New Librarian: Meet Tom Harrod

If you’ve been checking your email recently, you know that the School of Public Health has a new librarian, Tom Harrod.

Formerly the librarian for the Biology and Cell Biology/Molecular Genetics, Tom is adding the departments within the School of Public Health to his repertoire. He is available to help you with a myriad of taks, including reference questions, information about library research, Web page design for faculty, and other questions.

For starters, Tom has created a School of Public Health Library Resources Web page and a Master Journal List, which the Healthy Turtle encourages you to visit.

To learn more about Tom, the Healthy Turtle talked with him about his job and how he can help students and faculty learn more.

The Healthy Turtle: What does your job look like on a day-to-day basis?

Tom Harrod: My day to day duties tend to be varied - which is one of the really enjoyable aspects of this job. There are three main categories of activities that we as librarians engage in:

• Librarianship: This is what you would most associate with librarians - buying books, answering reference questions, etc--but it also entails things like doing library instruction and creating Web-based resources for departments or specific courses.
• Service: This entails serving on library-wide, campus-wide, and professional committees and groups.
• Scholarship: Librarians have faculty status and so we perform research and must present that research in posters, talks, and papers, just like other faculty.
  

A standard day begins with checking my email so that I can respond to any library-related requests that come my way--I am very punctual with emails from students and faculty--and beyond that, there is no typical day for me.

HT: What questions can undergrads come to you with? Grad students? Faculty?

Harrod: Any of these groups can come to me with any information related question they might have. I think a lot of times people are hesitant to ask me a question because they think they might be wasting my time or perhaps they feel confident that they are able to meet their information needs without assistance, but I think the old adage is true that "people don't know what they don't know." I can't tell you how many times I've had undergrads, grad students, and faculty tell me "I never knew the library offered that!"

Additionally, I think people may be thinking of librarians in too limited a sense--we are here to help address any information needs. I would urge people to feel free to ask me about our services and resources--it never hurts to ask and you might be surprised by what we offer!

HT: What are some of the things that the library offers that most students don't know about?

That is an excellent question--in fact, I think that is one of the biggest challenges facing subject librarians. We offer much more than just access to books and journals! The libraries offer a lot of resources such as citation management software, article databases, etc. that people just are not aware of--it is a significant part of my job to overcome that lack of awareness.

However, the one thing that the libraries offer that is probably the most under-utilized resource is the librarians themselves. Sorry for the blatant cliche--but seriously, we are here to help you find information, do library instruction, create web-based resources to support classrooms and labs and assist with all information needs, so please take advantage!

----

For all your library and information needs, email Tom at tharrod@umd.edu or visit the SPH site here.