Gloria Werner, 1940–2021

Gloria Werner, successor to Louise M. Darling at the UCLA Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library, university librarian emerita, and eighteenth editor of the Bulletin of the Medical Library Association, died on March 5, 2021, in Los Angeles. Before assuming responsibility in 1990 for one of the largest academic research libraries in the US, she began her library career as a health sciences librarian and spent twenty years at the UCLA Biomedical Library, first as an intern in the NIH/NLM-funded Graduate Training Program in Medical Librarianship in 1962–1963, followed by successive posts in public services and administration, eventually succeeding Darling as biomedical librarian and associate university librarian from 1979 to 1983. Werner''s forty-year career at UCLA, honored with the UCLA University Service Award in 2013, also included appointments as associate university librarian for Technical Services. She was president of the Association of Research Libraries in 1997, served on the boards of many organizations including the Association of Academic Health Sciences Library Directors, and consulted extensively. She retired as university librarian in 2002.

Gloria Werner, university librarian emerita and successor to Louise M. Darling at the UCLA Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library, died on March 5, 2021, in Los Angeles.Werner was born on December 12, 1940, in Seattle, Washington. She skipped grades a couple of times in the Seattle public schools and applied to Radcliffe, Pomona College, and Oberlin College—all of which accepted her. She chose to go to Oberlin and arrived in the small college town in Ohio at the age of sixteen. While at Oberlin, she was a French major with an art history minor, but she also had a continuing interest in music, particularly classical piano. She played a piano concerto with the University of Washington Symphony orchestra when she was only fourteen, and Oberlin''s well-known music conservatory allowed her to continue her piano studies. It appears that the small liberal arts college suited her as she graduated with a BA in French in three years in 1961.While at Oberlin, Gloria worked as an assistant at the Oberlin Art Library. Following graduation, she returned to Seattle and obtained her master''s in librarianship from the University of Washington in 1962. Because of her interest in libraries, she had always intended to get a library degree. Though art history was perhaps her greatest love, it would have required at least a master''s or PhD and many more years of education to become an art curator or museum director, which was something she was uninterested in pursuing at the time. In 1962, she was honored with the University of Washington School of Librarianship Award for Most Outstanding Student [1].Before assuming responsibility for one of the largest academic research libraries in the US, Gloria began her career at the UCLA Biomedical Library. She was fond of saying that despite not having attended UCLA, she was born and raised professionally there [2]. Before library school graduation, she was offered a job at Seattle Public Library, which had the largest art history collection in the area and where she had completed an internship. Even though she had no science in her academic background and had already been offered a job at Seattle Public Library, University of Washington Library School Dean Dorothy Bevis was instrumental in convincing her to apply for an internship at the UCLA Biomedical Library. After being accepted and completing the NIH/NLM-funded Graduate Training Program in Medical Librarianship Internship in 1963, she was hired as a reference librarian by Director Louise M. Darling. Gloria also celebrated a momentous event in 1963 when she married Newton Davis Werner, a Los Angeles native who had recently completed his PhD in chemistry.From 1963 to 1979, she assumed increasingly responsible positions in the UCLA Biomedical Library including head of reference and assistant/associate biomedical librarian for public services (Figure 1). She took a year off in 1967–1968 to work in London as librarian of the Wellcome Historical Medical Library, while her husband was completing a Fulbright Fellowship. In 1979, she succeeded Louise Darling as director of the Biomedical Library (later named the Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library by action of the UC Board of Regents), and as director the Pacific Southwest Regional Medical Library Service and Cancer Information Center. As director, Gloria added computer-assisted instruction and audiovisual services, implemented the transition from bibliographic searching by librarians to end user searching, and oversaw the physical expansion of the library. She was also designated an assistant dean of the UCLA Medical School.Open in a separate windowFigure 1Gloria Werner (left) with Louise Darling (right), 1972In 1983, Gloria was persuaded to take on the position of associate university librarian for technical services for the UCLA Library system. In this role, she oversaw the development of the UCLA Library''s online information system, ORION, based in part on the continuation of automation efforts initiated by the Biomedical Library. She served in that capacity until 1990 when she was appointed university librarian. Her accomplishments in this position included renovating the historic Powell Library built originally as the main university library, establishing the College Library Instructional Computing Commons, managing the transition from print to electronic resources in many disciplines, reducing multiple campus library locations, and managing successive University of California budgetary shortfall issues. She also became active during this time in the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), serving as ARL President (1996–1997), as a member of the Research Collections Committee, and as a participant in ARL''s Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) program.Werner was associated for ten years with publication of the Medical Library Association''s journal, then titled Bulletin of the Medical Library Association (BMLA). In 1973, Robert F. Lewis, biomedical librarian at UC San Diego, was appointed to the first of two three-year terms as editor. He chose Gloria to lead the editorial committee of the journal and then, a year later, to serve as associate editor during his two terms as editor. During their tenure, the publication type called “brief communications” became part of the journal, and the editorial committee and peer review process were strengthened under Gloria''s guidance. When Lewis stepped down in 1979, Werner, who was the choice of the editorial selection committee, became the eighteenth editor of BMLA. The editorial selection committee recommended her reappointment in 1983, but she had to decline due to her new position in the UCLA library system [3]. Werner''s successor as editor praised her for “her encouragement of authors” and for “developing a peer review system that is among the best in scientific publishing” [4].Though she was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest and arrived serendipitously at UCLA, Gloria stayed the course and contributed significantly to the development of the UCLA library system over her forty-year career. In 2013, she was honored with the UCLA University Service Award. The arc of her career spanned from MEDLARS and other batch process retrieval systems to online catalogs and digital libraries. She served on the boards of many organizations including the Association of Academic Health Sciences Library Directors and consulted extensively. She was tempted only once to return to Seattle when the University of Washington offered her the university librarian position.When Gloria retired as UCLA university librarian in 2002, she continued to treasure her ties to UCLA as well as her love of music, art, and travel. She and her husband Newton were avid art collectors and donated generously to the Grunwald Center for the Graphic Arts in the Hammer Museum. Gloria served on the Docent Council of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and was active in many other organizations. Music continued to be an integral part of her life as a season ticket holder of the Los Angeles Opera, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Ojai Music Festival. Gloria is survived by her son, Adam, daughter-in-law, Tammy, and grandson, Noah.     

Establishing the foundations for an inclusive education system in Iraq: reflection on findings from a nationwide survey

This paper reports a national study on the prevalence of childhood disability designed to inform initiatives promoting improved school attendance by children with disabilities in Iraq. The study was commissioned by UNICEF, coordinated by the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics, and designed by academics in the UK in consultation with Iraqi academics and professionals. The mixed methods study included a major household survey, semi-structured interviews, and focus groups across four of Iraq's 18 governorates (Erbil, Baghdad, Najaf and Basra). An initial scoping study collected background data through interviews, site-visits and document analysis, establishing the context and informing the design of the main study. In this paper, we provide an overview of the educational context in Iraq, data on school attendance and disability among children aged 6–18 years, and the perspectives and vision for education in Iraq verbalised by key stakeholders. This research provides insights into current patterns of school attendance, and considers some of the implications for inclusive education in Iraq. We conclude by discussing the potential for implementation of Iraqi policy initiatives to impact on the rights of disabled people within education and wider social provision.     

Who are the independent editors,how did they reach their role and what are their associated job satisfactions?

This paper presents new evidence on the world of the independent editor in the publishing industry, analysing their demographic background, education and training, working practices, links with professional organizations, motivations for ‘going it alone‘, and job satisfaction. The results help contribute to the understanding of this important and growing segment of the publishing industry, challenge some of the commonly held beliefs about their role in the industry and set these within the broader context of changes in work organization in publishing. Contrary to the assumption that self‐publishing largely takes place without the involvement of an editor, research into the processes of self‐publishing (previously published in this journal) found that editors (and other providers of publishing services) were in fact often involved. The results are significant for the traditional publishing industry, the users of independent editorial services, and the editors themselves.     

Changes in respiratory muscle and lung function following marathon running in man

Respiratory muscle fatigue has been reported following short bouts of high-intensity exercise, and prolonged, moderate-intensity exercise, as evidenced by decrements in inspiratory and expiratory mouth pressures. However, links to functionally relevant outcomes such as breathing effort have been lacking. The present study examined dyspnoea and leg fatigue during a treadmill marathon in nine experienced runners. Maximal inspiratory and expiratory pressure, peak inspiratory and expiratory flow, forced vital capacity, and forced expiratory volume in one second were assessed before, immediately after, and four and 24 hours after a marathon. During the run, leg effort was rated higher than respiratory effort from 18 through 42 km (P < 0.05). Immediately after the marathon, there were significant decreases in maximal inspiratory pressure and peak inspiratory flow (from 118 +/- 20 cm H(2)O and 6.3 +/- 1.4 litres x s(-1) to 100 +/- 22 cm H(2)O and 4.9 +/- 1.5 litres x s(-1) respectively; P < 0.01), while expiratory function remained unchanged. Leg maximum voluntary contraction force was significantly lower post-marathon. Breathing effort correlated significantly with leg fatigue (r = 0.69), but not inspiratory muscle fatigue. Our results confirm that prolonged moderate-intensity exercise induces inspiratory muscle fatigue. Furthermore, they suggest that the relative intensity of inspiratory muscle work during exercise makes some contribution to leg fatigue.     

Verbal reasoning test scores and their stability over time

As part of an extended study into school assessment practices the use of verbal reasoning tests and their possible contribution to measuring pupil progress is being investigated. One phase of the study has involved testing the stability of individual verbal reasoning scores over time. The findings of this phase are presented here and located within the broader context of intelligence testing. The discussion concludes with a number of questions relating to the use of pupils’ academic achievements as appropriate measures of school success. The ongoing work considers how pupil success could be measured fairly, taking into account individual pupil differences, including both genetic and socio-economic factors. The work being developed has potential for both formative and summative assessment procedures and also as a tool for reporting the achievements of individual pupils and educational establishments. The full work will be published in due course.     

Innovating for a cause: the work and learning required to create a new approach to healthcare for homeless people

Innovation occupies a pivotal place in our understanding of knowledge-based economies, and this is raising questions about sources of innovation, how it originates, and the role played by employees, work practices and learning. This paper explores these issues through case study research into a new approach to providing healthcare for homeless people in England, and by bringing together conceptual insights from the employee-driven innovation literature, and more broadly from social and practice-based learning theory and organisational theory. Applying these perspectives to our case enables illumination of the innovation as a process – not an event – and as an ongoing set of organisational practices that transcend their origins. Through our analysis we argue that the notion of ‘a cause’ is helpful in elucidating the impetus and the commitment to making the innovation happen (and go on happening). Our findings are presented under three themes: ‘establishing a cause’, ‘organising for innovation’, and ‘innovative capability in practice’. Building on these, we have identified five key inter-related dimensions which help conceptualise the work and learning that it took to create and (re-)enact the innovation and that we suggest may have relevance for understanding and characterising other employee-led innovations in and perhaps beyond healthcare.     

A Curriculum-Based Passage Reading Test for Monitoring the Performance of Low-Progress Readers: The development of the WARP

Results are presented from two studies involving 190 primary and high school (Year 7) students and 146 older low-progress readers in the late primary years. These studies contribute towards the development of five 200 word standardised passages which may be employed interchangeably to monitor the performance of low-progress readers towards achieving functional literacy. The passages are shown to possess both high parallel form reliability (0.94 to 0.96) and internal consistency (0.97 to 0.99), and also good criterion validity (0.78 to 0.80) with reading accuracy. Appropriate growth in performance over the primary years is also demonstrated. These findings suggest that an extrapolated model of curriculum-based measurement (CBM), which incorporates elements of more traditional reading assessments, would overcome some of the problems associated with CBM.     

Dimensions of student success: a framework for defining and evaluating support for learning in higher education

ABSTRACT

The capabilities students need for success during and beyond higher education extend far beyond specific discipline skills to include the development of productive mindsets, the management of life circumstances and the way they relate to others and identify with their profession. The provision of support for these capabilities at university can be both diverse in scope and diffuse in delivery. Consequently, the development of streamlined and integrated evaluation strategies to measure the extent to which these capabilities are being successfully delivered can be challenging. This paper describes how one Australian university used a collaborative process to design an evaluation framework for student learning services. The framework, a first for this university, represents the breadth of student support, including a typology of support for learning: connectedness, mindsets, self-management, professional identity and academic capabilities. These terms, coined as dimensions, form the scaffold of university-wide delivery of support for learning initiatives.