The Future

For the last week or so I have been working with a group working on a poster project about what the library of 2025 would be like. Despite the economy and decreasing of library budgets we all had positive outlooks for the future of libraries, which I think is awesome. No matter how bleak the future looks we will always have upbeat librarians, and with upbeat librarians come awesome libraries. We just need to adapt to the changing times and diminishing wallets, in fact librarians and libraries are a great resource to help with just that, we will just have to practice what we preach. And I will just have to accept the fact that at least in the reference section I will not always have a physical book in front of me, though it pains me...dearly. (Not against digitization, I am just not for  removing print resources, I think they are still a valuable tool that is far less corruptible.)

Academic Libraries

This week in 511 we were visited by academic librarians, one from Cornell and one from Bird Library. I went into the class being optimistic, actually keeping an open mind to considering academic libraries as a career path. I came out of it absolutely sure I did not want to be an academic librarian. The Librarians themselves were good people, I just found myself getting bored with the subject, which was the killing blow to my interest in being an academic librarian. It may have been the fact that they had slide presentations (one prezi, one powerpoint, the prezi presentation was a little more interesting and I have been meaning to try the tool out since a friend showed it to me last year. It is pretty awesome.), they are in fact the only visiting librarians that had slide presentations, maybe it was the fact that the other librarians didn't stand behind a pedestal and actually engaged us.  Is that just how academic librarians are? The psychology minor in me is peaking my interest in figuring out how librarians in different areas of the field behave and think (cognitive and behaviorist, talk about your oxymoron). Who knows, maybe it will help me figure out how to change how librarians are viewed. Its harder than changing my title as many have thought about, but I think it is more worth our time in redefining "librarian" than calling us something else. If you want to call yourself something else, go for it, but I would rather be called "librarian" and try to redefine it than to be call an "information specialist." That just sounds standoffish to me, something that would scare people away from asking me for help, which is why I want to be a librarian.
That brings up another point I want to make. I have been told several times that saying that you love books in a library interview is a bad idea, but I feel like that is wrong and denying your roots and yourself if you do in fact love books.  Loving books is what brought me to the library in the first place, and if I had never gone to the library, I would never have wanted to be a librarian. Yes that is one reason that I want to be a librarian, but it isn't the defining reason, and it isn't the only reason, but I don't think I should have to deny it or omit it just because some librarians have come to see "loving books" as taboo. The biggest reason I want to become a librarian is that I want to help people, something that I have realized before but not given much thought, but that does not make my love of books any less or any worse of a reason to be a librarian.

Therapy Dogs in the Library

Last week in 511 we were visited by a Librarian from the Syracuse area who brought a therapy dog that their library allows patron/user/member/owners check out for a certain amount of hours. This brought back to my head an idea I have had since my family got a therapy dog, a chocolate standard poodle (pictured on the right) we named Luna.  My mother is a Special ed teacher and she brings therapy dogs (Luna and five other standard poodles owned by a family friend) into the school one day each week of the school year and has students read to the dogs (with a handler in the room with them, usually my Pepere). This allows children to improve their reading skills in an environment where they won't be judged, dogs do not judge and are very attentive because they are getting attention from the students.  Other schools in the area have been working on starting a similar program, and one of our local librarians is training to be a handler.  I think this would be really cool to get started in public libraries, and even school libraries. It gets community involvement and offers a much needed service, and it does not just have to be children that take advantage of it.  There will always be that problem of people who are afraid of dogs, or allergic to dogs, or just don't like dogs but that is a problem that I think we just have to deal with.  That is one of the reasons we chose a Standard Poodle, they are highly intelligent dogs, that are hypoallergenic and though they are highly energetic they listen well and remain calm when they have to be. I feel like this is one service that many libraries can benefit from that will greatly benefit their communities.

I get confused about my train of thought

                This week in 511 we had two School Librarians from Syracuse area schools visit the class. I considered being a school librarian but then decided it wasn’t for me. I liked helping children, in fact much of my volunteering at libraries has been with children, but I think helping the entire range of people would be more for me. I don’t know if I could handle the school lifestyle like many of my friends can. I do find it interesting that the first thing I wanted to do as a kid was be a teacher and I avoided going into education because of my fear of public speaking, and I keep finding ways to get back to it despite myself.

            One of the guests was talking about her iStaff, which consisted of student hires, and it got me reminiscing about my days as a library aide in High School at LFHS. Which got me reminiscing about my days volunteering at Treat Memorial Library. Which got me wondering: Why the hell did it take me until my last year of undergrad to figure out I wanted to be a librarian? I mean, I still would have done the whole creative writing program, doubt of that will never crossed my mind, but I could have planned this out so much better.

                This week in 511 we took a visit to the special collections in Bird Library. For part of it we were lectured by Professor Kenneth Lavender about Special Collections, what they had in Bird Library and what he does for them. It definitely seemed really cool, especially with the historical documents and books he showed us. I cannot lie that I got some nerdy enjoyment in being that close to books from almost the beginning of written language to the 20^th century. Is that enjoyment enough to entice me to go in that direction? Immediate reaction was that it didn’t feel like enough, but now that I have given it a week my thoughts are just as muddled as they were before.

            The second part of the class we met the people in charge of preservation and they taught us about what they do to fix books and other print materials that are brought in to them, including special collections books. It is definitely a cool job to have, though personally I feel like my hands are too shaky for the special collections side of preservation. It is definitely an aspect of librarianship that interests me though. Being from a State and town whose main industry is paper making it was definitely interesting to hear about the history of paper making and how we have been doing it “less right” than the Japanese have for centuries.

Probably a ramble

    Late again this week for my blog, sorry about that. I had no idea what I would be writing about when I started this so I will probably be rambling, apologies.
    I guess one thing that has been on my mind this week, again, has been where I am going with this degree. I know I want to work in a library, and that is all I wanted to do when I first came here. I just wanted to be a librarian, and I kind of still want to be a librarian.  Now though I have found myself deciding between cataloger (apparently the weird guys among the weird guys that are librarians), public library, or Cultural Heritage and Preservation.  Working on the Digital Library Wiki for Jill Hurst-Wall has added another interest to me. It would be pretty cool to work on a digital library, though I would be afraid to lose that physical contact with people that a digital library wouldn't give me. The more I talk about this, the more I am leaning towards public librarian working in children's or youth services. So you are helping me out a little bit this week.

Filtering: Good, Bad, or don't know what to do?

            A lot of people from this weeks 511 class are probably going to be talking about filters in the library; either that or I am a week behind on this subject. Not filters you put in the coffee maker mind you, internet filters.  As a librarian do you allow people to go wherever they want using your internet, or do you use filters? Senator John McCain pushed through a law that required libraries to put in place internet filters in order to continue receiving federal funding.  The law was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2006, to the celebration of McCain.

            This is a tricky and highly controversial subject. First, because it involves money, many libraries, especially small public libraries, depend on federal funding and grants in order to continue operations and pay for things such as computers and books, and would be severely curtailed if they couldn’t get that funding. Filters can be good in that they block people from being able to look at X-rated material in the middle of the library, ten feet away from children and other adults. (You have to have some sort of mental disability if you can look at stuff like that in a public place.) On the other hand, these filters might block sites that people might need to reach, that have nothing to do with such material.  Plus there are also ways to get around these filters, granted some of the people will not know anything about how to do that, but there will always be that one guy.

            If your all for open access, then you don’t really care for filters. I for one am one of those undecided people who is teetering between opting for filters and not having them at all. Eventually I will probably have to make a choice, but I feel this takes more research. Yay, research!

            Also, something having nothing to do with filtering: