Last fall, I nominated one of my office buddies, Liz Jenkins, an intern at the Biomedical and Veterinary Medicine Libraries and a Master of Library and Information Science (MLIS) student at Drexel University, for the “Up and Comer” award, an early career award given to library staff and MLIS students who are passionate about the future of libraries.

Against the Grain Media looks for nominees who are future library leaders and change-makers who actively innovate, inspire, collaborate, and take risks.  Liz met those criteria, and was a 2018 award winner. Against the Grain Media features award winners in both a print magazine and in a podcast interview (podcast yet to come!).

Liz Jenkins holding medical devices she cataloged

There are many reason why I nominated Liz for this award, including her collaborative spirit. Over the summer, I watched her collaborate with fellow Biomedical Library staff members in preparation for the Medical Student Information Fair, which is an annual event for first-year medical students held every August, as a part of the medical student orientation. Liz created beautiful posters reflecting the event’s theme of National Parks, featuring inspiring and relaxing National Parks scenes. These posters, in part, inspired the posters I created for the Biomedical Library’s Relaxation Room.

Liz is also enthusiastic about tackling new and unusual projects.  At the time of her nomination, Liz was actively cataloging medical devices on behalf of a partnership between Penn Libraries and Penn Health-Tech. She worked with Penn Health-Tech, the Materials Library at the Fisher Fine Arts Library, and a metadata expert to find the best way to catalog these devices (a big first for her and everyone at Penn Libraries), so Penn faculty, staff, and students can now browse the collection online and check out the medical devices from the Biomedical Library Circulation Desk. At the Veterinary Library, Liz is currently applying  her metadata skills to catalog Penn Vet yearbooks. She has documented her cataloging procedures, so future interns can build on her projects at the Biomedical and Veterinary Libraries.

Overall, Liz is passionate about libraries and is eager to learn new things. Upon graduation, she would like to be a librarian at an academic library. I am excited to see what is in store for Liz’s career.