Poster Session I

This first poster session had a variety of posters and all authors were eager to share their knowledge with colleagues. I didn't have a chance to speak with all authors, but I did get to speak with a few of them and two topics stood out to me.

I spoke with Darra Ballance about her poster titled "For the mouths of babes: nutrition literacy outreach to a child care center." Most outreach that I've read about have dealt with clinics or faith based organizations and this one took a different take on who they reached out to. I loved that she and Dr. Webb worked with child care workers and gave them the tools they need to make healthy decisions about the food given to children at their center. Board books about nutrition were given to children to take home and iPads were given to the workers to use for a variety of things, including looking up nutritional information on appropriate websites such as MedlinePlus. This project is replicable and could be used with child care centers who work with underserved populations throughout the south.

The other poster that stood out to me was "Strategic marketing for university libraries" by Kim Mears and Renee Sharrock. Kim was very open to questions and shared information about how her library rebranded itself and started their marketing plan. I'm not sure how many libraries in our chapter have marketing plans, but always think we can do a better job of engaging users - especially since we get new users every year. Kim shared with me her thoughts on marketing and it's impact on library use, as well as what steps she thinks her library will take in the future. The University Libraries Marketing Committee also created a LibGuide that discusses their marketing plan and templates. This could be very helpful for all libraries, but has great information for libraries who which to start a marketing plan.