Community Engagement Award to help RLC reach out to community for health education

INA, Ill. (June 6, 2014) - Plans are in the works for Rend Lake College’s first Health and Wellness Fair, which will be held in the spring of 2015. The event and some other activities will be offered thanks to a Community Engagement Award of $4,500 from the National Network of Libraries of Medicine Greater Midwest Region.

The Health and Wellness Fair will be a community event to educate attendees on a number of health care issues. There will be exhibits and health care professionals present, as well as a children’s activity, called Body Health Walk, and much more.

“The National Library of Medicine is an association that provides educational materials to health care professionals or anyone teaching in a health field,” said Beth Mandrell, Reference Librarian. “They do a lot with their money to push for health care information education. For example, they have a website that anyone can use. We received a health information literacy award to help us reach out into our community through our students.”

The Health and Wellness Fair will tie in with a health awareness week on campus, the first of its kind. A number of students on campus, such as those in the Nursing Program, and RLC officials will be on hand to participate in the community education.

“We want to have professionals come in and talk to people about any health issue. We also want to have some demonstrations, like CPR training,” said Mandrell. “We’re going to be giving away things, as well as giving out information. Any way that we can get health care information out there, we’ll try it.”

For the children’s activity, the Body Health Walk, a number of stations and activities will be set up for students to learn about the body. Different curricula are being prepared for different age groups. Local schools will also be invited to participate.

The last aspect of the award will be a new health information website through RLC. It will link to the services provided by the National Library of Medicine and be available for students and patrons to utilize.

“We already have an audience here,” said Mandrell. “We have college students of all ages, the (Rend Lake College Foundation) Children’s Center, and schools that use our facilities. Every student has family or friends whom they care about, so reaching out to our students is our best avenue to get information to the public.”

More details on the Health and Wellness Fair will be provided as they become available. This project has been funded in whole or in part with Federal Funds from the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, under Contract No. HHSN‐276‐2011‐00005C with the University of Illinois at Chicago.