How much longer will libraries need librarians?

This morning I visited LISNews and found a post, “The future of libraries - no MLS needed?” written by Christopher Kiess, an Ohio hospital librarian. Kiess speculates whether the nature of library work, public library work in particular, has changed so significantly that the MLS degree won’t be seen as important for work in a library much longer.

Here’s his core argument:

The library is becoming less and less of an entity requiring an MLS degreed person to manage it. As cataloging becomes outsourced, clerks become prevalent and we see a variety of other disciplines working in a library, the MLS becomes devalued. I had a respected colleague suggest to me not too long ago that a public library requires an MBA more than an MLS. I would agree. What is at issue here is the skill set of the librarian and that is a central factor in whether we can save our profession.

Kiess says that as long as people in the Google era conceive of the major function of a librarian as helping people find books, CDs, or DVDs on the shelf - even if it’s the “right” book, or CD, or DVD - they’re not seeing us as much different from the non-MLS’ed clerks at Borders. The difference comes in the full variety of services we provide. Librarians who serve youth can make the argument that because libraries are about literacy, and that because we are trained in the ages and stages of literacy, we can offer advice and counseling to parents, teachers, and children that goes beyond what a bookstore clerk can provide.

In the 21st century, every child needs to know how to read well to be successful. The pressure on our schools to make all children literate will only grow as the years pass, and libraries play an essential supporting role, even when the Net seems to have stolen away much of our old “homework-support” function. We’re the ones leading the way in setting babies, toddlers, and preschoolers on that road, and we support kids’ reading through the summers. (And - see below - gaming may increase our future role with teens.) I think the argument will, in the long run, be tougher to prove for librarians working with adults.

That means, of course, that we all need to be making noise. We need to be offering programming that pulls literacy together with the materials in our collections. Youth librarians need to be offering “literacy counseling” to parents who come in and ask us questions about the best materials for their children. We need to be more than the greeters that some public libraries seem to be moving their staff toward.

Oh - and here’s a great piece of news that’s exactly the kind of thing that needs to happen. I’ve crabbed a bit in the past about why we’re doing so many gaming programs in libraries for teens, when the relationship between gaming and literacy isn’t - at least for my curmudgeonly self - clear. Here’s an ALA press release announcing that the Verizon Foundation has awarded ALA a $1 million (!) grant to develop best practices for gaming activities in libraries. Here’s what it says:

“Gaming is a magnet that attracts library users of all types and, beyond its entertainment value, has proven to be a powerful tool for literacy and learning,” said ALA President Loriene Roy. “Through the Verizon Foundation’s gift, ALA’s gaming for learning project will provide the library community with vital information and resources that will model and help sustain effective gaming programs and services.”

I hope we do get some good ideas and programs out of this grant. Anything that builds the link between literacy and libraries in the collective mind of the public is exactly what we need to demonstrate that librarians do essential, professional-level work.

 

Session at ALA on the future of libraries

Oops… right after I said I wouldn’t write any more about the ALA conference, I read an article on the Library Journal site about a session on the future of libraries that I felt I needed to mention, even if it (superficially) had nothing to do with youth work.

The thrust of the session, which happened when I hadn’t yet arrived in Anaheim, appeared to be that librarians must feel that they’re out of the “books and materials as objects” business, and instead in the “ideas business.” The assertion intrigues me; for the average urban or suburban branch library - I’ve spent most of my career in branch libraries - day-to-day existence is totally wrapped up in books and DVDs and fines and storytimes. Nothing grand at all, and almost all of it more concrete than abstract.

I’ve always believed that libraries are in the literacy business. We don’t teach people how to read, but we do just about everything else that supports literacy and celebrates it. We need to keep that as our focus. Literacy hasn’t gone out of style - it’s more important than ever. As long as we don’t lose sight of that role in our culture, we are about as cutting-edge as you can get.

But I don’t think that these speakers were talking about aiding and abetting literacy. So I’m interested in seeing what these grand, on-the-edge ideas could be. I feel as if the issue surrounding “the future of libraries” - public libraries, anyway - is simpler; we need to learn what our users want in 2008 and provide those things. We also need to learn what the people who don’t use us need in the way of media or services that focus on literacy and do our best to provide those things, too.

I was particularly interested, though, in reading what Stephen Abram of SirsiDynix had to say about librarians, and their drive to remain anonymous:

“If we want to be treated as professionals,” he said, librarians shouldn’t wear badges that say merely “Librarian” without their name. He mocked those who say, “I don’t want to tell anybody my name, I might be stalked,” suggesting it doesn’t occur to workers at Wal-Mart.  If you want to be treated like a professional, you have start acting like one,” he said.

He asked how many attendees offered pictures of the staff on their library web sites? Few raised their hands. “Since when is the value in libraries in the books, not in the people?” he asked. “I want to see our whole profession where everybody’s Nancy Pearl on steroids.”

If you work in a library, you know how controversial what he said is. I note that Abram is male, which in this context is critical. Nor does he work with the public. I wonder whether more than a minority of female librarians would support what he says above.

I have witnessed several fellow librarians harassed by “weird guys” who are regular (um, too regular, if you know what I mean) library users, and spoken to many more who have suffered earlier in their careers from a little too much attention. Public libraries - particularly their adult services departments - are filled with  customers who haven’t been taking their meds.

On the other hand, I totally agree with Abram - we do need to have our names out there in front of the public (and yes, on the library Web site, too), and be proud of who we are and what we do. We do need to be more professionally assertive. I’ve always worn my full name on my badge proudly. But then, I’m male and I’ve never been harassed.

The fact remains that we’ll be most successful if we step away from anonymity. “We need to think bigger,” several of the speakers agreed, and I think so, too. Librarians - especially those who aren’t children’s or YA librarians - tend not to want to make too much noise or attract too much attention to themselves, but we need to change that. Children’s and YA librarians need to repeat the words, “We make literacy fun!” over and over. “Can’t find the information you want? We can!” is good, too.

We need to show everyone in every city and suburb and small town what we can do to make kids want to connect themselves with literacy in all its forms, but especially with the printed word - whether that printed word is online or on a page. We need to say it and show it a thousand different ways. That’s the best kind of future for all of us in youth work.

 

Huh? An “automated librarian machine”?

China has been showing off its technological wonders as it gears up for the Beijing Olympics this summer. Among those wonders is an “automated librarian machine” that issues library cards and lets citizens of the booming factory city of Shenzhen check out books and other media without entering an actual library building. In other words, the machines are teeny automated branches.

Evidently once these machines are installed throughout the city, cardholders will be able to place a book or DVD on reserve and it will be delivered to that machine in a matter of days. The article says:

“It’s really convenient. It only took 16 seconds to issue a book card [library card?], and half a minute to eject books,” a local library patron surnamed La told the newspaper after testing the machine near the library.

Readers can also reserve books through the library Web site or the machine. Once the book is available, the reader will receive a text message, and the book will be delivered to the self-service machines closest to the reader.

These machines hold 400 books or other materials, and users can search the catalog to place things on hold, or borrow one of the high-demand items (at least I assume that if you ran a 400-volume library, you’d have only high-demand items) in the machine for anyone to borrow. I also assume a delivery truck would reload the machine daily.

I’m amused by the fact that it’s called a “librarian machine.” The only librarians involved here are probably doing the planning in the Shenzhen Library. As far as services to children, sure - this machine can deliver materials needed for school assignments (if kids or parents know exactly what material they need), or easy readers, or Thomas the Tank Engine videos. But it can’t do a storytime or make recommendations as to what to read next.

 

The state of libraries: “funding down, but gaming up”

It’s National Library Week (April 13 - 19), and here’s a story on the International Herald Tribune site about ALA’s 2008 “State of America’s Libraries” report. ALA President Loriene Roy told the Associated Press that while school libraries in particular continue to struggle with small budgets, many libraries serving teens have been reaching out successfully with gaming events.

In the story, Roy does admit she knows one Texas librarian “who prefers to focus on books,” but boy, that librarian is seen as a fossil in this piece. Roy raves about how great it is that everyone’s gaming in the libraries:

“I actually know a lot of librarians who are terrific at ‘Guitar Hero,’” Roy said, adding that “people who come to play these games often can’t afford them at home. And what better place to try these out than at a library?”

Roy cited gaming as a positive trend during a difficult time. In recent years, school libraries in particular have struggled to offer more services with less money. Average funding per student dropped from $19.14 in 1999-2000 to $13.67 in 2003-2004. Roy said financial support has probably decreased further in the past few years.

What do I think as I read this piece? Warning: I’m feeling curmudgeonly today:

The 2008 “State of America’s Libraries” doesn’t seem to be available yet (Sunday 4/13) on ALA’s site, but I’m curious to come back and look for it tomorrow. On the whole, this past year hasn’t been a good one for libraries, with increasing numbers of folks from outside the world of libraries implying in blogs, letters to the editor, and other media outlets that libraries have pretty much run their course in our culture, and that the Net can take over from here, thanks.

Not that I believe that’s really true; I simply think we need to be concentrating our thought more intently on how we can explain why libraries are a good thing. Even the video gaming sessions seem to me to be kind of a desperate justification of falling all over ourselves providing something that has nothing to do with our core role - or more precisely, what our public sees as our core role - simply because that’s what teens want.

Isn’t a library’s main reason for existing to supply accurate, fun, and/or stimulating information and literacy-oriented recreation to folks, and to provide the fuel for literacy? I’ve presented a zillion programs for kids and adults over the years, but they’ve always had a tie to literacy. That’s always been my reason for working in this job. (I’ve always avoided presenting craft programs for kids unless I feel that the literacy tie is strong enough.)

Are we really doing anything to tie video gaming and literacy together? I haven’t seen it; I’ve simply seen us holding gaming sessions because that’s what gets teens - boys in particular - excited enough to come in and participate in a library-sponsored activity, thus racking up the numbers we need for our monthly stats.

Librarians who are fans of gaming programs keep saying that teens are lured in by gaming, and once they’re through the door, those teens use the library in more traditional ways. But is there any documentation for this claim? All I keep seeing are anecdotes. Are teens who come in for games actually checking things out? I’ve rarely seen it myself. I hope someone will do a study one day soon of how well gaming works as a draw to get teens to check things out - especially things with pages and print.

Boy oh boy, I’ll bet I sound old-fashioned. But I don’t think I am.

Curmudgeon switch, off. Now I feel better. I think I’ll go play my uke for a while.

 

The problem with e-books

Over the weekend I found this story on e-books on the Gizmodo blog (please ignore the crude graphic) that reminds us that the e-book files we download don’t really belong to us the way a 3-D book does. If we buy an Amazon Kindle or Sony Reader device, for example, and “purchase” the electronic book files from the online bookstore, we can’t sell them to someone else. We can’t even move them to other electronic devices we own.

The non-portability of electronic books is the publishing industry’s response to music piracy. While music has long been available without digital rights management (DRM) protections, publishers made certain early on that all bestsellers - or even books that might by some remote chance become bestsellers - are so heavily locked down that they can’t be printed or moved between devices. J.K. Rowling’s attorneys have refused to allow her publishers to release any of the Harry Potter books as e-books.

The only e-book files without this kind of DRM protection are public domain e-book files - the kind found through the Project Gutenberg Web site - and those voluntarily released by their creators through the Creative Commons strategy.

The Gizmodo post discusses what you get when you “buy” an e-book:

In the fine print that you “agree” to, Amazon and Sony say you just get a license to the e-books—you’re not paying to own ‘em, in spite of the use of the term “buy.” Digital retailers say that the first sale doctrine—which would let you hawk your old Harry Potter hardcovers on eBay—no longer applies. Your license to read the book is unlimited, though—so even if Amazon or Sony changed technologies, dropped the biz or just got mad at you, they legally couldn’t take away your purchases. Still, it’s a license you can’t sell.

But is the license truly legal? Here we’re on the cutting edge of the legal system. When you buy a 3-D book you can turn around and sell it. The legal consultants Gizmodo checked with say that it’s very possible for “buyers” of e-books to resell them or (attention, library folks) lend them. I think we have a way to go before the legal rights of e-book “owners” have been fully determined.

 

“Most Modern Library in the World”

Have you visited Jenny Levine’s “Shifted Librarian” blog and seen the DOK? We would call it the Delft (Netherlands) Public Library, but Levine writes that those who manage it named it that way “on purpose to get away from the traditional stereotypes of the public library, because the institution they’ve created is about as far away as you can get from the connotation of a 1950s building, filled with quiet people, all of them sitting alone, in a relatively dreary building, being shushed by an old lady with a bun.”

It is an exceedingly cool library, in that European-geometric-shapes-and-colors sort of way, and the library director appears to go (?) by the solo name of Eppo (plus he wears a fright wig and clown glasses, at least in Levine’s photo).

Of course I wanted to see the kids’ area. It looks flexible and lots of fun, with shelves that can be rolled around to create play and programming spaces. And talk about video games - look at the picture! Go to Levine’s DOK Library Concept Center Flickr page and take the DOK tour.

 

So exactly why is it that librarians are professionals?

The Monkey heaves a big sigh of disillusionment after checking LISNews and finding this link to an official statement from Elizabeth Buchanan, Director of the Center for Information Policy Research of the School of Information Studies of the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. The statement is undoubtedly responding (although Buchanan doesn’t directly say so) to the Marathon County (WI) Public Library controversy, in which four $46,000/year Librarian I positions were demoted to $36,000/year “Customer Services Librarian” positions.

It’s pretty clear that the demotions came about because the library profession struggles to come up with a clear description of exactly what the bearers of an MLS - or MIS, or whatever our degree is called now - who aren’t managers do in the Google era that makes them professionals. Buchanan, unfortunately, gives us very little to work with. (And to those who might be reading this who are library paraprofessionals - don’t worry, I’m not dissing you; I believe paraprofessionals are essential folks in every library. But this “Why is a library ‘professional’ really a professional?” discussion has been going on for decades, and I feel we’re at a critical tipping point.)

Here’s a sample of what Buchanan says:

We firmly believe that the role of a professional librarian should be valued, and, should be compensated appropriately as other professional degrees are. The value of professional librarians, and the complex work they do, should be taken very seriously. Libraries are indeed a public good, bridging information rich and poor and providing unfettered access to information. Professionally trained librarians, in collaboration with other library workers, benefit all members in a community.

Um, yeah, but what is it that the new holder of an MLS does, exactly? Am I missing something here?

Until we can clearly state, at a time when the Internet threatens our professional status, why we deserve to be considered professionals, it is going to be rough for us to let folks know what we do. As a librarian who serves young people and their parents, caregivers, and teachers, I know what I do:

I can make the printed word exciting for the youngest child, binding stories, songs, and rhymes together. I can persuade children to want to pick up a book, even when there are computer screens flashing all around. I can sell a book to a classroom of skeptical middle-schoolers. I can tell stories from different cultures and connect them to those cultures’ literature. I can find the information - whether on the Net, in a book, or somewhere else - that will help a young person write a paper or finish a homework assignment. Technology alone can’t connect with young people the way a living, breathing person can.

And you know that if you’re a youth librarian, you can do all this stuff, too. These skills are what make you a professional. The parents and teachers we work with regularly know what we can do. We simply need to make sure we let everyone - in particular the folks who don’t see us at work every day with young people - know why our jobs are critical to keeping each new generation of kids literate.

 

Here’s proof we need to formulate a critical need for libraries in the Internet Era

Whoa. No sooner had I posted the story below on the Marathon County Public Library and our urgent need to explain better to the general public why librarians need graduate degrees in the era of the Internet, than my wife forwarded me this article from the Gainesville (FL) Sun, an opinion piece called “Pull the plug on the library.” It’s by a library-hating fellow named George Elmore.

Elmore says that libraries have outlived their usefulness in the Internet Era; he wants to shut them down, whether they have professional librarians in them or not. Here’s a brief quote:

Historically the public library has been a valued research institution, and has served that purpose admirably. But no more. With the advent of the Internet and Google, virtually no serious research is carried on in the library stacks.

He calls his local Alachua County Library District “Alachua County’s version of Terri Schiavo, and life support is costing us nearly $20 million each year.”

I’ve heard lots of folks, particularly those who aren’t library users, say similar things about libraries, and I’m concerned that their numbers are growing. We had better get busy formulating better explanations of what we do post-Google, and why we do it.

 

Still more on the Marathon County Library “customer service” librarian demotions

I’m moving on soon (I promise) from this story, but it has upset me - and other librarians I’ve discussed it with - enough that I feel as if I need to link to one more story from Wisconsin. It’s a column from, natch, the Wausau Daily Herald, written by Gina Cornell, president of the Marathon County Public Library Board. Evidently MCPL has felt under fire from librarians, particularly Wisconsin librarians, who are letting everyone know online that they’re upset about the four Librarian I positions (one vacant) that were devalued from salaries of $46,000 to “customer services librarians” paid $36,000 annually.

Cornell attempts to blame what happened at the library primarily on the MCPL’s budget problems, and she doesn’t seem to realize that it’s a hurtful devaluation of the profession:

For example, the reduced amount of work requiring a master’s degree is a direct result of increased electronic access to information they previously provided. In 2007, only about 57 percent of the reference (complex) questions from the past year were handled at the Adult Reference Desk. This seems to be a trend based on increasing access to the Internet.

This movement is taking place all over the country, causing many libraries to re-examine and restructure how information services are being provided by library staff.

But here’s the kicker:

While the education and experience of our three existing MLS employees is valued and appreciated, the reorganization plan will put the library in a better position to appropriately serve our customer base as the trends in information services recognize that many people have a significant skill level and can obtain their own information to a great extent.

Yeah, the Board is telling the librarians, you’re valued and appreciated; you’re just valued and appreciated less.

This doesn’t make logical sense to me. If as many librarians aren’t needed because people are finding their own information, why not simply eliminate the professional term “librarian” from their job titles, not require an MLS degree from applicants, and call them “customer services specialists” or something? I suspect that the director and board chickened out from this obvious choice, since they would have had to lay off three people with degrees.

This situation leads me to ask us all a question: What, exactly, do public library professionals who aren’t managers do in the Internet Era that makes them professionals? Can we describe to the general public any longer why we need graduate degrees to hold our jobs? Sometimes I wonder whether we can. I know that there are plenty of “reference librarians” who now are spending far more time helping people with balky public-access PCs and printers than they do answering reference questions or doing reader’s advisory tasks. Very few of us are selecting books and media any more.

I, of course, believe that children’s librarians should have the least to fear from this kind of devaluation, since our jobs are the least technology-intensive, particularly our work with children under 8 and their caregivers and teachers. The more active we are in our work promoting pre-literacy skills and modeling how to share them with young children, the clearer our role becomes to the public. But I know that many people in the world of libraries don’t see things the way I do.

How should we be changing our jobs and explaining our jobs so that we’re clearly professionals in the eyes of the general public again?

 

Will libraries die in the Age of Google?

Slate, the online magazine, is featuring a slide show about the architecture of urban libraries over the last few decades called, “Borrowed Time: How do you build a public library in the Age of Google?” It’s another one of those “Cough, hack, libraries are dying out” pieces, featuring some really well-done photos of recently built libraries in downtown Chicago, San Francisco, Seattle (pictured here), and Salt Lake City, with a brief essay by Witold Rybczynski.

But here, from the final paragraph, is the kernel of the slide-show article. Rybczynski tells us:

Ross Dawson, a business consultant who tracks different customs, devices, and institutions on what he calls an Extinction Timeline, predicts that libraries will disappear in 2019. He’s probably right as far as the function of the library as a civic monument, or as a public repository for books, is concerned. On the other hand, in its mutating role as urban hangout, meeting place, and arbiter of information, the public library seems far from spent. This has less to do with the digital world—or the digital word—than with the age-old need for human contact.

Why 2019, I wonder? Why not 2018 or 2020? (And hey, Dawson also predicts that blogging will die out in 2022.) And if librarians will focus more and more on “human contact” and managing an “urban hangout” as the years pass, were the managers of Wisconsin’s Marathon County Public Library right to demote its Librarian I’s to “customer services librarians”?

I don’t think so, and here’s part of the reason why - the needs of young people and their parents-caregivers-teachers. As you might expect, there’s no mention of services to young people in the article. (Writers about “libraries” as a concept and a building, rather than the services libraries provide, never seem to think about children and teens using the library much, do they?) I’ve been telling anyone who will listen every time I’ve given a presentation that “libraries” have never been buildings, even though many members of the public think of them that way. They’re the services and materials we staff people provide and manage for the public, in those buildings and out of them.

Yes, we may no longer need vast downtown “temples” dedicated to information two decades from now. But you don’t need a temple to read Millions of Cats and Where is the Green Sheep? aloud to a group of 30 preschoolers.

I’m willing to bet that the need for what we library staffers do - managing information, helping people find what they need, and helping folks young and old who need assistance making themselves literate and educating themselves - won’t go away. And we’ll need places people can gather to interact, have fun, and share. (And host storytellers and puppeteers and singers.) I believe strongly that as long as parents want children who are literate, and as long as young people want to gain culture, there will be a place for libraries, of some kind and in some shape.