What your job title is, and what that means: I am a Reference and Teen Services Librarian. This means I am responsible for all teen collection development and programming, coordinating volunteers, ordering books, computer maintenance, answering reference questions, cataloging, working with periodicals and databases, reading professional journals such as Publisher's Weekly, and generally making sure the library doesn't collapse.
A description of a typical day: To start, I check email, process ILL requests, and fix whatever horrors the patrons visited on our 17 public-use computers between now and the time I left yesterday afternoon. As the teen librarian, I'm expected to keep up with current trends, so I read Rolling Stone, Seventeen, Entertainment Weekly, and newspapers at the ref desk in addition to my professional journals. I read my friends page throughout the day, because I'm subscribed to six library and information science (LIS) related feeds, including lisnews2 and catalogablog. I read the Search Day Newsletter from
[Error: Irreparable invalid markup ('<a [...] http://www.voya.com">') in entry. Owner must fix manually. Raw contents below.]
Hope it's not too late to help out!
<b>What your job title is, and what that means</b>: I am a Reference and Teen Services Librarian. This means I am responsible for all teen collection development and programming, coordinating volunteers, ordering books, computer maintenance, answering reference questions, cataloging, working with periodicals and databases, reading professional journals such as Publisher's Weekly, and generally making sure the library doesn't collapse.
<b>A description of a typical day</b>: To start, I check email, process ILL requests, and fix whatever horrors the patrons visited on our 17 public-use computers between now and the time I left yesterday afternoon. As the teen librarian, I'm expected to keep up with current trends, so I read Rolling Stone, Seventeen, Entertainment Weekly, and newspapers at the ref desk in addition to my professional journals. I read my friends page throughout the day, because I'm subscribed to six library and information science (LIS) related feeds, including <lj site="livejournal.com" user="lisnews2"> and <lj site="livejournal.com" user="catalogablog">. I read the Search Day Newsletter from <a href="http://www.searchenginewatch.com>Search Engine Watch</a>, and read the YALSA-BK listserv, the premier list for YA librarians and YA lit. I also write reviews for <a href="http://www.voya.com">Voice of Youth Advocates</a> and <a href="http://www.bookreporter.com">BookReporter.com</a>.
<b>What you need in the way of training/education/experience to do this job</b>: You need a Master's degree to become a librarian, and it has to be a Master of Library and Information Science from a school accredited by the <a href="http://www.ala.org">American Library Association</a>. For my Master's, I had to take courses in cataloging, information retrieval, the history of libraries and information science, public library management,young adult resources, adult collection development, marketing for libraries, information ethics, and others. I did lots of field work as a children's librarian while I was in grad school, and that helped me land a job after graduation.
<b>Why you like it and (if you dare)</b>: What's not to love? In a time where there is so much information available, it is the librarian's responsibility to be the liasion between the information and the end user, directing people to what they need. I don't care what they say, the whole world is NOT available through Google, though it is the web's best search engine. Information must be organized so it can be easily accessed, and it is the librarian's job to do that, as well as defend intellectual freedom and the right of all people to access any information they want. Plus, you know, there's the book aspect :) Being a librarian appeals to many aspects of who I am: literate, organized, a voice against censorship, an advocate for teens and their needs.
<b>Why you dislike it</b>: The pay is an absolute insult. Librarians make an average of $15,000 a year less than people in different fields with the same amount of education and experience.
<b>What sorts of things can go wrong at your job?</b> On a typical day, computers crash, books are not on the shelf where they're supposed to be, and there are patrons who think that because they pay taxes, they have a right to treat you like dirt. If our computer system goes down, it's very difficult to find books, because our card catalog is online. We could get a patron complaining about a book, or have a parent who is so convinced that their first-grader is ready to read <u>War and Peace</u> that they won't listen to professional advice on appropriate books. Books get lost, or shelved wrong, and are impossible to find.
<b>What kind of person thrives in your job</b>: You have to be patient, love books, love the thrill of hunting for information, be literate, well-organized, keep up on current events, and believe in equality among all patrons regardless of age, class, etc.
<b>Anything else you can think of that would give her an idea of what it might be like to choose your career?</b> As the way receive information changes, libraries have to keep up. Be open to change, though others may resist it. And read.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2003-04-24 07:46 am (UTC)What your job title is, and what that means: I am a Reference and Teen Services Librarian. This means I am responsible for all teen collection development and programming, coordinating volunteers, ordering books, computer maintenance, answering reference questions, cataloging, working with periodicals and databases, reading professional journals such as Publisher's Weekly, and generally making sure the library doesn't collapse.
A description of a typical day: To start, I check email, process ILL requests, and fix whatever horrors the patrons visited on our 17 public-use computers between now and the time I left yesterday afternoon. As the teen librarian, I'm expected to keep up with current trends, so I read Rolling Stone, Seventeen, Entertainment Weekly, and newspapers at the ref desk in addition to my professional journals. I read my friends page throughout the day, because I'm subscribed to six library and information science (LIS) related feeds, including
<b>What your job title is, and what that means</b>: I am a Reference and Teen Services Librarian. This means I am responsible for all teen collection development and programming, coordinating volunteers, ordering books, computer maintenance, answering reference questions, cataloging, working with periodicals and databases, reading professional journals such as Publisher's Weekly, and generally making sure the library doesn't collapse.
<b>A description of a typical day</b>: To start, I check email, process ILL requests, and fix whatever horrors the patrons visited on our 17 public-use computers between now and the time I left yesterday afternoon. As the teen librarian, I'm expected to keep up with current trends, so I read Rolling Stone, Seventeen, Entertainment Weekly, and newspapers at the ref desk in addition to my professional journals. I read my friends page throughout the day, because I'm subscribed to six library and information science (LIS) related feeds, including <lj site="livejournal.com" user="lisnews2"> and <lj site="livejournal.com" user="catalogablog">. I read the Search Day Newsletter from <a href="http://www.searchenginewatch.com>Search Engine Watch</a>, and read the YALSA-BK listserv, the premier list for YA librarians and YA lit. I also write reviews for <a href="http://www.voya.com">Voice of Youth Advocates</a> and <a href="http://www.bookreporter.com">BookReporter.com</a>.
<b>What you need in the way of training/education/experience to do this job</b>: You need a Master's degree to become a librarian, and it has to be a Master of Library and Information Science from a school accredited by the <a href="http://www.ala.org">American Library Association</a>. For my Master's, I had to take courses in cataloging, information retrieval, the history of libraries and information science, public library management,young adult resources, adult collection development, marketing for libraries, information ethics, and others. I did lots of field work as a children's librarian while I was in grad school, and that helped me land a job after graduation.
<b>Why you like it and (if you dare)</b>: What's not to love? In a time where there is so much information available, it is the librarian's responsibility to be the liasion between the information and the end user, directing people to what they need. I don't care what they say, the whole world is NOT available through Google, though it is the web's best search engine. Information must be organized so it can be easily accessed, and it is the librarian's job to do that, as well as defend intellectual freedom and the right of all people to access any information they want. Plus, you know, there's the book aspect :) Being a librarian appeals to many aspects of who I am: literate, organized, a voice against censorship, an advocate for teens and their needs.
<b>Why you dislike it</b>: The pay is an absolute insult. Librarians make an average of $15,000 a year less than people in different fields with the same amount of education and experience.
<b>What sorts of things can go wrong at your job?</b> On a typical day, computers crash, books are not on the shelf where they're supposed to be, and there are patrons who think that because they pay taxes, they have a right to treat you like dirt. If our computer system goes down, it's very difficult to find books, because our card catalog is online. We could get a patron complaining about a book, or have a parent who is so convinced that their first-grader is ready to read <u>War and Peace</u> that they won't listen to professional advice on appropriate books. Books get lost, or shelved wrong, and are impossible to find.
<b>What kind of person thrives in your job</b>: You have to be patient, love books, love the thrill of hunting for information, be literate, well-organized, keep up on current events, and believe in equality among all patrons regardless of age, class, etc.
<b>Anything else you can think of that would give her an idea of what it might be like to choose your career?</b> As the way receive information changes, libraries have to keep up. Be open to change, though others may resist it. And read.