TTW Contributors
-Kyle Jones
Professional Interests:
Kyle’s background in English literature and secondary education motivates his interests in how new digital literacies are framing the way students view the academic world. He sees the Read/Write web as a valid and feasible tool librarians can implement into daily practice, and like Kyle’s fellow contributor below, Lee Leblanc, he too believes that librarianship is undergoing exciting seismic change. Additionally, Kyle sees enormous potential in new avenues of marketing and business models that librarians could tap into to meet their users’ needs and wants from libraries. He blogs about library-related topics at The Corkboard.
Background:
Kyle is a semester-and-a-half away from graduating from Dominican University’s (River Forest, IL) Graduate School of Library and Information Science and an undergraduate alumni of Elmhurst College (Elmhurst, IL) (also read: he’ll need a real job soon). His interest in librarianship as a career began after he was introduced to Library Land in an undergraduate course entitled Great Chicago Libraries. As for his technology background, Kyle used Read/Write Web technologies such as RSS feeds and blogs during his student teaching experience and saw first hand how innovative ways of information gathering and sharing had positively affected students’ academic lives.
Workplace:
Kyle works full-time as the Library Technology Assistant at the A.C. Buehler Library at Elmhurst College with innovative librarians and staff members. Duties of the position ebb and flow from day-to-day but generally include maintenance of all library technologies and various opportunities to teach technology skills to students, faculty, and staff. While his views and opinions may be drawn from some of his work experience, they are his own and do not reflect upon his colleagues or his workplace.
edited: 9/25/2008
Personal Pursuits:
Kyle is an avid auto racing enthusiast, rider of a very sweet single speed bike, reader, and lover of coffee.
-Lee LeBlanc
Professional interests:
Lee’s main interests are leadership within libraries, the strategic use of technology in libraries and the innovative services libraries must employ. These three areas, Lee feels, are what will increase the relevancy in users’ lives. Lee agrees with Mr. Jones that libraries can harvest the best business practices currently in use without becoming heartless, without losing focus of the missions of libraries, and while adhering to ethical standards. Recently, Lee has come to understand that you don’t choose libraries, Libraries choose you. Lee ultimately believes that libraries are in a great age of change; now is the time to invent a new kind of library.
Background:
At work on a Masters of Information Science with concentrations in Information Architecture and Technology, Lee attends the College of Information at Florida State University. Lee’s work career has been varied, dynamic, and stress-filled. Having a librarian as a mentor after he got out of the military and worked through his undergrad, he developed a deep appreciation for what libraries could do for individuals and their communities.
Workplace:
Lee works full-time in Reference and Technology at Florida Gulf Coast University Library. Answering questions at the reference desk, guiding lost patrons in the library, and wrangling hard drives are just a few of Lee’s tasks everyday. Any stories Lee shares do not reflect criticisms or practices of his current employer and all conversations you read are sanitized to protect his peers in the field. This means you can contact Lee with absolute anonymity.
Personal pursuits:
Photography, graphic novels, martial arts, vegetarianism, libraries, and Buddhism rank as major time sinks. You’ll find Lee a bunch of places online but flickr is where he hangs out most. Lee also throws-up some blog posts on Bibliodox. Lee also likes microblogging for his fascinating personal life.
