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What Single Book Is The Best Introduction To Your Field For Laypeople?

Ask MetaFilter is a great site I've referenced a few times before.  As I write this, this recent question
has almost 300 “favourite” votes which makes it one of the most popular questions and answers I've even seen.

Nobody posted a pick for a book that provides a good introduction to librarianship (yet) but I'd say something like “Our Enduring Values” by Michael Gorman is probably pretty close. I mean, the table of contents in that link does a pretty good job by itself of summarizing what librarianship is all about!

In fact, I've heard of one library's board of directors (who, like most library boards is comprised of a mix of municipal appointees and volunteers from the wider community but not actual trained librarians) who voluntarily agreed to work through this book, one chapter per meeting, to familiarize themselves with some of the core values of librarianship.  Pretty good vote of confidence, I'd say!

Posted 12 September 2007 § Jobs § Library § Main Page § PopCulture ‡ Comments (2) ° Tagged:

Join the FIMS Professional Mentorship Program

I'm pretty much the perfect example of the value of the Professional Mentorship program at FIMS.  I participated in it all three semesters I was there.  I had a great mentor in my first term and an okay one in my second.  But it was the third that made it really pay off.  When I sent in my application to join in my final semester, I asked if they were able to match me with someone in western Canada and preferably Saskatchewan (my other two mentors were Ontario-based which was fine but didn't help a lot in terms of my networking – and have I ever mentioned how much I hate that word?  Netsocialing it is then.) 

They paired me with a rural librarian working in Weyburn Saskatchewan who I'd heard of but had never met in person.  The mentorship went well but the big pay-off was when I got back to Saskatchewan and we exchanged some e-mails.  I mentioned that I was still looking for work and he said I should apply at his system, Southeast Regional Library “because you never know what will happen.” 

I'd been focusing my search on Regina up to this point but it was the system I'd grown up with, it was based where my in-laws lived and something in his voice said this was more than just idle chatter.  A little while later, I got called by the SRL Library Director, a few days later I met them for an interview where they revealed that my mentor was taking an 18-month leave of absence.  One thing leads to another and here I am, not quite six months later, sitting in Weyburn and heading down to SRL HQ every morning!

So anyhow, long story short (too late!), I highly recommend that you participate in the UWO CLA Student Chapter's Mentorship Project – whether you're reading this as a student or a grad.  This term, it's particularly important as FIMS is taking in a one-time only (yeah, we'll see about that?  (Where's my emoticon of a happy face with dollar signs for eyes?)) triple cohort which means there will be 120 new students looking for the kind of advice and guidance that only comes from a working librarian who's been through the grind that is FIMS.

Here are the details about how the program works, straight from the hard-working coordinator, Erin F (the e-mail for the program is at the bottom of this post if you want an application or more details):

—

CLA- UWO Student Chapter:
Mentorship Program Charter

 

Information about the Mentorship Program

  • The
    Mentorship Program’s goal is to connect Library and Information Science
    students with library or information professionals.
  • The
    key characteristics of the program are facilitating knowledge exchange and
    providing guidance to current students entering the profession.

 

Who can be
a Mentor?

  • Librarians
    or Information Professionals who would like to provide support and
    coaching for an interested student.
  • Librarians
    or Information Professionals with an interest in contributing to the
    education of a future professional.

 

Who can be
a Mentee?

  • UWO
    MLIS students who would like advice and guidance about library and
    information careers from professionals in the field.
  • UWO MLIS
    students who are interested in making professional connections in the
    library and information science workforce.

 

Mentoring
Relationship Guidelines

  • Communication
    between mentor and mentee should occur at least twice per term
  • The
    mentor should try to respond to the mentee within two weeks.
  • The
    mode of communication is at the discretion of the participants but several
    effective methods include emails, phone calls, and lunch or coffee
    meetings.
  • Suggested
    discussion topics and activities include:
  • resume
    review
  • course
    recommendations
  • industry
    overviews
  • professional
    trends
  • current
    issues
  • job
    shadowing
  • library
    tours
  • attending
    conferences
  • introductions
    to other professionals in the field.

Should either party have any concern about the mentoring
relationship, the administrators are available for advice.Students who take part in the Mentorship Program should
consider returning to the program as a Mentor.

For more information about the program please contact Erin
Fields at westernmentorship@gmail.com

Posted 11 September 2007 § Jobs § Library § LibrarySchool § Main Page ‡ Comments (0) °

Breastbook?

Facebook has been censoring photos of breastfeeding mothers.  If you believe breastfeeding is a non-sexual, natural thing (and that your eyes won't melt if you catch the corner of a boob in a photo), there's a Facebook group you can join to show your support.

I have a feeling this will be Shea's next profile picture…


(via Techcrunch)

Posted 10 September 2007 § Baby § Censorship § Internet § Main Page § Shea ‡ Comments (4) ° Tagged:

Evolution of "The Banjo Bowl"

CANOE — SLAM! Sports – CFL – Winnipeg: Evolution of the Banjo Bowl

(Hate to say it but I think the Riders are due for the loss today, especially after how the game ended last week.  The Bombers will be pumped for today.  I hope I'm wrong.)

Posted 09 September 2007 § Main Page § PopCulture § Saskatchewan ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

Friday Late Link – "Slam The Boards" Librarian Challenge (September 7, 2007)

Sorry for being late again this week – same “real world must take precedence sometimes” excuse as last week.

That also means anybody reading this has a bit less notice that September 10 has been declared “Librarians Slam The Boards” day.

Jessamyn West over at librarian.net has more details but basically, the idea is that librarians show up on any of the dozen or so “answer sites” on the Internet and provide responses while indicating that the question has been answered by a librarian.

The idea is to promote the role that librarians fill in providing quality information for others.

“This
means making it clear that this question was answered by a
librarian/library professional/etc. End each answer with the mention
your own library, your VR service, etc. Add the link. Mention that
readers should consider their own libraries, too. Promote it to local
media. Keep in mind how many people don’t even realize that libraries
offer reference services. Let’s surprise and delight them with our
quality.

I’d like hundreds of librarians to do this. Thousands? Why not?

I
see this as an opportunity to make the reference librarian community
more visible. I’d like to see a number of us remain engaged in the
answer services, on the chance that the users will have us in the backs
of their minds when they have questions they don’t want everyone to
see. As such, I’m not expecting to see a huge “blip” in our
reference/VR stats because of this. But who knows? The point is to meet
some folks where they otherwise wouldn’t expect us.”

I love some of the taglines they’re proposing librarians use with their answers:

# Have a question you don’t want the whole world to see?
# Librarians—Ask Us, We Answer!
# If you need more help, just contact your local librarian.
# Librarians—We eat questions for breakfast!

Posted 09 September 2007 § FridayFunLink § Library § Main Page ‡ Comments (0) °

Things You Can Do When You Have Your Laptop But No Internet Access

Went to our family cottage at Katepwa Lake last night, one of the few places left on earth that doesn't have Internet connectivity apparently.

I did have my laptop so after Pace went down for the night, here are some things I was able to do (or at least thought about doing)…

– I've mentioned that pre-blog, I wrote in a journal on a daily basis.  I could've done this (but didn't.)

– play computer games (really, the only game I play is EA NHL 2000.  Yeah, I know it's very outdated but I've kept the rosters updated for the most part using an editor and it's like NHL 94 – the all-time best hockey game – in its timelessness, at least for me.

– look through old library school essays.  Laugh hysterically at the amount of bullshit that spewed forth.

– do some creative writing (I did say this was a list of things I *could* do, not necessary that I did do, right?)

– look through old digital photos

– listen to collection of downloaded music

– watch a downloaded movie

– use guitar tab I happened to have on my hard drive to play campfire songs using a borrowed guitar.  I haven't taken my guitar to Weyburn so my only chance to play these days is on the weekend so my callouses (the hardest part of learning to play guitar is developing the callouses) are gone and my fingertips hurt like hell today! 

– file anything in the backlog of e-mail that doesn't need replied to

Posted 09 September 2007 § List § Main Page § Technology ‡ Comments (4) °

The Job Hunt – Professional Librarianship v. Whatever You Can Get

I had a conversation today that made me remember the internal debate many of us (including myself) go through when we first graduate – namely, do we hold out for a professional librarianship position or do we apply for whatever's available?

I know there are people reading this who fall into both camps so I thought I'd try to summarize the arguments for each.

I also want to
stress that I'm not making judgments here – I think both are valid
options and I recognize that we all do whatever works for us as
individuals.  So with the patented Hammond Disclaimer out of the way…

Only Professional Librarianship Positions
– that's what you went to school for (duh!)
– for the most part, professional librarian jobs pay more than a library assistant/library tech position
– someone once told me that you only have one chance to set your entry level spot into a profession.  That resonated so I'm including it here.
– there are people out there who feel that other MLIS grads taking anything less than a professional librarianship position somehow devalue the entire profession
[edit
added via someone's e-mail comment – like it or not, there is a library
caste system which means that you will be treated differently than the
other “real” librarians if you're not in a capital-L *Librarian* position.  This
ranges from not being invited to PD opportunities to social functions
that the librarians have.]

Take Whatever's Offered and/or Available First
– bills don't pay themselves
– often a clerk/tech/assistant job gets you that foot in the door that allows you bid on internal positions (ie. in a union environment)
– it's a good way to get frontline experience that will serve you well for your entire career, especially if you've never worked in libraries before and/or are going to end up managing people doing the jobs that you start out in.
– some people are able to return to positions (the same or similar) in libraries where they worked before, retaining their seniority/benefits and reserved seat in the coffee room.

Have I missed anything?  I'm whipping this list off the top of my head pretty quick.  Personally, when I had this internal debate, I was really close to applying for a couple library assistant-type positions early in my job search when they were the only things out there.  But I decided to hold out at least for a bit longer and it worked out in the end (though I'm very conscious that it could have easily gone the other way.) 

Posted 07 September 2007 § Jobs § Library § LibrarySchool § List § Main Page ‡ Comments (10) °

Pace's Day of Firsts

Pace laughed out loud for the first time today, went for his first swim in a real pool and then had his first time in a shower afterwards.  What a busy day!

Posted 06 September 2007 § Baby § Main Page § Video ‡ Comments (0) °

MeeMix Invites

I have a few if anybody's interested.  Post a comment or e-mail me off-list

Meemix is a music service halfway between Pandora and last.fm.  (Er, holy shit – when did Pandora shut down to users outside the US?)

Anyhow, hopefully Meemix is still up since it's even better than Pandora in many ways.

“Imagine a world of music – sorted by the songs you love. Imagine
broadcasting the soundtrack of your life to an audience around the globe.
Feel the magic and find your rhythm at MeeMix. Internet radio that gets you.”

Posted 05 September 2007 § Main Page § PopCulture ‡ Comments (3) ° Tagged:

Happy Labour Day (Reflections ofa New Father at Three and a Half Months)

I know Labour Day is about another type of struggle but I thought I'd take this pun-based opportunity to talk about how it's been to be a first-time father for the last three and a half months:

– all other milestones (driver's license, graduations, marriage) pale in comparison to the one where your life changes from “don't have children” to “have children”.  (I guess the milestone of alive/dead would be an even bigger change but I haven't heard too many reports from the other side for comparison's sake.)

– your free time evaporates and (for the most part) you don't care.  I think I wrote recently that I watch absolutely no TV these days and do a lot less reading.  Obviously I do still spend time on the Net but that's about the only indulgence I allow myself.  And surfing the Net is definitely something that gets interrupted a lot more than it did before.

– you don't mind being interrupted to change diapers, wipe drool, fetch things for mommy when she's feeding the baby or whatever.

– you quickly gain the ability to ignore contact with bodily fluids that previously would have probably made you puke (uhm, including puke.)

– baby's firsts are all amazing – from first coo to first poo.

– even more amazing than the baby smiling at you (which is unbelievably cool) is when you can tell the baby is trying to communicate with you…you babble and it babbles back, you make a face and it makes a face back.

– when your baby makes the leap from sleeping for 2-3 hours at a time to sleeping for 5-7 hours (around five weeks for us) is possibly the single best moment of the first three months outside of the actual birth.

– it's not as expensive as you think it might be, especially if you're  willing to use second-hand and garage sale clothes, furniture and toys. 

– babies make good free weights.  My arms are probably stronger than anytime since high school.  (The rest of me, not so much.  But I expect this to change too as soon as he gets mobile.)

– according to the photos on Shea's Flickr account, apparently one of the main reasons we had a baby was to dress him up in embarrassing outfits, sort of like a real life Cabbage Patch Doll.

– the best thing we bought was a battery-powered baby swing (aka “the Neglectomatic” (c) – The Poo Bomb web site)

– even if you pick a name that has, just an an example, four letters and is a fairly common English-language word, people will still ask you “how do you spell that?”

Finally, Ask MetaFilter happened to have a thread recently from someone looking for good books for first-time, clueless parents. 

The thread has lots of good comments and advice including a slight derail as some person named “Jaybo” gets into a brief debate with another poster about whether it's better to think of breastfeeding as being potentially hard and being pleasantly surprised if it's not versus thinking it's easy and being disappointed if it turns out not to be. 

Posted 04 September 2007 § Baby § List § Main Page ‡ Comments (0) °