Director of Publications

Southern College of Optometry (SCO) Names Dr. Sharon E. Tabachnick

Director of Library Services and Associate Professor

MEMPHIS, Tennessee (April 24, 2008) – Sharon E. Tabachnick, Ph.D., has been named Director of Library Services and Associate Professor at Southern College of Optometry (SCO) in Memphis.

Dr. Tabachnick fills the position formerly held by Nancy Gatlin, the college’s previous Director of Library Services, who retired earlier this year after serving the college for nearly 40 years.

Dr. Tabachnick previously served as an Associate Professor and Instructional Services Coordinator at the University of Memphis Libraries. In that capacity, she coordinated all instructional services at the university’s libraries, including scheduling, curriculum and instructional design. She also taught undergraduate information literacy and research methods classes in a number of disciplines.

A certified teacher and librarian, Dr. Tabachnick has worked in a number of schools and libraries in the United States and abroad. In Tennessee, her experience includes service as at the Science and Engineering Librarian at Tennessee Technological University. In Memphis, she worked as a researcher at the Center for Research in Educational Policy, as a Youth Services Librarian in the former Memphis/Shelby County Library System, and as a third- and fourth-grade teacher at the Solomon Schechter School.

Her educational work also includes teaching English as a second language abroad and teaching upper-level teacher education classes at the University of Oklahoma.

At the University of Oklahoma in Norman, she earned a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology (Instructional Psychology and Technology Program). She also earned a master’s degree in Library and Information Management from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

Her professional affiliations have included membership in the American Library Association, the Association of College and Research Libraries, the Special Library Association, the American Educational Research Association, and the American Psychological Association. She is a member of Phi Kappa Phi, the academic honor society, Beta Phi Mu, the international library science honor society, and in 1987, she was chosen as Outstanding Young Woman of America.

Established in Memphis, Tennessee in 1932, Southern College of Optometry is an independent, not-for-profit institution of higher education with a mission to educate men and women in the art and science of optometry.

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