Prepared by the Association of Vision Science Librarians
Updated by Caroline Allen, Marilyn Dow, and Michelle Schonken
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History of the Opening Day List
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This list is a compilation of recommended books and journals for a vision science collection. The purpose of this list is to identify titles which should constitute a basic or "opening day" collection for a vision science library in a college, hospital department, medical center, corporate, or association setting. The items are suggested by librarians who are members of the Association of Vision Science Librarians (AVSL), and cover topics of interest for both optometry and ophthalmology collections. The librarians use reserve lists, book reviews, expert opinions, faculty recommendations, usage statistics and other criteria for making their selections. We hope that this list continues to help vision science libraries with their collection development decisions.
Gale Oren, MLIS, AHIP
The intention of this list is to provide a good foundation for what patrons, students, faculty would expect to find, therefore, some titles may be older than would be expected. This may be for a variety of reasons such as they are heavily used in courses, foundational titles, or not often updated in that field, etc.
The Opening Day Collection is updated periodically and completely revised approximately every two years. For further collection development, we recommend reviewing your own faculty’s recommendations, subject lists from non-partisan parties like Doody Core Titles, book reviews, and other vision science institutions’ catalogs. The AVSL listserv is also a wonderful community and resource to ask advice about specific titles. Members of AVSL can contact the listserv with suggestions.
Michelle Schonken, MLIS, AHIP
The first official Opening Day List was created by Nancy Gatlin of the Southern College of Optometry in 1981. She continued to do updates every 2-3 years until the 1998 edition, when Maureen Watson (Michigan College of Optometry) took over.
Others working with Maureen over the years included Jerry Dujsik (Illinois College of Optometry), Pat Carlson (Southern California College of Optometry), and Cindy Hutchison (New England College of Optometry). Maureen continued until the 2011 edition, when Gale Oren, together with Louise Collins, Suzanne Ferimer, D.J. Matthews, Mike Piorunski, and Alicia Prosser took on the project.
BOOKS BY TOPIC
+ = New Title to the List
# = New Edition or Reprint
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ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY