Building a bioinformatics community of practice through library education programs

Area of Science:

• Bioinformatics and Computational Biology
• Library and Information Science
• Health Sciences Librarianship

Background:

• Emerging research fields like bioinformatics present unique challenges for academic libraries.
• The University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill Health Sciences Library is actively developing services to support this community.
• Understanding user needs and defining the library's role are crucial for successful service development.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine the community of practice concept as a framework for bioinformatics library services.
• To outline the context, goals, and current services of the UNC Health Sciences Library in bioinformatics.
• To discuss strategies for service evaluation, development, and demonstrating library value.

Main Methods:

• Exploration of the community of practice model.
• Analysis of the UNC Health Sciences Library's role and services in bioinformatics.
• Discussion of challenges in supporting emerging scientific communities.

Main Results:

• The community of practice concept offers a valuable framework for understanding and developing library services for bioinformatics.
• Key challenges include needs assessment, role definition, relationship building, staff preparation, and funding acquisition.
• The UNC Health Sciences Library is actively engaged in addressing these challenges within its mission.

Conclusions:

• Academic health sciences libraries can effectively support emerging fields like bioinformatics by adopting strategic frameworks and addressing inherent challenges.
• Proactive engagement, clear role definition, and continuous service development are essential for demonstrating library value in specialized research areas.
• The community of practice model provides a roadmap for libraries to build and sustain impactful services for scientific communities.