NERMLS and the community hospital: service, education, and advice

Figures relating to the document delivery service of NERMLS are given. NERMLS has collaborated with the Postgraduate. Medical Institute in Boston to improve standards in community hospital libraries by creating a core library of books and journals and training library supervisors to work in these libraries. Institutes have taken place in the Countway Library, and guidelines for library development in community hospitals have been drawn up. Activities of Regional Medical Programs in New England are discussed, and further plans of NERMLS described.     

Educational brokering: New services for adult learners

This paper describes a fast-growing variety of programs that directly enable adult learners to pursue educational and career plans within their communities. Educational brokering serves an intermediary role between individual clients and the vast array of educational resources in a region. This paper considers the missions of brokering—advisement, assessment, and advocacy—its organizational arrangements, and the sources of its support and development. Specific successes and impacts of brokering are presented, as is the importance of the brokering idea to several larger public policy issues. Efforts currently underway to expand brokering activities on a national level are also discussed.Dr. Heffernan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Higher/Postsecondary Education at Syracuse University and is Coordinator of Research and Editor of theBulletin of the National Center for Educational Brokering. He has been assisted in the preparation of this article by Francis U. Macy and Donn F. Vickers, Director and Associate Director, respectively, of the National Center for Educational Brokering, 405 Oak Street, Syracuse, New York 13203.