[Publib] Article about the Marathon County situation

[Kathleen Stipek]

As a non-administrator, I am concerned that the Marathon County
Library's director was complicit in the demotion of the 3 librarians.
If she truly believes that a reference librarian does nothing more than
a big-box bookstore clerk, then she needs to be fired because she has no
clue what goes on at the reference desk or the public service floor.  It
is not all best-sellers and a/v checkout.  If she thinks, as do many
administrators and academics that 'it's all out there on the internet'
she really needs to work with a few patrons.  If I had a nickel for
every time I have encountered a patron who could not frame a question
that would get an answer from the relatively controlled vocabulary of an
OPAC let alone the inchoate muddle that is the internet, I would not be
involved in this debate--I'd still be asleep in my beachfront suite on
Maui.  Librarians, uniquely, know how to extract from a patron the
information he or she needs to express in order to receive the
information he or she needs to get.  I daresay that every one of us who
works reference has been timidly asked at least once a month for a
biology book when closer inquiry reveals a recent diagnosis of cancer.
We are the ones who can help a patron sort out his or her thoughts and
then  help sort those thoughts into a coherent search.  Try doing that
at Borders or any other big-box.  If our own leaders think this sort of
thing, it becomes very discouraging to those of us on the desks.  Why
bother developing skills that aren't appreciated?  Why bother being
loyal to those who aren't loyal to you?  Perhaps, when ALA next wrings
its hands about the lack of fresh young blood in the profession they
will think that perhaps it is time for academics, administrators, and
organizational leaders to come together and aggressively promote the
people who work the desks and actually do information provision for the
patrons.

Kathleen Stipek
Alachua County Library District
401 East University Avenue
Gainesville, Florida 32601
352-334-3931  (fax) 352-334-3948
 
     --Non, merci.
       Cyrano de Bergerac


-----Original Message-----
From: publib-bounces at webjunction.org
[mailto:publib-bounces at webjunction.org] On Behalf Of Jennie J. Stoltz
Sent: Saturday, March 15, 2008 5:00 PM
To: publib at webjunction.org
Subject: [Publib] Article about the Marathon County situation

Kris Adams Wendt, the Director of the Rhinelander District Library in
Wisconsin wrote an article which will be published in the Sunday, March
16th edition of the North Star Journal (Rhinelander newspaper).  She has
posted the same article on her own library's website which is much
easier to read than the online version available on the newspaper's
website.  Here is a link:
http://wvls.lib.wi.us/RhinelanderDistrictLibrary/Director%27s%20Columns/
columns.htm

Very well written.

Jennie J. Stoltz
Director
Pewaukee Public Library
Pewaukee, Wisconsin
(262) 691-5670, ext. 20
(262) 691-5673 fax

GoodSearch for the Pewaukee Public Library.

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