Posts by: Thomas Quinn
Image credit: NASA
50 years ago, on July 16, 1969, at 9:32 in the morning, the Apollo 11 mission launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, aboard a Saturn V rocket. This was going to be the culmination of decades of work, and on July 20th, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would walk on the moon, the first two people in human history to do it. This Saturday, July 20th, is the 50th anniversary of the landing! There is a wealth of interesting things out there about the moon landing and the Apollo missions as a whole, but here are a couple to get you up to speed. I’ve read and watched most of this by this point, so I can happily tell you it’s quality stuff.
First: NASA is running a lot of events (including live streams) in honor of the 50th anniversary. They have a whole schedule on their website, and I highly recommend taking a look!
Second: NASA has released some stunning photos in honor of the anniversary. Check ’em out, all for free! You won’t even need your Tufts Login!
Third: if you prefer to read (or need to keep your roving data costs down when off of WiFi), I’d recommend checking out Amy Shira Teitel’s Twitter account. She runs a very interesting YouTube channel called Vintage Space, and there are few laypeople quite as well steeped in space exploration history (particularly of NASA and its missions) as she is. Over on Twitter, however, she’s doing a live stream text and video of the full Apollo 11 mission, as it was happening. You can pretend you’re in 1969, but without the pesky interference of not having your smartphone!
Fourth: Books! If you want to honor this anniversary by digging into the moon missions and NASA a little bit more, Tufts has got you covered. For instance, Carrying the Fire: An Astronaut’s Journey is the autobiography by Michael Collins, the pilot of the Apollo 11 mission. While Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the lunar surface, Collins orbited in the spacecraft, and is the man who got them there and back safely. Moon Shot: the Inside Story of America’s Race to the Moon and Almost Heaven: the Story of Women in Space can also add some interesting context for you in space travel. If you want something a little more close to home (since we are a health sciences campus), there’s always Trailblazing Medicine: Sustaining Explorers During Interplanetary Missions. But if you’re going to be sitting on a beach and want something a bit more…fictional, you could to a whole lot worse than the very popular (and very funny) book The Martian by Andy Weir. These are only the tip of the rocket, of course. Poke around on JumboSearch and who knows what you’ll find! And don’t forget, if you want anything from one of the other Tufts Libraries, all you need to do is Request Book. You might not get it in time to read it this weekend, but there’s still plenty of 50th anniversary summer ahead of us.
Finally, I will leave you with this list of breakthroughs & advances. Space exploration is a dangerous game, and scientists need to stay one step ahead of nature if humans are to survive in such a hostile environment. Luckily, when they do, life down here on Earth can get a little better too – everything from LED lights and memory foam to better firefighting equipment and prosthetic limbs owes a bit of debt (or its existence entirely) to missions like Apollo 11.
So, for a few moments this Saturday, if you look around at the technology that powers your life, perhaps take a look upward, too, at the moon, and reflect for a moment on all the brave and brilliant people that made that event possible 50 years ago. What a wild ride it’s been.
Ad astra,
Tom
Photo credit: Tom Quinn
This year, for Independence Day, the Hirsh Library will be closed Thursday, July 4th – Sunday, July 7th. We’ll be open regular hours again starting Monday, July 8th.
If you’re going to be hanging around Boston for that weekend, you could definitely go check out the Boston Fireworks Spectacular!
Hope you have a fun (and safe) weekend!
Hello all, this seems like a good time for a brief round-up of what we learned during the two Affiliation Statistics months this year. If you don’t remember (and how couldn’t you?), those were October and March, when we went around asking you all what programs you happened to be from. It’s always an interesting project when we do it, and I always enjoy showing you some of what we learned.
For instance, the breakdown of days! The way we do the actual survey involves some randomization and scattering around the month, but we make sure to get each day of the week included. In the past, Wednesday has been the busiest day of the week at Hirsh, and that held out in the March count, but in October, Monday was the busiest! There are many different reasons this happens, including class schedules, exam schedules, and even weather patterns. It does help us understand our patron needs, though, which is one more way we can help you all out.
Now, obviously we didn’t go around and ask you about what school you were from just so we could show you this chart of what days of the week are more popular. No, what you may really want to see is the breakdown of which program had the most people here to count, and here you go! The answer…well, probably won’t surprise you, but it’s still fun to look at!
Click to embiggen
Well would you look at that! Medical students and Dental students were the largest population in the library! Unlike past years, it appears there are more MD students studying in the Library, and I have a theory on that: seating. One thing I’ve noticed in the past from other statistics posts and round-ups, particularly when doing the end-of-year, is that our Medical students tend to prefer quiet space for studying. This past year, the Hirsh Library has exponentially increased the amount of available study space on the 7th floor – the quietest of the study floors – and then this happened. That March bar corresponds rather well with 2nd years preparing for their Step exams, too.
Is this a direct causation, or a happenstance correlation? As much as I’d like to say it’s causation, I’m cautious about claiming that. Then again, as the movie Field of Dreams once said, “Build it and they will come.” So who knows!
For the record, we’ve also recorded a drop-off for PA, PHPD, and MBS from October to March. But we’re seeing people from the other Tufts programs and all our various other affiliates here in larger numbers. Remember that everybody in the Tufts Community is welcome here all the same! Hirsh is for all of you.
Now the best way to see how good my guess about the extra study space is, of course, is to do something like, say, look at which floors were the busiest. But I’d have to have all that data handy and be able to put it in a totally different chart.
Good. News.
Click to en-full-size-en
Okay. Full disclosure: I always knew it would look like this. The 7th floor is crazy popular. We collect data year-round (which I will be discussing in a post a few months from now, for an end-of-year wrap-up), and one thing I have noticed is that the 7th floor is consistently twice the populous of any other floor. Twice! Which makes sense when you stop and think about it: it’s got the most of all kinds of study space, and is somehow still the quietest floor of the lot.
I think I speak for everyone here when I say: I’m glad you like it so much!
That’s all for now. Good luck with the remainder of your exams, and I’ll see you back here this summer for the big wrap up, when I talk about some interesting numbers (like busiest days) and how this year stacks up against years past!
-Tom-
Hello! Do you like to study? No? But you like it when you can check out chargers and stuff earlier/later than normal, right? Especially when you have to study? What if there’s also free coffee?
There we go.
Good news! The Hirsh Health Sciences Library will be having another three weekends of Extended Hours this spring, so you will have more time to check materials out and get help on the weekends!
On the following weekends, the desk on the 4th floor will be open 10am – 10pm:
Image source: https://pixabay.com/photo-1752164/
Saturday, April 6th
Sunday, April 7th
Saturday, April 20th
Sunday, April 21st
Saturday, May 4th
Sunday, May 5th
We will also have free coffee for you all on the Saturdays! The coffee is scheduled to show up at 6pm, so so you can come take a quick study break and commiserate while you caffeinate.
Just so you know: this only applies to the staffed desk. The building itself has its normal operating hours, so you can still stay until midnight as normal.
If you have any questions you can feel free to swing by the desk on the 4th floor or call us at 617-636-6706. Otherwise, we look forward to seeing you those three weekends!
Happy Studying!
Hello hello!
March is upon us, which means the time has come for our second (and final) Affiliation Survey this academic year! What does this mean for you? Well, this is that time when we walk around and ask every one of our lovely patrons which program they are with (Dental, Medical, Sackler, etc). This is all we ask. We will not ask for your name or even which year you’re in! The numbers we collect are used in aggregate so we can get a snapshot of what the library usage is like.
This post from this past June shows you just what all the numbers ends up looking like.
Now here’s how it goes: there are 7 days spread out over the whole month, randomly chosen to try and maximize the usefulness of the numbers (in other words, we’re trying not to get skewed by exam blocks too much). On those days, HHSL staff (you’ll probably recognize us!) will walk around 4 times over the course of the day to gather the totals of how many people from each school are in the library. There will be signs and posters up this month, so you’re not caught unaware.
Keep your eyes out for them!
We won’t announce ahead of time which days we’re counting (see our need to randomize, above), so it’s safe to assume that it could just happen any day this month.
Don’t panic!
If you don’t want to be bothered (or to speak out loud), you are welcome to leave your ID next to you while you study. If that is still not good enough, you can write your program down on a piece of paper and leave that next to you. If you’re in a group room, feel free to stick a note to the outside of the door (on the wood – the windows must remain clear!) telling us how many people of what program(s) are in the room. Done and done. We will add that number to our count, and we will move on to the next person!
There are pencils, pens, markers, scrap paper, and tape down at the Service Desk on the 4th floor, so you can even make your sign bright and cheerful! If you have any questions or concerns, let us know either in person at the desk, or through Ask Us on our website. We’re here to help and make this quick and easy.
But otherwise, we look forward to seeing you all this month and finding out just what our beloved HHSL looks like this fine autumn.
Good luck on studying and I look forward to seeing you in the library!
Tom
Image source: https://pixabay.com/photo-1752164/
Exam season is upon us, which means it’s time for Extended Hours! Hirsh Library extends its weekend hours to help you study, and we will be open from 10am to 10pm on the following days:
Saturday, December 1st
Sunday, December 2nd
Saturday, December 8th
Sunday, December 9th
Saturday, December 15th
Sunday, December 16th
We will also have free coffee for you all on the Saturdays! The coffee is scheduled to show up at 6pm, so so you can come take a quick study break and commiserate while you caffeinate.
If you have any questions you can feel free to swing by the desk on Sackler 4 or call us at 617-636-6706. Otherwise, we look forward to seeing you the next three weekends.
Happy Studying!
This year, in observation of Veterans Day, the Hirsh Health Sciences Library will have shortened hours on Monday, November 12. That day we will be open 12 pm – 7 pm.
The Sackler Building will still have card swipe access for its normal daily schedule, so you are welcome to swipe in and come study in the building! Just be aware that the desk on the 4th floor will only be staffed from noon to 7pm.
We hope you have a lovely weekend, and will see you back on Tuesday for our normal operations!
Hello hello everyone. It’s about that time again: time for the Affiliation Survey!
Twice a year, the Hirsh Health Sciences Library runs the Affiliation Survey, where we walk around and ask every one of our lovely patrons which program they are with (Dental, Medical, Sackler, etc). This is all we ask. We will not ask for your name or even which year you’re in! The numbers we collect are used in aggregate so we can get a snapshot of what the library usage is like. The graph you see above is the result of last year’s two Affiliation months, for instance.
Here’s how it goes: there are 7 days spread out over the whole month, randomly chosen to try and maximize the usefulness of the numbers (in other words, we’re trying not to get skewed by specific exam blocks too much). On those days, HHSL staff (you’ll probably recognize us!) will walk around 4 times over the course of the day to gather the totals of how many people from each school are in the library. There will be signs and posters up this month, so you’re not caught unaware.
Keep your eyes out for them!
We won’t announce ahead of time which days we’re counting (see our need to randomize, above), so it’s safe to assume that it could just happen any day this month.
Don’t panic!
If you don’t want to be bothered (or to speak out loud), you are welcome to leave your ID next to you while you study. If that is still not good enough, you can write your program down on a piece of paper and leave that next to you. If you’re in a group room, feel free to stick a note to the outside of the door (on the wood – the windows must remain clear!) telling us how many people of what program(s) are in the room. Done and done. We will add that number to our count, and we will move on to the next person!
There are pencils, pens, markers, scrap paper, and tape down at the Service Desk on the 4th floor, so you can even make your sign bright and cheerful! If you have any questions or concerns, let us know either in person at the desk, or through Ask Us on our website. We’re here to help and make this quick and easy.
But otherwise, we look forward to seeing you all this month and finding out just what our beloved HHSL looks like this fine autumn.
Good luck on studying and I look forward to seeing you in the library!
Tom
In recognition of Labor Day, Hirsh Library will be open 12 pm – 7 pm this Monday, September 3rd. The Sackler building entry hours are unchanged.
Hirsh Library will be open regular hours again on Tuesday, September 4th.
We hope you have a safe and fun long weekend, and we’ll see you at the desk!
Hello! Did you know that here at the library, we have a whole lot of skulls?
Not…not in our heads. I mean anatomical models. In fact, Hirsh Library has over 50(!) skulls you can check out, so you can study them and do awesomely in your classes. What kinds of skulls, you ask? Well, let’s take a look!
Real Skulls
Let’s start right at the top: we have real human skulls, and we have them in a few different ways. First up are the full skulls, which come apart into two or three pieces, depending on how the springs on the jaws are. The downside is that these skulls are on the older side, so there are elements that have sustained a little damage over the years. But all the same, we have them!
We also have half skulls. They are cut vertically, and can come with or without a brain, as seen below.
They’re all available for checking out, and follow the same four hour rules as all Reserve materials. We just ask you to be gentle with them. (But feel free to casually mention that you can check actual human skulls out from your school library to any members of your family who have never gone through health sciences graduate programs. The reactions you’ll get will enhance every visit home, guaranteed.)
Plastic Skulls
But, what if you don’t want real bone, or what if they’re checked out? We still have you covered with all of our plastic skulls! The most popular of these are probably the labeled plastic skulls, and we even have one that has muscle connections painted on, so you can get a better sense of how it all lines up. See for yourself:
The bonus of the painted skull is that it also looks festive, ready for holidays to freak out the more squeamish of your non-health sciences friends back home! All labeled skulls come with guides as to what those labels actually mean, so these are the go-to skulls of all students freshly dealing with head and neck anatomy. Welcome to the club.
What if you really want to take a skull apart? We’ve got you covered. Meet our unlabeled, plastic, bilaterally cut skull. It’s missing a tooth, so feel free to give it a semi-ironic nickname, like “Bitey” or “Smiles.”
Finally, the newest editions to our skull collection! We recently received about 40 skulls from the anatomy lab. They are plastic, unlabeled, come in special cardboard boxes that can fold out into display cases, and are in fantastic shape.
So there you go! We have 50+ skulls, mixed up over 7 different styles, and that’s not even touching all our other models – teeth, a brain that comes apart, a spinal cord, pelvises – even two full skeletons, the famous Leo and Theo! So swing on by the Library Service Desk on the 4th floor, and check out a new silent study buddy.
Just remember: you can pick your skulls, you can pick your nose, but you can’t pick your skull’s nose.
Oh. I, uh…guess you can. Looks like there’s always something new to discover with a Hirsh Library Skull!
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