Category: librarianing

Conference Summary: MLA Applied Technologies & Trends Workshop

On Friday, May 10, I had the pleasure of presenting at MLA Applied Technologies & Trends Workshop, If you caught my show before, at Library Tech Conference, you may notice some similarities. The presentation I gave at MLA is updated with a lot more content  and recent revisions as well as I even have a checklist put together that I PDFed for people to use that I promised to have for people back in March.
Since I was one of the last persons to present, below are my notes on the other presentations I attended along with links as appropriate.

Keynote: Good For Whom? 

By Matthew Reidsma / Grand Valley State University
Why are decisions made for design not carried over to digital tools? Meaning, why do we apply strict questions to physical items but not to digital ones.

  • Functional: How does it function?
  • Behavioral: How do behaviors change?
  • How to do it?
    • This is where most people stop.
    • These are internal questions, that we ask ourselves on everything.
  • “The library world has been fa too gullible, far too willing to regard any technical advance as a service advance.”  – Jonathan D. Lauer & Steve McKinzie
  • Human: How does this affect human experience?
    • Need to think more about the person who comes into our library, less about what we’re doing about them.
    • How do people FEEL?
      • How you treat people is more apt than what you did or will do. For example, if you treat a customer nicely, they will tell maybe 1 or 2 people. If you treat them badly, they will tell, on the average, nine people about their experience.
  • “User experience isn’t about expert intuition, it’s about expert listening.” – Whitney Hess
  • External questions: How to find how these technologies  are going to affect not just people, but work flows, and technologies themselves.
    • Adding the human element
  • A way forward: Ditching the label maker
    • Prioritize users over process
    • We could be reactionary (train industry of people to undo the work of crappy vendors) or say to the vendors, “Makes this easy to use.”  Demand it to be easy to use.
  • Prioritize users over processes

Resources/sites mentioned

Session: Cloud & Mobile Computing 4 Your LIbrary Resources & Services

By Michael Samson / Wayne State University

  • All the Google products, all the time
  • Chromebox / Chromebook instead of using vendor specific hardware
  • Hardware: Android (Nexus 4, 7, 10)
  • Tools / apps / gadgets
    • Creating custom search engine for faculty for their interests
    • Ability to share content via Google drive (presentations, documents)
    • Cloud is the new mainframe
  • Creating an entire workflow of tools in the Google cloud

Session: Sharing Technology Skills with Patrons and Colleagues

By Scott Skowronek / Lansing Community College

  • Uneven distribution of technology skills across staff and faculty
  • Creation of Tech Guides
    • 4 student staff per semester
    • Empowered to seek out and assist
    • Customer service focused
    • Roving support
    • Employee traits & Responsibilities
      • Keep the interactions time short (15 minutes) and then escalate
      • Know the GRCC core systems
      • Record each interaction (to identify peak times and keeps statics)
    • Training
      • Identify the “Big 3” technical problems and train the guides on these first. Example:
        • Blackboard problems
        • Forgotten passwords
        • Attaching files to emails
      • Find the technology pain points
        • Ex: Printer jams
      • Work with staff strengths
      • Collaborative training
        • Using iPads with Google docs to  train and track problems, seamless synching and updating
      • Encourage guides to Google for problems
    • Logistics
      • One tech guide on shift at a time
      • 3 hour shifts
      • Tech guide iPad
      • Peak hours
    • Pitfalls
      • Morale issues
      • Patron problems and problem patrons
      • Shift switching and absences
      • Staff technology ability
  • TechSnippets
    • Presentations that contain 10-15 minutes of content, open to faculty/staff
    • Maybe schedule 15 minutes  for discussion after
    • Schedule midday – more people on campus, this is when departments break for lunch, etc
    • Discuss single technology or a cluster of similar
      • Dropbox (Google Drive, iCloud)
    • Discuss singular concepts
    • Feed them!
      • Get a $100 convention oven, make cookies!
      • Use cookies to lure them into your lair
    • Marketing
      • Multiple channels
      • Multiple reminders
      • LibCal for sign-up and contact
      • Target a specific audience
  • Resources for ideas for Tech Snippets

Session: What to put on that new TV in the lobby

By David Hytien & Britain Woodman / University of Michigan

  • Content
    • Creative Commons content
      • Youtube. Vimeo, etc
      • From NASA, NOOA, White House, Internet Archive, Flickr
    • Content from various places like the above, plus student content, staff content, and public content available on campus, found content
    • RSS feeds
  • Logo
    • Recommend size is 1080×1920
    • Transparent
    • Should be png or gif as they are lossless
  • Videos
    • Create in iMovie, drop movies and logo just created
  • Resources

 
 

My #ACRL2013 Schedule

I do not plan what I’m doing while I’m at a conference. I usually just register for the conf, show up, figure out what I want to do on the fly, and then head home. My interest in a particular conference is usually thematic base OR I know people I respect/admire are presenting, so where I go is kind of all over the place.
ACRL piqued my interest because one of my future husbands, Henry Rollins, is keynoting. (INORITE!) So while I attempt to contain my fangirl squeeing, I started seeing people on various social networks post their schedule for ACRL. I couldn’t figure out why people were doing this until I sorted that it probably has more to do with how terrible the My Planner site is (it’s “mobile friendly” but there is no desktop version – it’s just amplified in a browser. There is also no app) then anything else.
My website does responsive mobile rendering of my blog and unlike My Planner, it’s super easy to read. So for my edification, here is my schedule for ACRL. Yes, there are some conflicts. Yes, it will more than likely change.
And you’re attending ACRL this year, you should definitely come by and say “Hi!”

Wednesday

Drive from Grand Rapids to Indy
04:00 – 05:45PM
Opening Keynote, Geoffrey Canada (JW Grand Ballroom 1-6)
05:45PM -07:30PM
Exhibits Opening Reception (ICC – Exhibit Hall)
07:00PM – 08:00PM
First-time Orientation/ACRL 101 (ICC – 104-106)
08:00PM – 10:00PM
Battle Decks! – Imagine, Improvise, Inflict: Get Inspired or Die Trying (ICC 109-110)
09:00PM – 12:00AM
ACRL Think Tank Tweetup & Social! (The Slippery Noodle)

Thursday

10:30AM – 11:30AM
Game on! Creating Video Game Collections at Academic Libraries (ICC 109-110)
10:30AM-11:30AM
“‘You Have Stephen King? Really?’, Or, The Role of Popular Reading Materials in Academic Libraries” (ICC Exhibit Hall)
01:00PM – 02:00PM
Visual Literacy in Action (ICC 109-110)
Planning Programs for Bridging Cultures: Muslim Journeys Bookshelf (ICC Exhibit Hall)
Hacking the Learner Experience: techniques and strategies for connecting with your instructional ecosystem (ICC Wabash 2-3)
11:30AM – 01:00PM
Innovative Customers Lunch – Indianapolis Marriott Downtown (Marriott Room 8-10)
03:00PM – 04:00PM
What’s in a Name?: Information Literacy, Metaliteracy, or Transliteracy (ICC 125-126)
04:20PM – 06:00PM
Keynote, Henry Rollins (JW Grand Ballroom 1-6)
06:00PM – 07:00PM
Henry Rollins Book Signing (JW Grand Ballroom Lobby)
08:00PM – ?
LibTechWomen meet-up at ACRL 2013 (Scotty’s Brewhouse)

Friday

08:30AM – 09:30AM
THATCamp ACRL 2013 (1) (ICC Wabash 1)
11:00AM – 12:00PM
THATCamp ACRL 2013 (1) (ICC Wabash 1)
11:00AM – 12:00PM
“The Mother of all LibGuides”: Applying Principles of Communication and Network Theory in LibGuide Design (ICC 125-126)
12:00PM – 1:00PM
EBSCO’s Academic Luncheon (Indianapolis Marriott, Marriott Rooms 5 – 10, 2nd Floor)
01:30PM – 02:30PM
Mapping the Motor City’s Cinema: A Collaborative Digital Humanities Project (ICC 107-108)
01:30PM – 02:30PM
THATCamp ACRL 2013 (1) (ICC Wabash 1)
04:00PM – 05:00PM
THATCamp ACRL 2013 (1) (ICC Wabash 1)
04:00PM – 05:00PM
Quest for Engagement: Innovative Library Instruction with Games-Based Learning (ICC 123-124)
04:00PM – 05:00PM
Using Data Visualization web widgets to Improve the Institutional Repository User Experience (ICC 120-122)
04:00PM – 05:00PM
When Social Media Fails to Inspire: Transforming your library’s social media presence (ICC 120-122)
08:00PM – 10:30PM
All-Conference Reception – Indiana State Museum

Saturday

08:30AM – 09:30 AM
Queering the Library: What are YOU doing to serve your LGBTQ community? (ICC 107-108)
09:45 – 10:45
Waking the [Digital] Dead: A Continuum Approach to Digital Initiatives (ICC 101-103)
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Summary of LibTechConf 2013

Last week I had the pleasure of presenting at the Library Technology Conference, which is held at  Macalster College in St. Paul, MN. As I mentioned at the beginning of my talk, I did not know LibTechConf (as it is affectionately referred to) existed until last year, when several people I professionally admire were prepping for their talk that year. After some research, I found it was highly regarded, specially curated, and previous LibTechConf conferences had a wealth topics that were  often not repeated elsewhere  The content was not a regurgitation of the same stuff, different conference (or year) you may see with larger conferences.
I’m thrilled to have been a part of it this year.
Wednesday
Keynote: Virginia Eubanks – Can Tech Serve Social Justice?
Eubanks, Internship Director of the Women’s Studies Department at University at Albany and co-founder of Our Knowledge, Our Power, gave an impassioned talk on the use of technology in the realm of social justice. She explored the idea the digital divide is not just a barrier between person and tech, but it is also a barrier and a preventer to getting services and needs that many existing without making a living wage were getting access to. Eubanks also discussed how companies, in the US and elsewhere, took advantage of impoverished areas to find workers for their factories and exploited them for cheap labor. In addition, some of these companies would train their employees to work within various areas of the company, but instead of investing more education or training to promote them, the workers were often fired or laid off due to outsourcing or job consolidation.   If interested in more of Eubanks’ work, check out her book Digital Dead End: Fighting for Social Justice in the Information Age
Session: OMG! My metadata is as fresh as the Backstreet Boys
Short, but sweet, session on using Google Refine (which recently changed to OpenRefine a few days before the talk) and Freebase to clean up dirty metadata. Examples were given of how robust the products are and how to best utilize them
Session: Websites are for people
Highly informative session that makes the bold statement: Libraries should not be building or designing websites for supposed library needs, but should be building  for the library’s patrons/community/users needs. The presenter walked us through how user design and experience (UX) is not just for websites, but for everywhere and everything  in our world.  He gave examples of these outside the digital world experiences such as the badly designed parking meters that give conflicting instructions to directional information at walk-up restaurant counters that force the person to make too many choices in order to order food and pay for it.  He then tied these back to user design for websites and how the same mindset is seemingly applied. “Library websites are too complicated.” And he’s right.  After the talk, I started seeing user experience problems everywhere. My current favorite example is on the way home from the conference, the terminal as MSP had a large display built to emulate an app that was available for you to download on your smartphone. The problem is they don’t illustrate it’s just a demo and not usable, so you walk up and start mashing your fingers against the glass to get information and see that it won’t do anything.
Session: How I stopped worrying and learned to love Institutional Repositories
My presentation!
Session: Digital Preservation = Enduring Access
This isn’t what I quite thought it was going to be. I was looking for more information about on plans, techniques, and tips and it turned out to be more of a “This is what we’ve done, this is we may do.” It felt really like an intro class to archives and digital preservation, which would have been fine if it had billed itself as that, but it didn’t.
Thursday
Keynote: Kimberly Bryant – Founder, Black Girls Code
Just like Virginia Eubanks, Kimberly Bryant’s talk was passionate, engaging, and brimming with lots of good information. Bryant talked about the formation of Black Girls Code, with the purpose of getting women into tech as well as engaging them, and getting them to start taking chances in technology. While discussing the early days of BGC, Bryant was pleasantly surprised to find it was not start-ups or colleges that would help, but it was  libraries that would become the place for BGC meetings, programs, and workshops. BGC started out with intent to bring its messages to under represented areas (underscoring much of what Eubanks was discussing in her talk) and it has grown. There is now discussion to start similar groups like BGC for other underrepresented populations.
Session: Copyright, Licenses, and Fair Use: What’s Up With That?
Here’s the first thing you should know:

If you’re not a lawyer and you’re giving advice on copyright issues on campus, you may get in trouble for practicing law.

Second thing you should know, First sale rights could be applied to EVERYTHING: Used cars, after-market products, even library lending.
A recap of this really informative presentation should be best be presented in links that were relevant to the talk:

  • Center for Social Media: Fair Use
  • Fight Copyright Trolls
  • Ruling of Cambridge University Press, Oxford  University Press, and Sage Publications vs Georgia State University
  • Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries (Not legal advice.)
  • Buffy vs Edward

To see more what people are saying about LibTechConf, check #LTC2013 on Twitter.

Wanna get involved in LITA?: An Experiment

A couple of months ago, I was talking to Andromeda Yelton and a few other women on IRC and the discussion of LITA came up as Andromeda is running for board in the current election. I lamented, as I always seem to do, that whenever I tried to get involved with LITA actively in some fashion whether by responding to open requests, joining committees, or starting a SIG, I never seemed to get a response back from anyone within the organization.  It is super frustrating because there IS content coming out of the org, but seemingly trying to penetrate it is some kind of Byzantine affair.
Andromeda said this was one of the things she wanted to change once she was elected — there are a lot of amazing people out there with a lot of awesome talent and skill sets that could make LITA amazing but it’s current set up is driving us all away. Her response was to write up a HOW-TO guide on how to get involved and since this started with me, in a way, I  promised her I would renew my due and try out her tips for a year to see how much her advice worked.

Wanna get involved in LITA? Here’s how, part I.

Andromeda’s first suggestion is join Interest Groups. She lays out all the reasons why this is a great idea, with the big one being flexibility. I also liked the fact that there is short life span (they sunset after three years, but can be renewed ergo they reflect current interests of the profession). Working from the top, I started checking out IGs of interests and here are the ones I selected.

  • Digital Library Technologies Interest Group
    Due to my resurged interest in repositories and past work with digital archiving, this is right up my alley. I check out their page and see there is very little in terms of content or resources. I head to their mailing list page and see there has only been a few emails in 2013 (namely adverts and solicitations).  I’ll join the mailing list, the group on CONNECT, and get the RSS feed for the public posts on CONNECT.
  • Emerging Technologies Interest Group
    Another interest up my alley, and unlike the DLT group, Emerging Technologies has content on their page. Except – no mailing list nor can I find it on the list of all ALA mailing lists. They DO have a CONNECT site, which I join and also pull their RSS feed as well. Downside: With the except of the 2013 Midwinter dates, the content on the CONNECT site is two years old and older.
  • Technology and Industry Interest Group
    Established in 2011, this group is the melting pot of vendors, librarians, organizations, and everyone in between. CONNECT is rarely used as is the email list. I subscribe to the mailing list, join the CONNECT site, and add the RSS feed.
  • Universal Accessibility Interest Group
    My institution has started several initiatives with Accessibility, so again, this is another one of my interests. I join the CONNECT site (again, content is not currently upated), grap the RSS feed for the CONNECT site, and join the mailing list. Now the mailing list is not listed on the IG page, but I did search for it list of all of ALA’s mailing lists.

I also looked at Open Source Systems, Standards, and Mobile Computing but figured four would be a good place to start.
Almost all of the IGs looked as if they were incredibly quiet, if not dead,  if the mailing lists and CONNECT sites were to be believed. If work is being done, it’s being done somewhere not immediately visible which then brings up the, “How do I get involved?” question up again.

Wanna get involved in LITA? Here’s how, part II.

Communication. It’s the backbone of librarianship. Andromeda recommends following LITA via Twitter  and Facebook  and to subscribe to the LITABlog as these are the official modes of disseminating news about the org.
This is one of my biggest complaints to Andromeda: The official channels are pretty dead. I used to follow @ALA_LITA, but their rarely updating feed meant I would often miss something if they posted in the waterfall that is often my timeline, so I unsubscribed from them and put them on a list to check at my leisure. I had added the LITABlog to my RSS reader ages ago, but the site mainly pushes job openings and not much else.
I apparently had NOT liked LITA on Facebook, so I  made sure to do that AND added them to my interests list (apparently the current way to get all the content from page/person).
I never knew about LITA-L as a separate mailing list because I was getting email what I assumed to be LITA-L for years now only to find out what I was getting was the more advertisement / announcement stuff as opposed to discussion and involvement stuff. That’s super confusing. I’ve now joined LITA-L.
Now if you’re not on Facebook, or Twitter, don’t know about LITA-L, and stopped following the blog, other than getting content from the random LITA email every once in awhile, how are you to know about upcoming events and shenanigans?
You’re not and you won’t.
This isn’t a LITA thing, or a even an ALA thing, but it seems to be a lot of big orgs thing: Blind acceptance your public is going to follow you on Facebook, or Twitter, or something else that requires a login to get access to.  If you’re not updating your blog/website with the same information you’re putting to your community on those sites, then you have failed at your job.

Wanna get involved in LITA? Here’s how, part III.

Conferences. I LOVE conferences. The learning, the networking, the gossiping, the often free booze.
When I headed to ALA Annual in 2010, I was looking at the workshops/pre-conference list and saw a LITA technology petting zoo. My interest was piqued until I saw the multi-hundred dollar price tag associated with it – for a technology petting zoo that was filled with mainly open source software freely available to download.  No one could give me an explanation as to why I had to pay all that cash (on student budget) on something I could do at home.
Ever since then, I’ve been weary of LITA at conferences.
But keeping true to my commitment to give my wooing of LITA my best gung-ho effort, I submitted not one but two proposals to LITA Forum (one solo, the other in partnership with Val Forrestal). In addition, I’m going to ALA Annual this year (first time since 2010), and will be tracking the LITA tracks while there so expect updates from the various conferences.
I also started following LITA Planning Committee on CONNECT and added them to my RSS reader. (They also seem to rarely update CONNECT, but no stone unturned, etc).

Wanna get involved in LITA? Here’s how, part IV.

Board meetings. This one I have not yet had an opportunity to take advantage of yet, but as I am on the official communication mailing lists now, I should be able to monitor quite easily.

Wanna get involved in LITA? Here’s how, part V.

Informal communication – my favorite. I already follow Andromeda on Twitter, but I also subscribed to her Twitter list of LITA Board members, many of whom I already follow. I also follow numerous people involved in LITA who are not on the board via Twitter or their existing blogs, so there are those options as well.
She makes it clear she’s listing her favorite places and haunts and others should search for ways via channels they really like, but I think there’s a good point to be made here. I’ve been working on cleaning up and closing social media accounts I do not use or have interest in, so a lot of potential ways to meet or get involved are closed.
For example, I dumped my LinkedIn account last summer after LinkedIn was hacked. I have no intention of starting an account there again as I didn’t find it particularly useful and often, more intrusive than Facebook. I am on Google+ but I look at it maybe once a month if I even remember that often. I was on FriendFeed but dumped it because I was never really active on it.
This will be an interesting experiment this year how to keep up with what is going out in LITA via informal methodology, especially if stuff seems so random.

Wanna get involved in LITA? Here’s how, part VI.

By-laws.
Holy cats pajamas. I’m not sure I’m ready for this quite yet. The manual will probably begin as more of my speed, but this something for further down the field. Just not today. 🙂

Wanna get involved in LITA? Here’s how: your turn.

I really appreciate and am grateful all the work Andromeda did to put this together, but I’m curious as to the other responses she received  as there is very little commentary on her blog. I wanted to make an honest effort on changing my perception of LITA because I want to contribute to my profession in meaningful ways. I’ve been a member of LITA since the days I was in library school (I graduated in 2010) and I never felt like I was part of a community that was supposed to be supporting me.
Here are the things I learned so far from Andromeda’s posts:

  • You can get the RSS feeds of groups in ALA CONNECT. This is awesome because I almost NEVER log in to CONNECT and the ability to get the RSS feeds of public content will keep me up to date on lots of stuff.
  • I had no idea LITA-L existed until recently.
  • I was not aware of LITA Forum, also until recently.
  • There seems to be a genuine effort for transparency but it needs more work.

At the very least, if anything comes out of this, it should be organizations like LITA should have a friendly, single HOW-TO guide freely accessible to hand to their new members to  get them started in the organization.
I’ll be checking in every couple of months or so on this experiment to see how things worked out. Stay tuned.

Introducing Graphicdemia: Collecting Comics and Graphic Novels in Academia

On March 2, I presented, along with two other colleagues, at the MSU Comics Forum on Golden Age: Comics and Graphic Novel Resources in Libraries. Our schtick, if you will, is to present the collection and outreach methods from three different types of libraries: academic, public, and special; and present specifically at a non-library conference.
In 1974, Will Eisner (yes, that Will Eisner) penned an article in School Library Journal entitled, Comic Books in the Library. For at least 40 years, libraries have been well aware of the importance of collecting comics and graphic novels. Librarians write and present on this topic to other librarians at librarian conferences and publications across the country all day, every day.
But what about interaction with the public, the communities we serve, comic stores, artists, etc? Do they know we’re doing this?
The answer is: Not so much.
My presenting colleagues and I recognized there is a disconnect between what librarians are doing and the community and artists we’re doing it for and this is where our presentation comes in. We’re also going to be doing similar presentations at C2E2 in April and Grand Con in September. The C2E2 presentation is going to be more of a how the collection is promoted and utilized, while the Grand Con presentation will be similar to MSU Comic Forum presentation or a hybrid of the two.
At the MSU Comics Forum, our Q&A after was pretty awesome and we got a lot of great questions. I felt really confident about our work and the audience seemed to really respond well to what we were saying. The confidence/passion of how we feel about our topic is evident, and we had a great rapport with each other to back up the other’s points. I’m excited about our future presentations.
Now, I began collecting graphic novels at GRCC for a couple of reasons. We literally only had a few titles, like Astonishing X-Men Vol 1 and Cartooning for fun and profit (circa 1945), but there was absolutely no cohesion to our collection (series titles were not continued, some of the books were older than dirt, and so forth). In addition, I was told someone local was going to donate a few boxes of graphic novels several years ago but they were all rejected by the librarians at the time as not being relevant to our curriculum. Even despite the fact someone was obviously buying titles since the library already a small growing collection in the stacks. So, no consistency or cohesion to the collection.
The other reasons I wanted to collect graphic novels was the value and diversity they bring to the collection, they would or could be supported across various curriculums and lastly, they could introduce students to new topics or be a bridge to a difficult topic.
I took my proposal to the librarians and my director, and they supported the idea of collecting graphic novels. I worked with our cataloger on how to best catalog our collection. By mid-spring 2012, I started collecting graphic novels and peripheral books.
When you hear librarians talk about collection development, they often mention the core collection. Typically this means titles that should be standard in your stacks, for whatever reason. To bring cohesion to the collection, I needed to find fairly recent core collection lists, websites, and books to start gathering titles as well as start tracking newly published titles to purchase.
This is when I started running into a number of problems.

  1. 90% (if not higher) of professional literature (print and online) on comics/graphic novels is geared for teen, tween, or younger
  2. General core collection books were outdated or the titles recommended would be out of print or geared towards teen and younger
  3. Suggested reading lists from various organizations (library and non-library based) would include out of print or age inappropriate or content inappropriate titles
  4. Review lists from in the profession literature or general newspapers and magazines, concentrate more on teen/youth over adult titles
  5. Academic institutions that carry comic / graphic novel collections either had their collections in special collections (typically non-circulating), focused on a specific type (golden age, silver age, etc), or  the emphasis was on research only
  6. Catalogs by publishers or book distributors concentrate on youth  over adult books. A recent spring catalog by a large distributor was 20+ pages on graphic novels, maybe 3 pages were geared for adult content.

First let me clarify, when I refer to something as being “adult,” I am not referring to something as being racy or pornographic. I am referring to materials that contain situations, language, or ideas appropriate for 18+.   It is generally accepted most weekly comics are rated as such, but per my list above, publishers, reviewers, and such concentrate on the under 18s. Which is maddening!
I am also get that adults will read content geared for the under 18s, which is fine. But my first goal is to support our curriculum so I have to be very specific on what I can and cannot buy. I can also afford to be picky as our local public library is one block away, whereas if it weren’t, my range would be much more diverse.
As I started researching and creating my core list, I was finding a lot of great sites that I thought would be of interest to my students, so I started a graphic novels subject guide. In order to get a better idea of what to put on my guide, I searched for other guides on graphic novels and became disheartened by what I found.

  1. Guides that were obviously templates and could be for any subject, with no relevant information on the specific topic (general database links, general how to pages, etc)
  2. Guides with dead links, broken embeds, out dated information or rarely updated
  3. Guides with mixed messages: Instructions on how to use databases, cite papers, find materials and then provide available books geared for instructors / researchers.
  4. Guides that did not provide additional information outside of their own resources, so no list of blogs, websites, societies, museums, etc for future investigation.

Many guides had one problem, but most had multiple. I imagined myself as a student gettings super frustrated if I was doing homework on the inability to find information.
This is what got me thinking about how graphic novels are perceived in academia, from a student’s point of view and a librarian’s point of view.  And to be honest, it’s a mess.
This is when I sussed out I had numerous goals I wanted to achieve when it came to graphic novels in academic libraries.

  • Present at non-library conferences how libraries of all shapes and sizes are collecting, promoting, and circulating graphic novels
  • Inline with collecting the collection, promote the heck out of it to my patrons and community
  • Keep the subject guide as divergent and current as possible for not only my students, but others as well
  • Start Graphicdemia, and keep it as current and robust as possible as a resources for librarians who are collecting at non-research institutions,  special libraries, adult services public librarians, or something else entirely
  • Perhaps write on this topic for publication

Currently I’m debating on what to put on Graphicdemia vs putting it on the subject guide, so currently my rationale is, “If it helps someone on the development and collection side, that goes on Graphicdemia. If it is of general interest, that goes on the subject guide.”
The response to this has been fantastic so far, and it’s interesting to see how many librarians are struggling with the same problem. This is what makes working at a community college so unique is we fall into that sphere between public and four year academic institutions  and we can pull from both on many things but others, we get lost in the shuffle.
I have a lot of work to do.

So, You Want to Become a Librarian/Archivist: 2012 edition

Dear Internet,
In 2008 or so, I started writing columns on “So, You Want to Become a Librarian/Archivist”, which ended up becoming pretty popular. With as many domain shuffles I’ve had in the last four years, the content is archived but has not been put back on this current domain as of yet.
A few days ago, my friend Kate said, “Hey! There is a thread on Ravelry about wanting to become a librarian. I think you should chime in.” And I agreed. Below is my original post with some slight editing. Once I stop getting lazy, I’ll put up the older posts, but the below pretty much is succintly how I feel today.
Please, please, please use this to pass around to anyone who is thinking of becoming a librarian, please add in your own comments about your experiences with library school, education, job hunt, anything. I don’t know where the misconceptions are coming from, but if watching #libchat is any indication, a lot of n00bs out there still can’t shake the myths. I no longer care WHY the myths exist, I just want to break them.
—-
First, if you can’t find what you’re looking for via Google or any search engines, then you’re going to be a terrible librarian. Here is my point: I searched for “online library science programs accredited” in Google and the VERY FIRST item is a link to ALA (American Library Association – our professions largest professional organization) listing of accredited schools, which includes online programs. I know of four you can do entirely online:

There is probably others that do entirely online degrees, but those are the big ones. The number of library schools in the US is tiny (like 50?), so it averages one per state. Most, if not all schools, offer a blended degree of online/in classroom.
There ARE schools that offer library science or library tech degrees in bachelors or as certification programs. These are not the same thing as getting a MLIS. I want to make this clear because this is commonly misunderstood.
So WHY do you want to be a librarian? You only say, I think I would be good at this. But you don’t really clarify WHY you think you would be good at this. Here is a major site aggregator for library jobs that is compiled by ALA. Even if you see the same job title twice, you will hardly see the same job responsibilities, duties, or description. If you think the job is going to be standing around all day handling and reading books: Let me burst that bubble for you right quick. I barely have time to keep up with my professional reading, let alone personal reading. I was more cultured in topics and titles when I slung books at a bookstore then working in a library system.
At this point, you’re probably wondering: Who the hell is this person?

  • I’m a systems and web librarian at a community college
  • I have a GED, BA, MA, and now my MLIS
  • I graduated from Wayne State in 2010 with my MLIS and archival certification
  • I’m not going to be overly humble here: I was the golden child of my class. I worked through school at the campus library as a reference librarian, I was on many professional committees on and off campus, I started a new organization ON campus, I was active within the community, and I had a 3.85 GPA. It took a year and 114 job applications before I landed a job. I applied for EVERYTHING and EVERYWHERE.

(Also, I would highly advise you NOT to go to Wayne for your online program. This is the worst run school ever, the director is douchebag delight who is out of touch with the needs of the students — we tried to get him removed as head when I was there.  His main residence is in the southern states. Yes, he’s a director of a program in MI, but lives in the south. The programs are poorly coordinated and run. Stay the fuck away from Wayne.)
Let’s move on to your education: A lot of people say that having a degree in history, or English, or similar is extremely helpful in having a MLIS. This is true and this is bullshit. It’s bullshit because EVERYTHING you do outside of library school will be extremely beneficial to your career path. Those customer service skills you learned in retail? You will be a prince(ss) among the people for deft handling of difficult patrons. You’re interest in comics and gaming? You will soon be scheduling programming and events for teens and adults when new releases come out. Worked in housekeeping or similar detail while going to school? You will be the MASTER of unclogging toilets. There will not be one skill you have not acquired in your personal or previous professional life that you will not call upon at some point in your library career.
Also, having a degree in the humanities such as English or History does not give you a leg up in getting a MLIS or working in a library. It is relevant if you want to specialize but if you are going to work somewhere and a specialization is not required, your degree in underwater basket weaving is just as useful as the one in physics. I am also going to strongly suggest you get, if you do not already have, heavy tech skills. I worked in the IT industry for nearly a decade before going back to finish my undergrad and then on my two masters degrees and having my background in IT  has been a boon to my job search and interviews
Next is job descriptions. My title is “systems and web librarian.” What does this mean? At my institution, it means that I am responsible for:

  • Maintaining our online catalog system (OPAC) in all capacities
  • I manage, update, create content for our library’s website and all social media accounts
  • I am a liaison to six departments on campus so I keep up to trends and info on all those fields
  • I do collection development for my departments
  • I teach information literacy classes 85 hours a semester
  • I am on the reference desk 10-15 hours a week
  • I am on numerous committees on campus
  • I participate heavily with the state wide library organization
  • I am the liaison to the institutions IT department and I work with them on many tech projects

Now I have a colleague who works at a local college here who does nothing but web development for the library. It was required he had his MLIS. Not that he does 1/6th of what I do, but that his job is 1/6 of what I do. Some librarians on this list may recognize that what I’ve listed is similar to their own lists of what is expected of them.
So the job market. Yes, it’s brutal. But so is it everywhere, it is NOT just in library world. I’ll reference my point above of 114 job applications and year before I landed my gig, but I want to stress I did NOT apply for positions only at libraries, I applied for any and all positions that I was qualified for in librarianship or as an archivist regardless of the sector. Just because you have an MLIS and/or you’re a certified archivist doesn’t mean you have to work at a library or at an archives. This seems to be a popular misconception that all n00b librarians/archivist seem to think is true. For example, Blizzard Entertainment is looking for an Associate Librarian & Archivist. I have many friends who have never set foot, professionally, in what is considered to be traditional librarian/archivist jobs. Other options are: Knowledge management, information architecture, UX designer, content producer, and about two dozen other fields you can go in with a MLIS.
So let’s talk cash. Yes, librarians are underpaid, I will not disagree with this. But the amount of cash you make is solely relevant to the type of job and where you live. I have friends in Chicago who work in public libraries who think $45K starting out is terrible, WHEREAS in Michigan (anywhere in the state really), that’s hooker and blow money right thar. I’ve applied for jobs, many with the same titles/qualifications/etc that ranged as divergent as $30-100K. It’s crazy with the lack of consistency, but I get super frustrated when people do not take cost of living and high cost areas into faction here. Another friend of mine, who is looking to move into becoming a director at a small college, found a gig in Maine that paid $32K. For a director’s job.
If you think librarianship is where the big rollers are, you are sorely mistaken. You can wage your MLIS into a field that pays you big money, but as a whole, librarians do NOT work for the benefits of fame and fortune.
We’ve talked school choice, getting an education, kind of jobs you can get, and your potential big bank.
Let’s talk about paying for this education.
I had $100K in student loan debt when I came out of my MLIS. (Had because it’s now down to $69K.) That money funded most of my BA and both of my masters. Knowing me, I knew that I needed to not work 40 hours a week while going to school because it would not work for me. I had tried that before many times and always ended up dropping out of classes (this is part of the reason it took me so long before heading back to finish my undergrad. I have transcripts in at least 6 colleges before I sucked it up and knew I had to put school as a priority). I knew that coming out of this, I was going to be heavily in debt and I was totally okay with that. Could I have made better choices with the funds? Sure. I could have done a lot more to save/grants/scholarships. But I do not regret getting my degrees. Not all people are like me. I have a friend who is doing her MLIS degree two classes at a time. I have another friend who did the program in 18 months (traditionally, it takes 2 years). Some are paying for it by themselves and others are getting loans. You need to do what’s best FOR YOU. Everyone’s experiences and expectations are different. There are a lot of options to finance/save/pay for classes. Research them. I was also lucky to land a job that pays me enough for hookers and blow, so I’m fast tracking my student loan payments and the entire debt will be paid off in 10 years.
Lastly, let’s talk about job titles. The field of thought is to be called a librarian is to have a MLIS. But, a lot of rural/small libraries are getting away with volunteers and/or long term employees who call themselves “librarians” (withOUT a MLIS) because they worked at that particular location for 900 years so they are the best choice. I do get that train of thought, I do. But it’s like calling ones self a doctor after reading WebMD. There is a lot more to the word “librarian” then just working in a library and I wish more people would see that.
Which brings me up to my last point: If you decide to go this route and you want to do this for a living, be prepared to defend what you do ALL THE TIME. Example: When I saw my orthopedic surgeon for the first time earlier this year, and he asked me what I did and I told him I was a librarian, he said, “I thought libraries are dead? Everything is on Google.” Uh, what? My retort was, “Do you stop using stairs because elevators come into existence? Do you no longer have an accountant because TurboTax exists?” He got my point real quick. People are often careless and dumb, but when it comes to the life of libraries, they are downright stupid.
This has been a production of “Lisa’s Quick Guide to Becoming a Librarian” in 10 easy steps. No warranties implied or assumed. Money back not guaranteed. Act now as this is a limited time offer.
So, why do you want to be a librarian again?
-Lisa
P.S. Every other Wednesday or so, there is a great chat on Twitter called #libchat, that starts at 8PM Eastern. You may want to check that out and consequently, you can find me on Twitter as @pnkrcklibrarian if you have any questions. Lastly, you can also email me if you have questions about Wayne, library school, or why the sky is blue!
P.P. S. Another niblet about Wayne:  I landed a job on campus as a reference librarian in one of their libraries in my second semester, which I worked at until I graduated 18 months later. As I was doing a dual degree of sorts (librarian AND archivist), I also won a scholarship that same semester. My final semester, I had a bill for the same amount of the scholarship. When I contacted the school’s office, I found out they revoked my scholarship 18 months later, because they felt it was “unfair” as I had the job on campus. The job paid me, but did not give me any tuition breaks. If my partner (now husband) at the time did not have a good job, I’d be up shit’s creek without a damn paddle.

So, You Want to Become a Librarian/Archivist: 2012 edition

Dear Internet,
In 2008 or so, I started writing columns on “So, You Want to Become a Librarian/Archivist”, which ended up becoming pretty popular. With as many domain shuffles I’ve had in the last four years, the content is archived but has not been put back on this current domain as of yet.
A few days ago, my friend Kate said, “Hey! There is a thread on Ravelry about wanting to become a librarian. I think you should chime in.” And I agreed. Below is my original post with some slight editing. Once I stop getting lazy, I’ll put up the older posts, but the below pretty much is succintly how I feel today.
Please, please, please use this to pass around to anyone who is thinking of becoming a librarian, please add in your own comments about your experiences with library school, education, job hunt, anything. I don’t know where the misconceptions are coming from, but if watching #libchat is any indication, a lot of n00bs out there still can’t shake the myths. I no longer care WHY the myths exist, I just want to break them.
—-
First, if you can’t find what you’re looking for via Google or any search engines, then you’re going to be a terrible librarian. Here is my point: I searched for “online library science programs accredited” in Google and the VERY FIRST item is a link to ALA (American Library Association – our professions largest professional organization) listing of accredited schools, which includes online programs. I know of four you can do entirely online:

There is probably others that do entirely online degrees, but those are the big ones. The number of library schools in the US is tiny (like 50?), so it averages one per state. Most, if not all schools, offer a blended degree of online/in classroom.
There ARE schools that offer library science or library tech degrees in bachelors or as certification programs. These are not the same thing as getting a MLIS. I want to make this clear because this is commonly misunderstood.
So WHY do you want to be a librarian? You only say, I think I would be good at this. But you don’t really clarify WHY you think you would be good at this. Here is a major site aggregator for library jobs that is compiled by ALA. Even if you see the same job title twice, you will hardly see the same job responsibilities, duties, or description. If you think the job is going to be standing around all day handling and reading books: Let me burst that bubble for you right quick. I barely have time to keep up with my professional reading, let alone personal reading. I was more cultured in topics and titles when I slung books at a bookstore then working in a library system.
At this point, you’re probably wondering: Who the hell is this person?

  • I’m a systems and web librarian at a community college
  • I have a GED, BA, MA, and now my MLIS
  • I graduated from Wayne State in 2010 with my MLIS and archival certification
  • I’m not going to be overly humble here: I was the golden child of my class. I worked through school at the campus library as a reference librarian, I was on many professional committees on and off campus, I started a new organization ON campus, I was active within the community, and I had a 3.85 GPA. It took a year and 114 job applications before I landed a job. I applied for EVERYTHING and EVERYWHERE.

(Also, I would highly advise you NOT to go to Wayne for your online program. This is the worst run school ever, the director is douchebag delight who is out of touch with the needs of the students — we tried to get him removed as head when I was there.  His main residence is in the southern states. Yes, he’s a director of a program in MI, but lives in the south. The programs are poorly coordinated and run. Stay the fuck away from Wayne.)
Let’s move on to your education: A lot of people say that having a degree in history, or English, or similar is extremely helpful in having a MLIS. This is true and this is bullshit. It’s bullshit because EVERYTHING you do outside of library school will be extremely beneficial to your career path. Those customer service skills you learned in retail? You will be a prince(ss) among the people for deft handling of difficult patrons. You’re interest in comics and gaming? You will soon be scheduling programming and events for teens and adults when new releases come out. Worked in housekeeping or similar detail while going to school? You will be the MASTER of unclogging toilets. There will not be one skill you have not acquired in your personal or previous professional life that you will not call upon at some point in your library career.
Also, having a degree in the humanities such as English or History does not give you a leg up in getting a MLIS or working in a library. It is relevant if you want to specialize but if you are going to work somewhere and a specialization is not required, your degree in underwater basket weaving is just as useful as the one in physics. I am also going to strongly suggest you get, if you do not already have, heavy tech skills. I worked in the IT industry for nearly a decade before going back to finish my undergrad and then on my two masters degrees and having my background in IT  has been a boon to my job search and interviews
Next is job descriptions. My title is “systems and web librarian.” What does this mean? At my institution, it means that I am responsible for:

  • Maintaining our online catalog system (OPAC) in all capacities
  • I manage, update, create content for our library’s website and all social media accounts
  • I am a liaison to six departments on campus so I keep up to trends and info on all those fields
  • I do collection development for my departments
  • I teach information literacy classes 85 hours a semester
  • I am on the reference desk 10-15 hours a week
  • I am on numerous committees on campus
  • I participate heavily with the state wide library organization
  • I am the liaison to the institutions IT department and I work with them on many tech projects

Now I have a colleague who works at a local college here who does nothing but web development for the library. It was required he had his MLIS. Not that he does 1/6th of what I do, but that his job is 1/6 of what I do. Some librarians on this list may recognize that what I’ve listed is similar to their own lists of what is expected of them.
So the job market. Yes, it’s brutal. But so is it everywhere, it is NOT just in library world. I’ll reference my point above of 114 job applications and year before I landed my gig, but I want to stress I did NOT apply for positions only at libraries, I applied for any and all positions that I was qualified for in librarianship or as an archivist regardless of the sector. Just because you have an MLIS and/or you’re a certified archivist doesn’t mean you have to work at a library or at an archives. This seems to be a popular misconception that all n00b librarians/archivist seem to think is true. For example, Blizzard Entertainment is looking for an Associate Librarian & Archivist. I have many friends who have never set foot, professionally, in what is considered to be traditional librarian/archivist jobs. Other options are: Knowledge management, information architecture, UX designer, content producer, and about two dozen other fields you can go in with a MLIS.
So let’s talk cash. Yes, librarians are underpaid, I will not disagree with this. But the amount of cash you make is solely relevant to the type of job and where you live. I have friends in Chicago who work in public libraries who think $45K starting out is terrible, WHEREAS in Michigan (anywhere in the state really), that’s hooker and blow money right thar. I’ve applied for jobs, many with the same titles/qualifications/etc that ranged as divergent as $30-100K. It’s crazy with the lack of consistency, but I get super frustrated when people do not take cost of living and high cost areas into faction here. Another friend of mine, who is looking to move into becoming a director at a small college, found a gig in Maine that paid $32K. For a director’s job.
If you think librarianship is where the big rollers are, you are sorely mistaken. You can wage your MLIS into a field that pays you big money, but as a whole, librarians do NOT work for the benefits of fame and fortune.
We’ve talked school choice, getting an education, kind of jobs you can get, and your potential big bank.
Let’s talk about paying for this education.
I had $100K in student loan debt when I came out of my MLIS. (Had because it’s now down to $69K.) That money funded most of my BA and both of my masters. Knowing me, I knew that I needed to not work 40 hours a week while going to school because it would not work for me. I had tried that before many times and always ended up dropping out of classes (this is part of the reason it took me so long before heading back to finish my undergrad. I have transcripts in at least 6 colleges before I sucked it up and knew I had to put school as a priority). I knew that coming out of this, I was going to be heavily in debt and I was totally okay with that. Could I have made better choices with the funds? Sure. I could have done a lot more to save/grants/scholarships. But I do not regret getting my degrees. Not all people are like me. I have a friend who is doing her MLIS degree two classes at a time. I have another friend who did the program in 18 months (traditionally, it takes 2 years). Some are paying for it by themselves and others are getting loans. You need to do what’s best FOR YOU. Everyone’s experiences and expectations are different. There are a lot of options to finance/save/pay for classes. Research them. I was also lucky to land a job that pays me enough for hookers and blow, so I’m fast tracking my student loan payments and the entire debt will be paid off in 10 years.
Lastly, let’s talk about job titles. The field of thought is to be called a librarian is to have a MLIS. But, a lot of rural/small libraries are getting away with volunteers and/or long term employees who call themselves “librarians” (withOUT a MLIS) because they worked at that particular location for 900 years so they are the best choice. I do get that train of thought, I do. But it’s like calling ones self a doctor after reading WebMD. There is a lot more to the word “librarian” then just working in a library and I wish more people would see that.
Which brings me up to my last point: If you decide to go this route and you want to do this for a living, be prepared to defend what you do ALL THE TIME. Example: When I saw my orthopedic surgeon for the first time earlier this year, and he asked me what I did and I told him I was a librarian, he said, “I thought libraries are dead? Everything is on Google.” Uh, what? My retort was, “Do you stop using stairs because elevators come into existence? Do you no longer have an accountant because TurboTax exists?” He got my point real quick. People are often careless and dumb, but when it comes to the life of libraries, they are downright stupid.
This has been a production of “Lisa’s Quick Guide to Becoming a Librarian” in 10 easy steps. No warranties implied or assumed. Money back not guaranteed. Act now as this is a limited time offer.
So, why do you want to be a librarian again?
-Lisa
P.S. Every other Wednesday or so, there is a great chat on Twitter called #libchat, that starts at 8PM Eastern. You may want to check that out and consequently, you can find me on Twitter as @pnkrcklibrarian if you have any questions. Lastly, you can also email me if you have questions about Wayne, library school, or why the sky is blue!
P.P. S. Another niblet about Wayne:  I landed a job on campus as a reference librarian in one of their libraries in my second semester, which I worked at until I graduated 18 months later. As I was doing a dual degree of sorts (librarian AND archivist), I also won a scholarship that same semester. My final semester, I had a bill for the same amount of the scholarship. When I contacted the school’s office, I found out they revoked my scholarship 18 months later, because they felt it was “unfair” as I had the job on campus. The job paid me, but did not give me any tuition breaks. If my partner (now husband) at the time did not have a good job, I’d be up shit’s creek without a damn paddle.

Why (white) men should not (mostly) write about gender disparity in technology

Dear Internet,
In 1994 or ’95, I started getting interested in computing and even more specifically, the INTERNET. This all stemmed from a class I took at the time  (taught by a woman) succinctly titled, “An Introduction to the Internet”; which would be all command line interface until the college installed Netscape .9 in the open computer lab later that year. Color. Photos. From. Finland. WOW.
That class changed my entire life.
I got my first paid gig doing tech support at a local ISP in 1996, which lead to another gig in San Francisco, which lead to other gigs that took me around the country. My last pure tech job was as an Senior Internet Systems engineer at UUNet/Worldcom, which I spent my days configuring routers, studying for the CCIE, and other network engineering fun things. As WorldCom was going through a bit of a rough patch, I took this as a sign to head back to university, finish my undergrad in English (where I had started nearly a decade prior) and figure out the rest of my life. I moved back to Michigan and started classes at Aquinas in January of 2003.
I completed my undergrad in the spring of 2005, my first masters in the spring of 2008, and my second masters in the spring of 2010.
None of my degrees have anything to do with computing or technology, which was very much on purpose. My creative brain needs a lot of hand holding while my technology brain does not. While there were gaps between my technology jobs (school and all that rot),  I’ve always kept my head wet by keeping up my interests. My current position is the perfect job for me since it combines my education AND my experience: I’m a systems and web librarian at a local college. All of my senses are tingly.
I’m giving you this background not because I think I’m unique in my education or my foray into technology, but to illustrate that I’ve been in the technological world for a very long time and I have very rich experience of being a woman in a man’s world. I knew getting into tech back in the early ’90s  women were not as dominant and they were just starting to get into the peripheral of the scene. When I went to Def Con in 1997, the number of women who were hackers at the time were just beginning to be as dominant as the ones who came along to support their partners. In the next couple of years, the more cons I visited, the more women were becoming an integral part of the scene and less like visitors from another planet.
As this is such a male dominated landscape, I’m no stranger to sexism or sexual harrassment that was and still is clearly abundant in the world of technology. This is the one constant that has not changed since that first class I took in 1994.
To wit, within the last week alone, two seperate vendors did the following:

  • One sent an email explaining that to turn on the server I had just received by documenting I had to push the big green blinky button
  • After explaining to the vendor I was going to use sudo for installation of Enterprise backup and walked him through the steps, he still explained what sudo was and why I needed to use it

This is in addition to my day to day life where sexism runs rampart, whether it is intended or not. Last week, the beer guy who kept talking to TheHusband about the deliciousness of beer when we picked up a bottle of Guinness Black even after I pointed out it was for me; the car sales people who kept approaching TheHusband when we were shopping for cars even after we pointed out I was not only the primary person driving but also the purchaser. The comic book store clerks (5 out 6 we’ve visited) who kept trying to suggest titles to TheHusband even when it was I asking to buy such and such issues. So forth, and so on.
For many men, most I would think, don’t even think they are being sexist. Some even think they are being helpful. Our culture is so ingrained that something designed as being very male (beer, car shopping, computers, comics) belongs to the male of the party, they  without thinking about it direct all conversation to the male even if it is the female who is inquiring. I’m betting that 9 out of 10 men do this unintentionally and subconsciously, there is no thought that what they are doing is sexist.
I’ve long come to accept this is part of my life, as my interests in male dominated areas (comics, technology, sci-fi/fantasy) continues to grow, so too will the sexism (unintended or not) continue on. I’ve developed a thick skin to the daily sexisms because fighting each and every turn is exhausting, and often futile. So I pick my battles when I can and fight on like a good warrior for these battles.
This is one of those battles.
Ealier this week, Roy Tennant, who writes at Library Journal’s The Digital Shift, published an article called Fostering Female Technology Leadership in Libraries.
I’ll wait while you go read.
I’m going to go make some tea while you’re going through the comments.
I may also start a new cross-stitch pattern while you’re going through that.
Are you back? Good.
Here are the problems I have with Roy’s article, and later his comments.

  • When pointing out his suggestions were just as sexist, or at the very least patronizing to the very people he was trying to help, he told me, the very type of person he was trying to help, I was wrong.
  • When giving him suggestions on how better to further the action or dialogue, he ignored them.
  • When several of us pointed out that as a white man, he had the utmost of privilege and that his suggestions were born from that privilege, unintentional or not, and ergo why his suggestions sounded patronizing even when he thought they were’t, he took that to mean we were attacking him personally even though we were attacking his argument.
  • Ditto for the number of times he keeps discussing how much of a feminist he is on this site and other social media as well as alluding his critics are off the mark. Let me point out once more  the criticisms have come from the very people he’s trying to help. No one is disputing your feminism Roy, we’re critiquing your proposed solutions and your dismissiveness of our experiences in your follow up commentary.
  • When I disputed that the experiences he was writing about were not the same I experienced, so he should not generalize, he said, “yet I’ve heard the opposite from other female colleagues — that such jokes create a hostile environment for women. For now, I’m still with them.”  The problem with this is you cannot expect special treatment for women (tampering down of jokes/commentary  in the work place) if you want to be equal. You can’t have it both ways. It has to apply to EVERYONE or apply to NO ONE. It is not equality if special considerations are made. This was the huge problem I had with this list, because tampering down jokes and being respectful to a woman should not just about women, it should be for all humans.

What really gets my goat, however, is Roy’s apparent ignorance of his own privilege on this matter as he keeps beating it around social media how much of a feminist he is, so he’s right and we’re wrong. It was pointed out to him in the comments that as a white male, he enjoys specialized treatment, which he may not even be aware of but as a white male he does certainly enjoy. He told the person,

Karen, the fact that you think you know me is laughable. Indeed I have “given up privilege” as you put it. For but one example, I voluntarily left the LITA Top Tech Trends panel to make way for the committee to add more women, a number of whom I nominated in the process, and subsequently when the panel at one conference was again male-heavy I complained about at the session. I notice that they’ve largely been better about it since.

So. Giving up privilege, to him, means he left a panel on a professional association. And then complained about it’s male dominatedness later on? And that’s it? This is supposed to make me feel better? Nothing here about his personal life. Nothing here about what he is doing at his own company to promote women in technology or in other very public spheres he’s active in. Because an empty seat on a panel for a small subset of the profession is so helpful to the rest of the female gender in getting them into technology?
Right.
Ultimately what is causing me the most frustration is what also makes me the most depressed. Here is someone who has power, who is known on a large scale in the profession, who can’t even acknowledge that his approach to this very worthwhile topic is perhaps not the way that it should be? That maybe, instead of labeling myself and others critical of his approach (again, the very same marginalized group he is attempting to promote) as his “attackers,” he could step back for a moment and at least acknowledge our commentary might have some substance?
(Bears repeating: No one is disagreeing this topic isn’t worthwhile. I am disagreeing with this execution.)
This fight for equality is not even close to being over yet, nor will it be even in my lifetime. However, the unfortunate part is that it is people like Roy, self-styled (white) male femimists, who have solidarity for our cause, who want to be supportive of our needs, are the very same ones who are often our worst detractors. I believe Roy genuinely thinks that he’s doing a very good thing by writing about this topic, even if I disagree with what he wrote. I also think this is why he’s so defensive of any critique of his actions because he thinks he’s doing something to help the downtrodden, how on earth can this even be remotely bad?
Do not ever be afraid to be critical of anyone, regardless of who they are, when they start discussing means and ways of experiences and feelings when it is clear they have no experience in what they are discussing. You, and only you, can own your experiences and feelings. Do not let others dictate how you should live.
Roy asked for ways to change this, which I gave him a list which was ignored. Here is more to add to that list if you want to support women in technology:

  • Donate to the Ada Intiative.
  • Start/chair an interest group for women in technology in LITA, the technology arm of ALA
  • Start a GeekGirl Dinner in your area.
  • Use Meetup.com to start/find groups in your interests (there were loads of Women in Technology interest groups on MeetUp).
  • Depending on where you work, what you do; start off-site initiative for women to have a hack-a-thon
  • Find local hacker space communities to start a women’s initiative
  • Use professional conferences to propose panels / groups / discussions to get more people aware but also to pay it forward
  • Create a women in tech book club at local bar/ coffee house
  • Donate time to do mentoring to high school and middle school girls
  • Donate to or become a sponsor for a nearby women’s conference, like GeekGirlCon

Wanting to bring a voice to a marginalized group is a very good thing, but dismissing the concerns or critiques of that same group when brought up to you is bad. Do not generalize your assumptions of women as a whole in a particular area (in this case, technology) because your sample of that experience will be small and it will not be representative of all voices. Do not presume, as a male, to know my experiences and also, to dictate how I should feel about them. I can only speak of my experiences in my life, I cannot speak for other women, but the broader, much larger vile act of sexism is very, very real. Everyday Sexism is documenting this in spades.
Once this is posted, I’m donating to the Ada Initiative. I welcome any civil, commentary on this topic but keep in mind any obnoxious trolling will be deleted.
Fight the good fight,
ttfn,
Lisa
Edited: Nov 4: Added link to start a SIG at LITA in the to-do list

Information literacy scavenger hunt and plagiarism

One of the best things about working here in the summer is that the pace is much slower, which allows me to do more fiddling with projects that I may not have had a chance to work on during the academic year. Today I worked with an instructor to build together an info lit/intro the library scavenger hunt that he will be using for his fall classes (EN 098/CLS 100). As we worked, we fine tuned what he wanted to become more of an intro to the library then a true information literacy hunt. Since this particular prof didn’t want actual information literacy but more on how to use the library and what library services were available, this changed our plan of attack.
While searching to see what other libraries were doing, I found the following:

There a couple of things that came to mind as I searched:

  • Scavenger hunts for college age students were almost exclusively geared for mobile use (namely smartphones that had barcode/QR code readers on them), which keeps perpetuating that the digital age prefers this method of learning then to physical objects. This despite what Pew data that less then 50% of American adults over 18 own a smartphone.
  • Many of the scavenger hunt/get to know the library games (regardless of age appropriateness) were almost all online.
  • The theme seemed to be that many of the games were almost identical to the other, which lead one to ask, “Where did the game originate from?”

When I asked the question of the later to the prof I was working with, he informed me that in teaching it’s considered accepted, even encouraged, to appropriate ideas from one program to another because it’s (essentially) for the greater good. This not only means ideas and concepts, but also handouts/worksheets/homework assignments where a nod to the source is almost always removed or forgotten. I will not tell a lie: This bit of information blew my mind.
As a librarian, and an educator, I teach plagiarism, in any form, is bad and that the consequences are and can be tremendous. So why are there educators otu there thinking that because it’s for the great good, plagiarism is totally okay? What kind of message are we sending to our students?

Bagged & Boarded: The Best American Comics 2011

The Best American Comics 2011 (anthology) | 3/5
Quick Summary: Collection of sequential art works by upcoming and established artists, edited by Alison Bechdel
tl;dr Summary: The book merits a “meh” and is recommended to buy used or to get from the library but not something you want to necessarily keep in your collection, even for reference.
The Best American series and I have an interesting relationship. Something compels me to think I have to read the damn things, thus year after year I buy copy after copy of titles in the series, used/new/eBook, on the premise that I’m going to read them and each year, the books get stacked higher and higher on my to be read shelves, taunting me and of course, never read. (But don’t I look smart with them on my shelves?) When Amazon recently had a one day sale of the Kindle versions of the entire 2011 Best American series for $.99 per title, I snapped up what was available save for Comics (not on Kindle format) and Sports (zzzz). Much like my groaning bookshelves taunting me with unread words, my Kindle app winks at me with updates at its growing collection of books that gather [Continue Reading]
Originally published at: Lisa @ EPbaB

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