how you became an academic librarian.
I worked in the Brevard County Public Library system for ten years before accepting a job at Florida Institute of Technology as the head of Public Services. User experience and adult services are my areas of expertise and my transition to the academic environment has been transformative in terms of the expansiveness of user experience opportunities at this STEM research university.
How long have you been involved in ULS and what attracted you to the section?
When I joined ACRL two years ago, I was looking for a way to reach out to the professional academic librarian community. I gathered, correctly, that the listserv and committees would provide a dynamic exchange of information to help shape my understanding of academic libraries and fuel my growth as an academic librarian.
In your opinion, what are some of the most interesting topics or trends we are seeing in university libraries?
The Library’s role in student success is a pressing one. I currently sit on two subcommittees to support Library involvement in meeting student needs and enhancing retention and graduation rates. I also believe the pursuit of Open Access as a new model for scholarly publishing and OER are trends that will drive the future of libraries.
What goals for the section would you have if elected to this position? How do you envision committees and members helping the section achieve those goals?
I would like to see ULS embrace sustainability issues as an integral goal of university librarianship. Social responsibility, civic engagement and outreach to international students are all necessary components of a growing, global community of which the Library plays a central role. I think these goals should be central to the ULS Committee on the Future of University Libraries.
Where do you see ULS going in the future? How does it need to change and evolve to stay relevant to academic librarians?
Libraries inherently change and evolve and I think relevancy is no longer an issue. As professionals, librarians are continuously embracing new frameworks, strategies, technologies and spaces to support evolving learning models and digital scholarship. The members of ULS, the largest section of ACRL, will carry ULS into the future.
Tell us something interesting about yourself that not very many people know.
I was a caretaker for properties on an island in the Caribbean for a year and in the North Atlantic for two years before moving to Melbourne, Florida. I then served as an AmeriCorps volunteer for a year which provided the impetus and stipend for my MLIS. Thank you for considering me!
Read our interviews with the other candidates for ULS Member-at-Large, Bruce Henson: http://www.acrl.ala.org/ULS/2017-uls-candidate-for-member-at-large-bruce-henson/ and Ryan Litsey: http://www.acrl.ala.org/ULS/2017-uls-candidate-for-member-at-large-ryan-litsey/
