I totally forgot to link to my July column: http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2013/06/opinion/michael-stephens/learning-to-learn-office-hours/ How might staff development days evolve? I was impressed with the activities at Highland Park Public Library, IL, when I spoke at the library’s staff day a couple of years ago. Staff participated in a live, hands-on “passport to technology” program. Stations around the building offered staff members the chance to try out new devices and new web services offered by the library. The Best Buy Geek Squad was in attendance as well, offering encounters with popular and best-selling consumer tech. At each station, employees received a stamp in a […]
Categories Library Jobs & Careers
274 posts
I thoroughly enjoy Brian’s columns at Publisher’s Weekly: http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/libraries/article/58574-how-to-land-a-library-job.html A snip: Let’s get the bad news out of the way first: if you want to be hired as a librarian, get ready to move. Many of you are probably already in a large city or a university town with a library school, plenty of recent graduates, a public library that hasn’t hired anyone since 2008, and academic libraries that are only making part-time appointments. You’re going to need to look nationally, especially to land that first position. This is tough love—the sort I ignored back in the early 1980s. When […]
Honored to have written a third joint column with Aaron Schmidt! http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2013/07/opinion/aaron-schmidt/creating-a-library-lis-feedback-loop/ Recent articles from voices in the field of library and information science (LIS) have questioned the value of the MLIS or pointed toward an uncertain and evolving future. Former LJ editor in chief Michael Kelley’s “Can We Talk About the MLS?” garnered much attention. Kelley argues that the profession should have a serious conversation about the values and merits of formalized, professional LIS education. Is the library degree, in his words, “an expensive and unnecessarily exclusionary credential”? Kelley’s call for discussion is a sound one and is echoed in Brian […]
The Smile Politely blog has posted Freedom of Information Act documents related to the Urbana free Library weeding kerfuffle. http://www.smilepolitely.com/splog/foia_documents_from_ufl_staff/ A snippet: “She also reminded me that our mission was no longer lifelong learning.” I am having trouble processing such a statement. What will happen next? Also, see: http://www.smilepolitely.com/culture/voices_from_urbana_city_council/
Note: This post has been updated with Carol’s updated percentages! Please follow LIS professor Carol Tilley for more on what’s been weeded at The Urbana Free Library! https://twitter.com/CarolGSLIS Follow #bookgate too! Barbara Fister writes about the kerfuffle at Insider Higher Ed: http://www.insidehighered.com//blogs/library-babel-fish/throwing-books-each-other
This blows my mind! http://www.smilepolitely.com/culture/do_you_ever_read_any_of_the_books_you_weed/ Both UFL staff and the public (who were alarmed at the rapidly emptying shelves) spoke out, but the weeding continued until a library board meeting (and Mayor Laurel Prussing) was called. JP Goguen, a university library employee, was at the meeting, recorded it, and sent the recording to me (the board normally does not record meetings). The conversation at this meeting is alarming. Urbana Free Library’s director, Deb Lissak, made a unilateral decision to weed books in the print collection by date alone. It seems that the Adult Services staff’s expertise and knowledge of the […]
In the last three months, I’ve been interviewed about information literacy by two students. One was working on her MLIS and taking her first instruction course. The other was working on a dissertation, and I was a participant in her study on information literacy programs. These interviews started me thinking about what I’d tell new librarians interested in information literacy instruction. Here’s my advice for new instruction librarians entering the profession: At least 50% of being a librarian is building connections with people. Instruction librarians thrive by connecting with faculty members and recognizing how they can help faculty members reach […]
When I left the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at Dominican University and entered the profession, the faculty members did not leave me with answers. They left me with a question, which has driven my career. That question was simply, will libraries exist in the future? At the time, the web was fairly new, and many people argued that libraries had been displaced by this technology. As I entered the profession, this question pushed me forward. Based on the needs of my library, I have followed two paths to answer the question. First, when I started teaching information […]
When, in the early 2000s, you were passionate about your work in libraries, full of ideas and eager to hear others’ ideas about how libraries can best serve their communities, excited about what the future holds for libraries, hungry to discuss this stuff with people who shared these interests, and NOT a librarian or enrolled in library school or headed there, there were two great free channels where you could jump into the fray and educate yourself: listservs and blogs. These tools not only flattened geographies–so librarians from far-flung areas could ideashare– they flattened hierarchies: library paraprofessionals who might never […]
I for got to post last month’s LJ column here at TTW: http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2013/02/opinion/michael-stephens/essential-soft-skills/ I would add other soft skills such as intuition, political awareness, and a willingness to make and learn from our mistakes. Transparency is evolving into an even more clearly defined “full frontal” strategy for some corporations—putting it all out there. We should follow suit. Library schools should teach case studies of failed library systems and initiatives. We must study our failures as much as we study our successes. There seems to be an ongoing unwillingness to do this. But in fact some libraries make bad decisions, and […]