Becoming a librarian was no lifelong ambition of mine nor considerably well calculated even as I started school. The general idea appealed to me, and I figured it well suited to my outlook and personality, which it has been. But I didn’t really know what I was getting into. How could I? To laity, librarians are an imaginary cabal society, full of secrets but with nothing to hide. They’re either particularly helpful or especially mean, and they like books. Full stop. Fortunately for me, my preconceptions have imploded, and I am consistently surprised by pleased with how closely the issues of the information field—from hot, hyped topics to enduring concerns—align with my existing interests and have generated dozens more.

In this age of information (and misinformation, disinformation and infotainment), librarians claim that we’re needed more than ever. While I agree, more so I believe that we must explain what we are for while simultaneously reimagining what we do and how we can do it better. Insisting upon our necessity without proving and improving our relevancy with modern information, communication and technological environments—to say nothing of actual people—won’t capture us any mindshare, much less budgetary favors. Everything’s on the internet anyway, right? Everyone is an expert searcher, just check out all those hits.

Contrary to how this is going, I don’t wish to confuse a statement with a soapbox, nor a meaty essay of buzzwords and big dreams with a comprehensive understanding of what I’m all about. Suffice it to say, I have a lot to say, with a lot I’m excited to do in and for the library field. Though most of my experience is in academic libraries, my interests range widely, and I look forward to a position in any sector that will encourage and benefit from my engagement with them and other concerns.

Among my top interests…

Information literacy

This is often framed as a scholarly issue. While I’m definitely interested in helping students (and instructors) understand search, research and their information needs to achieve academic success, I am especially interested in how these skills overlap into everyday life. From consumer choices to political ideologies and values construction, understanding information—how to access, evaluate and use it, as well as recognizing the power structures involved in its creation and dissemination—shapes the foundation for an informed and engaged citizenry.

On a less grand scale… when imparting information literacy skills, I think it’s important that people get a big-picture view of how libraries make information available—and what exactly “information” is. For instance, when teaching undergrads how to find peer-reviewed journal articles, it’s reasonable to first ensure that everyone knows what peer review means. But do they know what an article is? A journal? How these relate to databases? What Google Scholar’s doing? That clicking “full text only” in subscription databases is a counterproductive, bad idea when your library uses SFX?

OK, that last one’s a bit advanced. But for the first few basics, however much it kills me to see blank expressions, these are not stupid questions and cannot be assumed givens. They are fundamentals that will either take a minute to explain and grasp or, without them, set students up for a degree’s-worth of time doing things the hard way or with unintentional deficiency. The more people know about information, the better they will be able to navigate it, anticipate results and troubleshoot when things go wrong. And the more librarians are seen as knowledgeable—and non-condescending—the more likely people will ask us for help.

Media and technology fluency

Information is less useful—if not useless—if we can’t operate the mechanisms that unlock its potential. While information content is inherently context rich, it is also tied to its particular format. We need the skills and vision to take advantage of new formats and devices, maximizing benefits while being aware of limitations and understanding the information behaviors and preferences of our users.

What tech-toys and internet sites do our library patrons use, and does it make sense to tailor our services to these products or models of communication? Would a mobile catalog provide a valuable access point? What will the DRM packaged with this eBook mean for a user’s privacy and PC security? Does anyone care that our library has a Facebook page? …Really?

Intuitive user design and integration of content

Although I support fostering independent library users (i.e., not spoon-feeding everything), there’s no sense making things unnecessarily hard with our largest self-serve enterprise—the library’s website and OPAC. It’s shocking (and embarrassing) that as champions of organization and access, even we can fail miserably at meaningfully structuring a website—especially when it’s a Frankenstein birthed in the mid-nineties, developed by dozens over the years without guiding principles for design, language and overall structure, and without any serious attempt at unified revisions.

Even with a robust, intelligent site, I see several opportunities in libraries’ online worlds for deeper integration of content—connecting it to users where they’re already at, as opposed to building it and expecting them to come. For instance, we can hope a user discovers the database tutorials by knowing to search for them or stumbling upon them in the Skills and Workshops section, or the Information Literacy Whatever-That-Means section. Or we can link or embed tutorials, help sheets and librarian chat directly at a database’s entrance, at the point of need (or as close as we can get, depending on the database’s own capabilities).

I know shortcomings in this area often result from a lack of know-how or a stretched-thin IT department, or complications and limitations with various software systems. This breaks my heart, but I still dream big, and I am excited by ventures such as BiblioCommons (in use at Oakville Public Library outside of Toronto) and VuFind. There is no reason library catalogs can’t be as sexy, functional and fun to use as Amazon—and not just for connecting content to users, but connecting users to one another through their own content: item reviews, ratings, tags and more.

Maximizing digitization projects

The digitization of once obscure and obscured materials brings these often excellent resources new attention, relevance and research and cultural significance in libraries from all sectors. But as with other issues of content integration, availability does not equal access. Digital collections need searchable, meaningful metadata and user-friendly interfaces—and arguably most importantly, multiple, creative points of access.

I am especially impressed (excited! inspired!) by the work of Lally and Dunford at the University of Washington Libraries, who added links to UW digital collections to appropriate Wikipedia articles, driving traffic from the pertinent but non-scholarly encyclopedic information to their little-known but relevant, primary source materials (Using Wikipedia to Extend Digital Collections, 2007). It’s an excellent example of connecting users to content where they’re already at—Wikipedia, the like-it-or-not wildly popular, search engine top result information darling. Admittedly, I love it, too. And I love the idea of making Wikipedia better with links to authoritative, reliable library content.

Communication and collaboration

I was briefly enrolled in an Information Services Consulting / Entrepreneurial Librarianship course. After the first class, I switched out—it wasn’t for me. My best ideas?—I want to give away for free. Librarians can cringe at things like Wikipedia vis-à-vis serious scholarship and respectable research, but the open source attitude of working together to formulate and refine the best product possible is remarkable if not revolutionary.

Libraries by and large all deal with the same issues and are subject to the same pressures—particularly a lack of cash. As such, collaborative projects and open communication is key to strengthening the profession. While this concept is hardly new, it deserves fresh perspective and renewed commitment, especially given the opportunities afforded by open source, flexible copyright, consortial agreements and the astounding but often taken-for-granted fact that the internet… exists. It has never been easier or cheaper to stay in touch, share information and work together on projects with colleagues—down the hall, across town and on the other side of the world.

Lifelong learning

Cradle prenatal to grave learning and literacies should be not just an ideal but a cornerstone for a modern society, with opportunities for participation as a measure of quality of life—from babytime singalongs to learning about genealogy, from exploring your city’s architecture to the history of antiquity, from pursuing higher education to socializing through video gaming, from exposure and access to creative works to the tools and support to create such works yourself.

I want never to stop learning. As a librarian, it’s my job to never stop learning.
It is my duty and honor to inspire in others the same curiosity and drive.

Additional Interests:

Copyright / copyleft / Creative Commons
Open access and open source
Scholarly communications
Information retrieval
Meaningfully leveraged social software