The End?

This is my last blog post of the semester and just as I started this blog with a time of reflection and self-examination, it seems appropriate to end the semester in a similar way.  How has what I learned this semester changed the way I see libraries and librarianship?  How will I apply this to my future work? Do I still have the same goals and vision for my career?

As I mentioned in my previous post, two of the learning experiences that influenced me the most this last semester was a professional ethics project and a paper that required me to visit two libraries.  The ethics paper was certainly the assignment that I enjoyed the most and, as I focused on library policies around people experiencing homelessness, I learned a lot about how libraries can create equitable and free access for a variety of patrons.  But even more than my own ethics project, engaging with my fellow students about their ethical scenarios and discussing the variety of approaches one could take to each situation was challenging and enlightening.  I found it to be a similar experience to when I took a mental health first aide class that taught you how to help and support people having a mental health crisis.  I lot of it was common sense, but I feel more prepared having thought out a crisis and how I would react ahead of time.

Having spent a lot of time thinking about libraries and librarians this semester, it was good for a project near the end of the term to get out and interact with real life people and places.  As much as I had been saying all semester that there is a lot of gray area in real life and that librarianship is more complicated than is seems in a class, the reality of libraries still was surprising and striking.  The librarians I met with are all doing their jobs well, but it was not the pristine ideal that I had subconsciously been expecting.  I have work in two different libraries, so I should have known better, but it had been several years and I have wanted to return for so long that I think I was seeing the profession through rose colored glasses.

My future work, I hope, will be more realistic and grounded as a result of this semester of learning about the reality and theory of libraries.  For example, I have gain skills in creating power point presentations and researching that I did not have before.  Both of these things are skills it seems that libraries are clamoring for.  I also feel like I can articulate the goals and ideals of library science in a clear and concise way.  As the librarian I will have to make decisions balancing different needs and values.  Now I will be able to make an informed decision and articulate to my coworkers and supervisors why I did what I did and what I was trying to achieve.

Looking back on my post about what my ideal job would be and what my goals for my career are, I believe that I still have the same vision that I had before.  It is, however, more refined and clearer than it was before.  I still would like to work in an urban public library, preferably as a reference librarian or manager.  I now know that the current trend in the major library system in my area is towards generalization and cross training of librarians.  As I make decisions about my education, hopefully I will be able to gain a broad base of skills.  I also want to make sure I recognize the fact that branch managers and even the chief librarian has someone supervising him or her.  Learning to work well with coworkers and bosses within a particular structure is going to be important.

I’m looking forward to continuing my library and information science education.  There is so much out there to learn and so many skills to be gained.  Thankfully, librarians are expected to continue to educate themselves throughout their careers and so this is just the beginning of a long and exciting process.

Where Am I Now?

Back in January at the beginning of the semester I outlinedsome of my assumptions and beliefs about the library profession.  At that time I articulated them as including:

1. Librarians are public servants. 

2. Librarian’s work will change depending on the community they are working in. 

3. Librarians must continue to learn in order to be effective. 

4. Librarians provide access to information freely and openly. 

5. Librarians give guidance and assistance.

Surprisingly, these assertions have not changed for me over the semester.  However, the way in which I would apply them in particular situations and how I would balance them when they compete with one another has shifted.  At the end of my original post about assumptions, I recognized the possibility that these beliefs could be in conflict with each other and wondered “What happens when a member of the community a librarian is working in pushes for a particular item excluded from the collection, against the judgment of the librarian?  How does a librarian choose what to include, knowing there are limited resources?  How does a librarian figure out what the needs of the particular community are?”  I now have a much better idea of how I would answer all those questions.  I’m looking forward to the fact that as I learn more about library best practices, that my understandings and application of these assumptions will continue to change.

I do feel like when I started the semester I had a very naive understanding of the profession.  I expected all librarians everywhere to always be striving for the highest goals of the profession and make decisions based on ideals.  However, both a project focusing on ethics and a paper about two library visits resulted in a shift in my thinking about how libraries operate.  The public library I worked at in college restricts movies that are rated R to patrons who are 18 or older.  This has always seemed like a good policy to me.  However, several of my classmates did an ethics project on a situation where a minor wanted to check out an R-rated movie with his mother’s permission.  The American Library Association encourages libraries to not restrict access to any materials based on age.  The ALA puts the responsibility on parents to set boundaries for their children, communicate them clearly and enforce them.  I now lean much more in that direction than I did before considering this particular ethical scenario with my classmates and hearing their viewpoints and reasoning.

The paper for which I had to visit two libraries greatly broadened my understanding of how libraries function, particularly in systems where there are multiple branches.  Even though I have worked at two different libraries, learning about library policies and procedures now that I’ve started to study the profession is a very different experience.  The little idea of what a library should be collided with what libraries actually are.  The biggest surprise I had was that collections decisions in the multiple branch system that I visited are made centrally at the main branch, not by librarians at neighborhood branch libraries.  I have had such a focus on how librarians can learn from patrons what materials they need, but there are other needs to be considered.  Budget is one of them, but it is also possible that a particular branch librarian will be biased towards collecting materials of interest to them.  Also, a branch librarian will not have the big picture, system wide view a centralized office would have.  I can now see the strengths and weaknesses of this model, but it has certainly changed the way I see the profession, large urban libraries and the current state of the profession.

Thankfully, even with this evolving understanding I am still very interested in working in a library.  I’m grateful to be a little shocked now, rather than after I start working at a new library.  I now have a better understanding that my past work as a librarian did not prepare me for everything, particularly in a large city with a diverse group of patrons with many needs.  I’m still looking forward to the challenge and the hard work of being a librarian. 

Raring and Annoyed Librarians

Librarians are often stereotyped as being quite, demure and conservative.  That has not been my experience of them, but that is often what’s portrayed in popular culture.  Two librarians working against this stereotype are Jessamyn West who blogs at librarian.net (“Putting the rarin back in librarian since 1999”) and the anonymous Annoyed Librarian on the Library Journal’s blog site.  Both Jessamyn and Annoyed have strong public opinions, senses of humor and are concerned about protecting free access to information.

The “rarin” Jessamyn is a “sometimes librarian, sometimes writer, sometimes blogger, and sometimes technology instructor/consultant.”  She has a second blog and two published books, both about the digital divide.  She usually writes blog posts a few times a month.  The topics she tends to focus on include public access to information, policies that affect that, current news about libraries and some interesting history about librarians and librarianship. Whatever the topic, I found her blog easy to read and always interesting.  She posts quite a few pictures, links and writes posts of various lengths.   

In the last several months my personal favorite was the longer post I Got a Kindle about her buying a Kindle and then trying different ways to download books onto it.  It was both informative (for someone who does not have an e-reader) and did the result of her need to be able to help patrons with their e-readers and e-books.  One issue that she’s been following over the last several months is open access, particularly to information gained and published from scientific research that the public funds.  She encouraged readers to sign a We the People Petition and kept them updated as the Obama administration came out in favor of such a policy.   

The Annoyed Librarian is a much more prolific blogger, though I am unclear if the writer is actually one person or many.  The blog says that “The Annoyed Librarian is possibly the most successful, respected, and desirable librarian of her generation. She has no other interest than to bring her wit and wisdom to the huddled librarian masses yearning to breathe free. The Annoyed Librarian is a free spirit and you are lucky to have her.”  This tongue-in-cheek biography captures well the tone of the blog itself.  All the posts are about things that are negative or going wrong.  While funny and somewhat refreshing at first, after a while this negative and sometimes snarky take on everything made me an annoyed librarian.

However, the topics covered on this blog are wide, current and generally interesting to those in the librarian profession.  Just in the first half of April there have been blog posts about fines, librarian salaries, the mission of libraries and who they serve, the ALA, National Library Week, social media, and copyright.  In almost all of these blog posts there is some library related news and the Annoyed Librarian responds with a counter viewpoint.  For example, one interesting blog post called “An Ironic Complaint about Public Libraries” responds to an article about “mission creep” at public libraries.  Libraries are expanding the services they provide beyond just books, and the author of the article complains that this draws undesirables to the library.  Annoyed uses this as a launching pad to rant about conservatives cutting funding for mental health care and homeless shelters.  While this is satisfying, I’m not sure that it’s a great way to respond to someone with a different view point.  Unfortunately, she does not seem to actually engage and debunk the ideas presented in the article.

I will probably continue following both these blogs.  However, I’m much more likely to read a full blog post from Jessamyn than the Annoyed Librarian.  It seems like being raring is much more compelling and readable than being Annoyed.

A Tale of Two Journals

Library science is a profession that requires continuing education and research, with practitioners always trying to create and share best practices with each other.  As librarians do research and learn, often this results in publications in library science journal.  Each journal has its own focus, goals and content.  It can be helpful when doing one’s own writing and research to know which journals to look in for different topics.  In this blog I will compare and contrast the Journal of Library Administration and Public Library Quarterly.

The Journal of Library Administration organizes itself each issue around a theme that they find current and compelling.  The journal itself describes that it hopes that it “communicates important trends and new ideas in management; provides historical perspectives and future projections; reports on the latest technology; reviews and discusses the evaluation and measurement of performance services; deals with cutting-edge issues in financial management and budgeting.”  Their intended audience is library administrators and managers, “anyone who is in a position of management in the library.”  Their entire published articles are reviewed by the editorial board and peers.  Authors are asked to submit original articles electronically to the journal.  Looking at the topics over the last few years, they are wide ranging.  They sometimes focus on a particular kind of library or others they focus on a particular issue or technological development, such as digital humanities or “building blocks of success.”   I am impressed with both the specificity of the articles and the great number of topics they cover.

Public Library Quarterly is more specific, focusing on topics that are important to public librarians.  They want the journal to be for “leaders-directors, managers, staff, trustees, and friends-who believe that change is imperative if public libraries are to fulfill their service missions in the twenty-first century.”  It puts articles through editorial and peer review as a part of its publication process.  They describe the topics they cover as being “best practices and models to improve service; management case studies-with results and failures; library mythologies that retard individual and institutional development; studies of how to plan results and accomplish desired outcomes; marketing and fund-raising tools that work; budget and financial analysis tools and tips; how new technology works in practice; innovative, high-quality programs for children.”  Looking over their last few issues, this seems to be an accurate summary.  It’s a wide range of topics, but certainly is all about public libraries challenges and experiences.  Their editorial board is mostly made up of public library professionals from across the globe, and a few other people who work for businesses that service libraries.  While the Journal of Library Administration seems to mostly to publish long research articles, Public Library Quarterly in its instructions to potential authors that they also take “news of current public library events, and book reviews covering issues of interest to those in public library work. Surveys that can be developed and used as national benchmarks for such administrative concerns as salaries, usage standards, and budget breakdowns are also published.”

In considering which of these journals would be of particular interest or help to me as a future professional, Public Library Quarterly seems much more useful.  While I am interested in library administration, the Journal of Library Administration always has articles about very particular situations.  I feel like I would need to be a manager in a specific situation, like in a health library or a library with budget problems, so get useful information from a particular issue.  Public Library Quarterly does not have a particular theme for each issue, and so it is much more likely that there would be something for everyone whatever their public library situation is.  It was very interesting to look at the variety of things people are writing about now in both journals.  Usually in searching I’m looking for information on a particular subject and looking at a variety of journals.  It’s a very different practice to look through an academic journal issue by issue.