Today it’s my last day working in a library. Tomorrow will begin a new era for me, when I start working as a researcher and teacher in a university of applied sciences. Considering this shift from practical to more theoretical work I wonder what will be the difference and which elements will connect the two worlds. I think it is very important that these two worlds aren’t really separated: Libraries should be in close contact to the results of academic research. And research should also deal with issues that are relevant for the practical work in libraries. Therefore I’m looking forward to work in a university of applied sciences – it means that the content and the results of research should be applicable by libraries, archives and other institutions.
When I visited the conference informare! last year in Berlin, I noticed that our library is sometimes far away from the subjects that were presented by scientists. When I came back to ETH library, I wrote a report and suggested that our library should involve more into scientific research. A leading academic library should be part of applied research in its field. An academic library should support research about subjects that deal with providing academic information. There could and should be a fruitful cooperation between library science and libraries.
I promise here and now, that I will try to combine the two worlds in my future work. I’m looking forward to going deeper in my analysis of current phenomenons and trends than I could do that before, when the interests of our library had to be the focus of my work. And on the other hand I intend to prepare the findings in a way that they can be adopted by libraries. This will be a great challenge!
Written on my way from Chur (university of applied sciences) to ETH library, on my last „hybrid“ day between the worlds…
Rudolf Mumenthaler 