Tian Zhang

Prof. Zhang has worked as a professional librarian since 1991. She began her career as a corporate librarian at Hoffman-La Roche. In1994 she joined the faculty of the University Libraries, as a Reference Librarian.
Prof. Zhang currently serves as the Serials Librarian and manages the Serials and Acquisitions Departments. Her goal is to establish strong collections for all campuses, with an ever-increasing emphasis on electronic resources. She liaises with the University faculty in providing resources for their teaching programs and the research projects. She works closely with the publishers/vendors to obtain the materials, and to maintain their accessibility for the St. John’s community. Due to budget constraints, Prof. Zhang is focusing more attention on open access journals with limited copyright and licensing restrictions. She adds the open access materials to the libraries journal collections as they become available.

As the longtime member of CALA (Chinese American Librarians Association), Prof. Zhang used to apply her Chinese language skills to offer basic bibliographic instructions to international students, as part of the International Student Advancer programs. She continues to assist international students and visiting scholars from China. She helps, if necessary, the librarian of the Asian Collection, utilizing her language and cultural skills to verify the collection of the materials.

In her free time, Prof. Zhang is an avid gardener. Her love of plants has led her to study oriental garden design, by attending workshops and classes to educate herself on the subject. She has applied her horticultural expertise to creating a beautiful home garden, and she readily shares her knowledge with colleagues, neighbors and friends in their own botanical ventures.