MLA’s strategic goal #3 is all about education, and how to seriously raise the bar on how we support you in your professional development. Just as the new MLANET website and community platform will put you at the center of the experience, our plan for MLA education will have you at the center as well. Not MLA. You, and others like you, who should come to and rely on MLA for their education in health information.
We will be successful when you are able to choose the classes you need in order to develop your professional competencies by selecting tracks and offerings in a structured program, at the right price, with the most effective delivery.
To get going, we want to achieve the following by the end of 2016:
- Finalize the revision of the professional competencies document (an effort led by the Task Force to Review MLA’s Competencies for Lifelong Learning and Professional Success) to ensure we are teaching the right things.
- Agree on what MLA’s education audiences are and create a priority matrix for what to teach to whom (professional competencies vs. audiences). Just as we can’t be everything to everyone, we can’t teach everything to everyone.
- Build a course list that is “student-centric.”
- Identify and implement a new learning management system (LMS) and content learning management system (CLMS) that provides you with a personalized experience for learning and centralizes your MLA CE certificates.
- Improve the process for the issuance of MLA continuing education (CE) certificates, including for courses offered by NLM’s regional medical libraries (RMLs).
- Open the CLMS to MLA’s large pool of member educators to build a selection of online course offerings that are compelling, with personalized support for educators on curriculum and instructional design.
- Develop several pilot courses on the CLMS.
In the next few weeks, look forward to an announcement of a new MLA director of education, as MLA prepares to build this better future.
Yes, the glass is half empty, and we have plans to fill it up!