Professional Skills for the Modern Student: How Librarians Developed and Taught a New Elective Course for Medical and Dental Students
Gauthier, Marissa F ; McIntyre, Rich Jr ; Shiel, Teri
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Abstract
In the Fall of 2017, a group of librarians at the UConn Health Sciences Library were exploring new instruction opportunities and decided to offer an elective on professional skills for first and second year medical and dental students. Our objectives were to become more involved with the Medical School’s curriculum, make more connections with students and faculty, and to represent the library and librarians in a new way. Our planning and ideas became “Marketing You,” a one-week, five-day course that taught students professional social media management strategies, how to write cover letters and resumes, how to design presentations and posters, and public speaking. Each session was two hours long and covered one professional topic with pre-class readings and media, in-class activities, discussion, and real-life examples. Students gave 10 minute presentations on the final day about what they learned over the week and what changes they made to their existing social media accounts, resumes, posters, or presentations. The course was taught in February-March 2018 and received great reviews and feedback from the six students who took the class. All students who took the post-class assessment rated it as being educationally beneficial, found the course content helpful, and enjoyed working with librarians. We benefited from the experience of honing our teaching skills, developing curricular materials, and learning more about the various course topics. We plan to offer Marketing You again in February 2019.