Category: Library School

Working online – Library school, committee work, work work, it’s all the same.

Today, Drexel (my alma mater), has an interesting post on their einsights blog, where they discuss different issues surrounding online/distance education. Today, they tackle common mistakes online students make and how to avoid them. The mistakes are:

  • Assuming online is easy
  • Poor time management
  • Communication breakdown
  • Not utilizing available resources
  • Not staying connected
  • Taking on too much too soon

I really identified with many of these mistakes, though by then end I think I had it figured out. I knew how to fit it into my life and understood that I had to really take the time and make the effort to stay on top of everything. I really think that these are useful tips to remember for any student, not just online students. (OK, save for maybe the first one?)

The thing is, these tips don’t stop being relevant when you graduate. In fact, I’ve seen how valuable the lessons of my online education have been for me as I work and collaborate with my colleagues from around the world. I know it’s going to be extra work, but it’s not impossible. I wonder, as more and more people graduate with online degrees, will professional online collaboration be more effective? It could happen. I know from my experience, it took time for people to warm up to the online environment. I had spent years chatting online and using message boards to communicate, so it was a fairly easy switch. You could tell some of my cohort struggled to figure out how to use the medium. It’s the same with using listservs, blogs, wikis, and other venues to communicate. If people aren’t comfortable with it, they won’t use it. So we have to work together, and then hopefully something good will come of it.

More on getting hired: It’s not passion, people!

I’ve confessed to being addicted to HR blogs in the past. One of my favourites, nö, my favourite is The Cynical Girl Laurie Ruettimann. Tonight’s she’s giving a presentation at NC State about getting a job after you graduation.

How To Get A Job: It Has Nothing To Do With Passion

I liked it. Particularly her main points:

  • Have a skill or two
  • Demonstrate a work ethic
  • Take pride in your work
  • Tell a better story
  • Rethink passion

All job applicants should have these in the back of their mind throughout the application and hiring process. I’ve witnessed acquaintances/colleagues/people I’ve interviewed falter on several of these points, which definitely makes for a less than compelling candidate. The interesting, and perhaps more controversial point is the last one. Ruettimann has pissed on the dreams of passionate new-grads before, but she makes a good point.

Don’t let your passion get in the way of a paycheck. You can work 8 hours at a crappy job and still have 16 hours/day to sleep, eat, poop, shower, and work on your passion.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t be one of those people who is all consumed by your profession (whatever it may be), OK actually I probably am, but I also think at some point you need to divorce your self the individual from your self the worker. Not that you can’t be an individual and a worker, but when times are tough and you need a paycheck, you might have to make that split. No harm in that, just reality folks.

So what’s that mean for librarians? (Since I know this blog has to tie everything back to libraries…) Recognize it’s a job. A special job that sometimes we take to cult like levels, but it’s still a job. I love what I do. I really like my field and I’m quite happy I fell into it. That said, I really hope this doesn’t define me. I would like to think there’s more to me than transportation information, but if my colleagues and customers don’t know that, it’s fine. I’ll bore my partner with the latest and greatest Sheffield Wednesday drama. If you, like me, are one of the several humanities grads needing a job, focus on the job not the subject. It will get you places and give you money to spend on your passion.

I got a degree so I could fix the printer?

Yeah, it’s that old topic again. You know, the “should you ever bother with the MLIS?” problem. Only slightly different. In this version it’s the “I got the MLIS so I shouldn’t be expected to do that” argument. Andy Woodworth sort of stepped in it with his post The Masters Degree Misperception. He writes:

It is a disservice to the education, to the degree, and to the profession when the bulk of a librarian’s daily tasks could be performed by someone with a GED. It does not take a master’s degree to place a hold on a book, clear a copier, push in chairs, tell people they are being loud, shelve items, or other similar tasks. When librarians are seen doing this and then told there is an advanced degree requirement, there is a reasoning dissonance that occurs in the outside observer.

You should go read it. It’s interesting, but not entirely on point. I like that it’s a more nuanced version of “what’s the point” with a little bit of elitism thrown in. You know that feeling, “I got my masters for this?” (Or maybe you don’t?) You should also read Emily Lloyd’s response, which I also enjoyed.

Now of course, I have to make it about me because isn’t everything about me? (That’s supposed to be a joke.) This week our student employees have had erratic schedules because it’s the first week of classes and they’re getting their own situations settled. As a result, I have spent quite a bit of time checking books out, putting holds on things, and fixing the printer. Did I go to grad school to do any of these? (Maybe the printer since it was a networking issue one of the times…) Not exactly, but I did go to grad school to be a good librarian and make our library a better, more service oriented space. If that means slumming on the circ desk, so be it. I say slumming it with sarcasm, because I think it’s really important to understand your patron’s experience with all aspects of the library.

Andy tries to soothe things over a bit with language about how his idea really can only be applied to large libraries, but I’m not buying it so much. So the degree should mean you’re only involved with planning and management and high level research? Then how will you stay connected with your users? It’s been a growing trend where more and more degreed librarians are being taken off the reference desks and given office hours instead. It’s got to suck to be taken away from the users like that. I love the fact that I spend 20 hours a week on a reference desk looking out to a library full of students and really getting an idea of what they’re doing. Even if it means that a lot of my interactions with them are for things that don’t really require my degree, it benefits me a lot as a professional.

Online Education – When the Ivory Tower goes to Bits



reading, originally uploaded by kendrak.

(That’s me, lo almost 4 years ago doing course work for my online MSLIS/MSIS program.)

I’ve never been able to (or really tried) to hide the fact that I went to school online. Was it my first choice? Not exactly, but given my options and my field I think it was the best choice for me at the time. I was worried that somehow my degree would be considered less worthy by my colleagues, but that hasn’t been the case. I still get the weird looks when people make the connection that “attended” a school in Philadelphia whilst living and working in Berkeley, but they get over it quickly. So that’s my background – I am a product of online education, as are several talented librarians. It’s hard to ignore that for many areas, it’s the only option for library school.

There has been a lot of discussion and angst about online programs recently in the area. University of California’s Commission on the Future is looking at ways to maintain access to education in the face budget woes, and they seem to determined that online education is the answer. The pilot is supposed to start with online courses that are required at all the campuses, which makes sense on an economies of scale thing. The Daily Cal and SF Chronicle have talked about it. It’s clear from the mood on campus that people are not happy at the thought. It’s clear that UC is thinking more students means more money, and there are legitimate concerns about the quality of education, but it could help make UC affordable and possible for many students who would otherwise qualify, if it were not for cost. Just yesterday it was announced that fewer Latinos were admitted this past year, while out of state admissions saw a jump. It’s related, naturally.

Then today University Diaries reported about a story in Georgia, where a student is accused of taking tests in online courses for a fraternity. Margaret Soltan’s concern is that with online courses you have no way to verify the students are who they say they are, and why she refers to online education as poor white trash. I can’t really tell how tongue-in-cheek it’s meant to be, being educated in poor white trash manner, but then again I’m not really trying to be too much of an academic. I am in the quasi-ghetto of the library after all.

Regardless, I think there is good reason to be concerned with how academia proceeds with online courses, but that doesn’t make online education and distance learning the end of civilization or the worst thing on the planet. I don’t think Drexel was like the University of Phoenix. (Or maybe I’m lying to myself?) I can’t imagine whatever UC ends up doing will be like something like they advertise in those catchy/annoying Education Connection commercials. I also wonder how much of the concern is legitimate concern for the quality of education for the students, and how much of it is concern about change. Maybe I would feel differently if I took the other path where I because a professor of Historical Germanic Linguistics, and I would be up at arms about how we are ruining the academy. I wish the criticism of online education didn’t have that tinge of elitism that tends to be so entrenched in higher education.

Honestly, when I think about people getting online degrees I think of my classmates. Most of us were either working full-time or raising families and working part-time. The flexibility of the program allowed us to continue to do so and only take out loans for tuition. There are lots of bright students who simply can’t afford to go to university with the current model, yet we as a society keep telling them that college is the answer. We need to change the message I guess.