And not the gardening kind either (although we are in spring cleaning mode at our city home (ie. Regina) since I took a few days off before the SLA conference later this week. Take a look at the program and see if you can spot two of my former colleagues who are presenting. Hints: one is also a former Spirit of Librarianship award winner who was also my student mentor and one is a published author who I think I had given his first public reading as part of the "Lunch Bucket Speaker Series" to a rapturous crowd of, oh, about four.)
Anyhow, back to the subject at hand...
I've done a bit of weeding here and there during the past year but a couple weeks ago, I had my first opportunity to do some more involved weeding in (of course) my hometown branch.
(I should note that I'm really trying hard to temper my natural biases, working in my home region and having family and friends in so many of the 48 communities I serve including having grown up in one that I seem to end up spending a lot of time at. But Indian Head just happened to be the first of about four (so far) branches that have asked for me to come help with weeding this summer - honest!)
Here are some random thoughts and impressions... - one of the hardest things you have to learn as a librarian (and presumably a book lover) is to be ruthless when weeding. The book is tattered? Gone. Hasn't been checked out in five years or more? Gone. Has outdated information? Gone. Has less than one use per year in the last few years? Gone.
- the weeded
books get a chance at second life in the library's book sale but I
suspect many of them end up in that big book sale in the sky after that
brief reprieve. - this is a point of contention for some librarians (yes, we get worked up about this stuff) but there are different views on what constitutes a "perfect shelf." Some like to see the shelf fully stocked so that you can barely squeeze a finger in and all the books in your collection are available to the patron. Others like to have their shelves 80-90% full to make re-shelfing easier. Others go even lower - maybe 60- 75% - which aids reshelfing and also gives the advantage of allowing to place more books face out and... (warning: Jason actually endorses a retail marketing concept ahead ) ...increasing the chances that the book will be picked up by a customer. (Ooops, Jason goes too far! )
I know one library that did an aggressive weed taking out 10% of their books. You'd suspect that their circulation would fall by 10%. Instead, it went up by 25% because they could do face-out shelfing and because the books that were left simply looked nicer and/or newer which made patrons more likely to take them out.
- even worse than killing the books is seeing all the work of somebody who came long before, back in the day's when a cataloging record wasn't a mouse click away but each entry had to be manually typed and labourously inserted into the book. I guess that's the nature of the beast and it happens in all fields but it's still tough to think of that work disappearing with the rip of the barcoded page.
- being in my hometown library, it was a bit eerie to see familiar titles including at least one series of sports tips for youngsters books I am positive I checked out in my younger days. (GONE!)
- further to that last point, I know all of the security and privacy issues around it but I still regret that libraries don't at least give us the option of keeping a permanent record of our borrowing. It's too late for me, having grown up in the analog age of date due stamps and handwritten library card numbers on the date due slip but wouldn't it be amazing if Pace could look back on his entire reading history when he turned 25 or 40 or 80?
- What happened in the early 2000's that kids simply stopped reading juvenile non-fiction? It's a bit early for the Internet so it must've been something else. CD-ROM's? So many of the books I looked at had good, regular usage and then 2000-2002 hits and they just stop circulating.
- The date due slips aren't just a history of which patron # took the book out and when but also, like marginalia that you often find in library books, a bit of insight into the history of the book itself. Notes from the librarian about the book: "Called M. Smith re: overdue. Said she'll check again." and from one librarian to another ("I enjoyed this one so thought you might too."). Card numbers are used instead of names but occasionally (usually when teachers borrowed a group of books or for non-local fulfillment), the full name and community of the borrower is written in instead. So I get to see that one of our current branch librarians (who I'll be weeding with in the next few weeks) was borrowing books for her children long before she began working for us. Or that one of my elementary school teachers regularly used public library books to supplement her lessons at school.
- when you go to delete the records of the books you've weeded, you should always ask someone who knows the system better than you do if you're doing it right. Otherwise, you could end up doing twice as much work. Or so I've heard...
Book beer pairings sees authors suggesting brews that are best enjoyed with their work. What brews go with your favourite books - a very important question for the ages.
In semi-related news, the next "Books to Beers and Stacks to Snacks" social gathering will happen following the final day of the SLA conference, Saturday May 3 at 5pm at the Cathedral Village Free House in Regina. Endnote speaker, Jessamyn West, is planning to attend so why not drop by if you're already taking in the conference and/or a MetaFilter member?
Today was our semi-annual branch librarian's workshop where we hold a day-long series of presentations related to librarianship and our library system specifically.
It went off fairly well with the usual mix of the good (the Dilly Bars from DQ for the afternoon "stretch break" were a hit, even if the weather had turned bitterly cold in the last couple days), the bad (one presenter didn't show up) and the ugly (most of my jokes at the podium. )
An unexpected highlight was meeting David Sparvier who is Canada's first Aboriginal professional librarian. We had invited a number of librarians from various First Nations in our region and Mr. Sparvier came even though he is now retired. (He told me his age and I said I would've guessed twenty years younger!)
I got to sit with him at lunch and spent an enjoyable but all too brief bit of time hearing about his experiences at U of T in the 60's doing his MLS, his early work with Provincial Library setting up the regional library system and various other related topics. I didn't even know that he had that small claim to fame as Canada's first Aboriginal professional librarian until a colleague pointed it out.
Some of these suggestions could be very useful in a library setting if you're trying to encourage movement towards more technology-based solutions and are feeling resistance from colleagues and/or management.
(PS - I've had this link kicking around for a LONG time and suspect I initially got it from someone else's blog. So if it was you that posted this, apologies for not giving proper credit.)
I may have mentioned before that the person I'm replacing at work is a member of ALA and, since he had his subscription to their e-mail newsletter, "American Libraries Direct", coming to his work e-mail address, it's been forwarded to me for the past year.
I don't get to look at every issue but have been very impressed with the ones I have read. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it's one of my favourite e-newsletters that I've ever subscribed to happened to have land in my in-box - a nice mix of topics, a section specifically for library-related technology news, a very intuitive layout, nice use of photos.
I'm trying to minimize the number of association memberships I buy (currently, only CLA and Sask Library Association) but might have to consider an ALA membership just to get this newsletter when I move on. (Hmm, how does this auto forward feature work in Outlook again? )
I glanced through a couple of the most recent issues and here are some things I came across (as well as a few other articles/stories/posts I have come across that make a good fit for a "housecleaning" post like this one)...
"20 Things To Watch" (PDF) - Stephen Abram in prognosticator mode. (On that note, I still have a $75 CLA gift certificate from getting runner-up in their student essay contest last year. I have to use it by the end of this month and Stephen Abram's book is one thing I'm looking at. Any other suggestions?)
"Amazon's Cookie Tax" - does Amazon charge different prices based on the previous buying history attached to your membership? MetaFilter discussion covers
"From Static to Dynamic" - a science library makes the long overdue move from static HTML pages to a dynamic CMS. Here's the blow-by-blow of the process, the hurdles and the outcome.
"Visting the Most Modern Library in the World" - the Shifted Librarian visits a library in Holland someone jokingly calls "an IKEAbrary" in the comments (and they mean it in a good way.)
Where do you go to look for library job sites? Here are some sites
I've seen. All are free for job seekers to search but some charge
employers for posting ads (which means they may not get the range of
postings that you'd expect.)
Foothills Library Association (http://www.fla.org/jobline.html) -
by far, my favourite job board. Focused on western Canada, has an RSS
feed, doesn't charge employers to post ads (but encourages them to buy
a $25 annual membership to support the volunteer-run board) so they
have lots of ads from all types of libraries rather than the other ones
I list below which seem to only have listings from big libraries with budgets
for recruiting people. This also forces institutions to choose - one might post to the Partnership while another might post to CLA - but not both which means you're forced to monitor both boards.
There
are probably also job boards for the library tech programs across
Canada, job boards targeted at specific areas of librarianship (the Special Libraries
Association has a job board, there's probably one for health science librarians, etc.). There are also the "big" job sites like monster.ca that post a range of jobs including the occasional one requiring an MLIS or others that might be of interest to MLS grads...but I'm not going to search out all of those!
Governments of all sizes tends have good job boards. Here's the Government of Canada's job site. Most provinces has similar sitesas do larger municipalities. These types of sites might not have
MLIS-specific jobs but could have others in a related area that
appeals to you.
One of our branch librarians also works for Regina Public Library. She wrote this article comparing and contrasting the two types of libraries for the Sask Library Association newsletter a couple years ago. I'm reprinting it with her permission. more»
Today was our library region's AGM and, though it fell on a different day (April 5 this year, March 31 last year), in my mind this marks one year that I've been with Southeast Regional since that was the day that I officially started.
It's funny to think back to that first day - just trying to remember the names of my new co-workers let alone figure out what was going on with all the policy and budget discussions that were happening as the day progressed.
Here are some other random memories of my first day on the job...
All the staff were wearing library golf shirts so I asked the staffer working the merch table (yeah, librarians are like rock stars - we sell t-shirts! ) if I could get one. "Oh no, you don't get yours until you pass your six month probation," he replied. "Oh...uhm...okay" I kinda mumbled (while thinking something a bit stronger in my head.)
The funniest part is that the shirts are stored in my office so I happened to "acquire" one quite a bit earlier than the passing of my six month probation. Oh, and that's something else that I think I first heard that day - my boss doesn't usually pass professional staff at their six month performance review even if they do a really good job because (I think) he believes very few people make enough progress in six months to earn a passing grade. Something like that anyhow. Well, I must've managed to pull the wool over his eyes because I managed to pass mine (to be fair, as did the person I was replacing so it's not like it's unheard of either.) Of course, in the end, that and a handful of loonies will get you a Starbucks coffee, right?
I remember wondering if it was a conflict of interest to give a hug to the Indian Head trustee who also happens to be a longtime family friend whose son is currently renting our farm land? (I did anyhow.)
More small town stuff...I remember talking to the rep from a town near Indian Head and (of course) he knows my mom because she taught him CPR.
I remember rushing around with the person I was replacing to print out copies of the Branch Awards pamphlet and take some plaques to be engraved in the few short hours before the start and end of the meeting. (I understand why my boss runs this surprisingly politically sensitive decision about branch awards by his Executive at their morning meeting before making it official but it does make for a bit of a crunch during the day!) Today wasn't too bad because I'd printed the pamphlets yesterday with the knowledge that I could still print more this morning if there were last minute changes or the Executive didn't like the little dashes of humour and "personal voice" that I inserted into my write-ups over the more typical generic blurbs that are used. ("Library A wins the Branch Service Award for having a committed board and successful programs that have led to increased circulation and a much respected place within the community. Congratulations!")
I also remember thinking "Holy crap - this is a lot I'm going to have to know how to organize for next year!" (and then not realizing for nearly six months, until right before the very similar fall semi-annual meeting, that it was a different staff person who did all the organizing for this one! I'm only responsible for the twice-annual Branch Librarian training workshops.)
I gotta admit - I was a bit taken aback that first day to hear that staff didn't get paid for the hour we spent at the AGM over lunch - even though we were obligated to be there and true, not really "working" but still, it wasn't like I could take off for an hour to go visit Shea or whatever so it wasn't like that hour was mine to do with as I pleased. I'd never worked in a place where this was the case before so I'm not sure if it was a literary non-profit vs. library thing or just a local policy or what. Being my first day (and knowing it was only a year and a half contract), I decided not to make (too much of) a stink about it anyhow.
I don't know if you do that thing where, maybe you wake up in the night and look at the clock and go "Oh, five more hours of sleep..yay!" or have a busy week ahead of you and think "If I can just get to Friday, I'll be fine." I was doing the same thing on my first day - not in a positive or a negative way - but just wondering, "What am I going to be like a year from now? Will any of this make sense? What will I have accomplished in the next year? Am I going to make it as a librarian or will I have to go back to school for my Masters in Journalism?"
Going to the bar with my new co-workers at the end of a long day and having one of them jokingly slurp up some beer that someone else spills on the table. "This is going to be a really interesting year" I remember thinking to myself.
Part of the reason that some librarians prefer to call patrons "customers" is that they believe in ideas such as "the customer is always right". But here's a good list of Five Reasons Why “The Customer is Always Right” is Wrong.
We run more than 3 million people through our books every month. One or
two of those people are going to be unreasonable, demanding jerks. When
it’s a choice between supporting your employees, who work with you
every day and make your product what it is, or some irate jerk who
demands a free ticket to Paris because you ran out of peanuts, whose
side are you going to be on?
) ...increasing the chances that the book will be picked up by a customer. (Ooops, Jason goes too far! 
) 
)
