Karen M. Drabenstott
Associate Professor
School of Information
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1092 USA
Voice: (734) 763-3581
Fax: (734) 764-2475
karen.drabenstott@umich.edu
New topic -- "Are Library Schools an Endangered Species?"
Many thanks to Paul Piper, our guest editor for "Damn the Information, Pass the Knowledge." During our winter open topics discussion, several members suggested a discussion on knowledge management and we have been fortunate that Paul was prepared to take on this task. We've had a busy two weeks of discussion on this topic. Please join me in thanking Paul for a job well done.
We now turn to the topic "Are Library Schools an Endangered Species?" Michael Seadle is our guest editor. He is digital services librarian at Michigan State University and editor of the peer-reviewed journal, Library Hi Tech. As digital services librarian, he works with a wide range of projects including text digitization, voice digitization, and geographic information systems (GIS). As editor of Library Hi Tech he is particularly interested in scholarly articles on computing, networking, and other technological developments that affect libraries. He came late to the library profession, after acquiring a Ph.D. in history from the University of Chicago and after over a decade of experience as a computing professional. He received his ALA-accredited library degree in December 1997 from the School of Information at the University of Michigan, and therefore has an inside view of recent developments in library education.
Please join in the discussion.
Michael Seadle
Editor, Library Hi Tech
Michigan State University Library
Voice: (517) 432-0807
Fax: (517) 432-1191
seadle@MAINLIB3.LIB.MSU.EDU
Schools of "library science" are vanishing. This is a fact which refers not just the closing of notable schools at prestigious universities like Chicago and Columbia, but also to the disappearance of the word "library" from Michigan, Berkeley, and a host of other ALA-accredited programs. The issue for this discussion is: what does this fact mean?
I would like to outline several extreme answers and encourage people to take sides, to offer alternatives, or even just to vote for proposition they find most convincing.
Proposition 1: THE END IS COMING
The trend is clear. Those wealthy private schools which could afford to discard a troubled program, and which are sufficiently unbureaucratic to act, have done so. Other institutions which could not take so decisive a step have reinvented their library programs into programs which are not about libraries at all, but about nebulous concepts like "information." In so far as these programs train anyone for a particular profession, it is computing, not libraries. Of course a few legacy faculty remain who can teach only a few legacy courses like cataloging, but they will mostly not be replaced and library science will slide into geriatric doom.
The loss of the schools will not matter because the whole profession is heading for obsolescence as well. Computer scientists are building intelligent systems which claim to be able to answer questions as well as a reference librarian and do so 24 hours a day on a diet of raw electrons. The same intelligent systems can catalog too, in so far as cataloging is necessary in a world where new information all resides in databases. The only human help in a library will be bookstore-style clerks who take patron's money (since none of this will be free) and pour free coffee for them.
Proposition 2: RESCUE IS AT HAND
The trend is clear. A few old-fashioned procedure-oriented library schools that could not keep up with the computer age have withered and died. The rest were scared into reforms that will boost the profession to a new level of importance in society. These new "information" schools have recognized that the word "library" connotes dusty tombs in a tired building from the pre-digital past. They have discarded it in favor of a term that actively embraces the computer age.
These new information schools really are library schools for a the digital era. They continue to teach the same philosophy and principles as the more old-fashioned schools which cling to a paper-oriented past. In effect, they are keeping what is best and most enduring in the profession and throwing out only those parts whose obsolescence is showing. The success of these schools is obvious from their record of placing graduates in a wide variety of information-oriented jobs, some of which have nothing to do with traditional libraries. This means that these schools are actually promoting the library profession because graduates are taking library skills into non-traditional work settings.
Proposition 3: WE CANNOT TELL
The trend is unclear. The data we have for library school closings and for name changes is too small to make any statistically reliable projections. People often rush to make predictions on the basis of small changes, but in fact a certain amount of variation always takes place in closings and openings and name changes. The vast majority of library schools still have the word library in their name, and are remaining open for business as usual. And we should remember that business as usual has always included a strong awareness of and concern for the latest technology.
Proposition 4: THE REAL ISSUE IS ENROLLMENTS
The trend in schools does not matter. It is the trend in enrollments which counts, and the latest figures show that enrollment in library and information programs is up significantly. What we really need to know is how many of these students are going into traditional library jobs, and how many would like to go into traditional library jobs but cannot because of a shortage of professional positions. It may actually hurt the profession in the long run if we turn out so many graduates that hiring new librarians becomes even cheaper and easier than it is today. In that light, the school closings and alternate "information services" careers may be a good thing.
Ben Speller
SLIS
North Carolina Central University
Durham, NC
speller@bambi.acc.nccu.edu
I assume that the term "Library Schools" means library science degree programs. I do not think that the mission or purpose of libraries can be separated from library science degree programs.
So if the mission of libraries is to identify, organize, and provide accessed to recorded knowledge in whatever format, then survival for libraries and library schools is not the main issue.
The mission has not changed but the way we (libraries and library Schools) do business has changed.
Organized knowledge has an informing purpose which sometime results in new organized knowledge; so let's see how all of the issues play out in this discussion.
The current situation is a wonderful opportunity if library schools and libraries can together seize it.
Ned Fielden
San Francisco State University
Reference/Instruction
1600 Holloway Ave.
J. Paul Leonard Library
San Francisco, CA 94132-4030
Voice: (415) 338-1454
fielden@sfsu.edu
I would like to respond to this discussion from a non-specialist perspective. One of the great difficulties I have with the term "knowledge management" or of the practitioner "knowledge engineer" is that it is hard not to think that here is another example of "title inflation" that so thoroughly infests American culture.
In a much earlier life cycle, I found that I had two job titles, depending on where I worked. When at a BMW dealership I was an "auto technician," when at a smaller more rural shop "an auto mechanic." With the exception of marginally better tools at the dealership, some increased informational support from factory bulletins, and my uniform being washed and pressed more regularly, there was no real difference in what I was called on to do. My skills and understanding of the nature of my work were identical. But the dealership hourly rate for repairs was considerably higher. Some of this follows the famous corollary to Murphy's Law which states "an ounce of image is worth a pound of performance."
This is not to suggest that specialists ought not to define themselves and call themselves the name that they think fit and proper, but I suspect that when at a non-specialist social gathering when handed a business card that says "knowledge engineer" on it, the average person is likely to think another case of title inflation has occurred.
(I have a hard time thinking that perhaps Aristotle would have had a business card with such a title, or perhaps "Sage Wisdom Services, Consulting to Macedonian Royalty and Conquerors.") Maybe it is all backward anyway -- the business card should say "Stupidity Manager (Minimizer?)" or "Ignorance Abatement" since this is really part of what we are dealing with here.
To lay claim to "knowledge" right up front, suggesting a mastery or transcendence, seems awfully pompous to me, even when combined with the more specialist definitions that accompany this line of work.
Codger comments from the end of the semester.
Frank Exner
Little Bear
fexner@nccu.edu
I don't mean to rant, but...
I have been a student of library science and information science for most of this decade. I am an information engineer for a large telephony equipment manufacturer. My wife is a children's librarian and our daughter is a medical librarian. In other words, I am fairly conversant with the euphemistic fashions floating around our schools. And, depending on my mood at the moment, this "information-knowledge" dichotomy is either a joke or a disaster waiting to bite us where it hurts.
Five years ago we were concerned about the difference between "data" and "information." We asked whether a "database" could hold real answers to questions (or was it truth, justice, and the American way we wanted) or did we need "information warehouses." (By the way, what is the difference between an "information warehouse" and a scaled-up "database"; they both require normalized contents.) Now we want to move our analogy base from "information" to the flashier "knowledge." Please ... we haven't even given the "information" analogies (like "information warehouse") time to become a hyphenated term.
How am I ever going to "pass the knowledge" if I have "(d)amned the information"? How are any of us ever going to follow our muses, dreams, studies, or instincts if we insist on sounding like an Arthur Andersen commercial? It never occurred that information science would turn into Consultants 'R Us. And I don't like it much.
It's time to quietly consider our position. We have become too hung up (and doesn't that phrase identify my age) on competitive lexicography. We need to let the dust, and our own jargon, settle. If I know what you are saying, and you know what I am saying, let us get on with the hard work we are both avoiding.
Of course that's just my opinion ... I could be wrong.
Frank Exner
Little Bear
fexner@nccu.edu
It seems to me that this should be a very busy subject, but it's not. Maybe that indicates a fifth proposition: As a profession, we just don't care enough about ourselves and our education.
As you probably know, since my last submission was only a week ago, I am one of a family of librarians, and all of us have different specialties. We were all educated at North Carolina Central University School of Library and Information Sciences (Dr. Speller's school). All of us have been astonished at librarians' lack of professional pride and assertiveness. This has to translate into lack of recognition on our campuses (on the if-you-don't-blow-your-own-horn-no-one-will theory), and a lack of recognition leads directly to a lack of strength and power. According to my management training and experience, a lack of strength and power lead quickly to a lack of existence.
Dr. Robert Ballard, one of my mentors, was invited to participate at a meeting of the National Academy of Sciences Information Technology Board. There he spoke with many of the most important computer scientists and engineers. According to these scholars, librarians have a distinct role: we organize information. (As Representative Major Owens [the only librarian in Congress] has noted, only librarians know that all knowledge can be placed between 000 and 999.) Maybe the computer specialists seem to be taking over the heart of librarianship (what and where is the information and how can it be delivered to the patron) because we have abdicated our place in the scholarly heavens?
In the information age (which, I suspect, is any time and any place) committed librarians cannot be obsolete. If we take the heroic position that we are the profession undergirding culture, then we will find ways to meet the new needs while, at the same time, meeting all of the needs we have been. It is a scary proposition but an absolutely necessary one. That is why I called it heroic.
Our library schools are a reflection of us. They are not an endangered species unless we are. And that is a question for each librarian's heart.
Paul B. Wiener
Man of Letters
Melville Library Special Services
SUNY at Stony Brook
pwiener@ccmail.sunysb.edu
I sympathize with your feelings, Mr. Exner, but remain puzzled, as I have been for many years, as to why librarians should think they are so important, given the range of work there is in the world, and some of the incredibly demanding jobs and responsibilities other workers assume. I find the issue of "librarian pride" to be always rather pathetic, usually self-defeating, of the "doth protest too much" variety, and always addressed to (and answered by) our small band of specialized, esoteric, self-congratulating souls.
Frank Exner
Little Bear
fexner@nccu.edu
Certainly there are many important, even critical, jobs in the world. Librarianship is one of them. I would prefer not to bring my personal story to this forum, but, in this case, my personal story is one of librarians as life savers (and I don't mean the candy).
In 1989 I began to get progressively weaker and lost 90 pounds over five months. By the time I was hospitalized I was losing one pound a day. Nationally recognized neurologists could not diagnose my ailment, although they treated a low vitamin B-12 level (which turned up in blood tests) with shots. Then I turned to the Durham (North Carolina) County Library Reference Department; they looked up vitamin B-12 deficiency in several sources and sent me copies of the material. Surprise ... the symptoms matched what I had been going through for over a year. When I showed the reference material to my doctors they were able to diagnose me.
Then another condition showed up. It involved exhaustion, muscle spasms, choking, and shortness of breath. Again, the doctor's couldn't diagnose my condition. This went on for several years. In 1997, when I had taken enough library science to know how to do reference, I started to research my symptoms. I found Post-Polio Syndrome. Again, the fact that I could bring reference materials to my doctors, along with the fact that they are terrific doctors who listen to their patients, allowed (after several specialists) a diagnosis and recommendations to my employer.
What has this to do with librarianship? If it weren't for our profession, I am not sure I would be here right now. I do know I would not be functioning as well as I am. And library schools? If these skills aren't taught, and taught to people committed to this profession, people like me will be the worse for it.
Paul B. Wiener
Man of Letters
Melville Library Special Services
SUNY at Stony Brook
pwiener@ccmail.sunysb.edu
Dear Frank,
That's a wonderful story and I'm glad you shared it with us. It doesn't really change my thinking, although I'm sure many people will find their skepticism about doctors confirmed.
Of course librarians have in the course of their jobs been indirectly responsible for saving lives. Thus should it be. The same could probably be said of almost every line of work. I'd love to know if anything I've ever done as a librarian had such an impact. My wife's job as an OT gives her constant feedback on life-and-death issues. But I'll bet an anecdotal article on such a theme would be very well received among librarians, and would have many contributors.
Dan J. Bye
Information Adviser
Distance Learner Support
Sheffield Hallam University
D.J.Bye@shu.ac.uk
"It seems to me that this should be a very busy subject, but it's not. Maybe that indicates a fifth proposition: As a profession, we just don't care enough about ourselves and our education. ... Our library schools are a reflection of us. They are not an endangered species unless we are. And that is a question for each librarian's heart."
It is not self-evident that professional self-confidence must translate into caring about a particular form of professional education. If I couldn't care less whether a particular library school stays open or not, that does not imply that I don't care about the profession of librarianship.
David Robert Austen
davidaus@indiana.edu
Paul Wiener wrote:
"... why librarians should think they are so important, given the range of work there is in the world, and some of the incredibly demanding jobs and responsibilities other workers assume. I find the issue of 'librarian pride' to be always rather pathetic, usually self-defeating, of the 'doth protest too much' variety, and always addressed to (and answered by) our small band of specialized, esoteric, self-congratulating souls."
You make a good point or even several there, Paul. Librarians -- or at least the MLS graduates exiting our nations library schools these days -- might well believe they are truly the Chosen because of the missionary-like sacrifices they make when they get out on the street. Those of us in library schools who have decided NOT to take on "librarian" jobs can expect to be paid at least double their salaries, if we go into information technology jobs, for example.
Librarians probably earn this little because of the low value society attaches to:
Doctors (and nurses, to some extent) now largely avoid this stigma (stigmata) thanks to industrial action and the critical nature of the services these "helpers" provide. It would appear, however, that the link between the knowledge found in books and the saving of lives is apparently much too vague for legislators and administrators deciding on library budgets.
True, there are other workers with much more demanding jobs and responsibilities, but few would be paid so little and rarely would the treasures they guard be appreciated so rarely.
Michael Seadle
Editor, Library Hi Tech
Michigan State University Library
Voice: (517) 432-0807
Fax: (517) 432-1191
seadle@MAINLIB3.LIB.MSU.EDU
I agree that issues about the profession and its value are closely bound with library school education. Is not installing a sense of professional pride one of the purposes of any professional school? Personally I don't see why anyone would go to a library or information or any other school that preached the degree of self-effacement that I see practiced among many of our colleagues. So let me try to stimulate this discussion with a the following question:
Are students and faculty flocking to the new information schools because the old-fashioned library schools have lost all confidence in themselves and what they teach? In other words, are library schools poisoning themselves with low self-esteem?
Jeri DeSantis
jdesantis@groton.k12.ct.us
Frank Exner's testimonial touched my heart! Stories like this help me remember why I am studying library science.
Professor Marcia J. Bates
Dept. of Information Studies
Graduate School of Education and Information Studies
University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA)
230 GSE&IS Building
405 Hilgard Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1520
Voice: (310) 206-9353
Fax: (310) 206-4460
mjbates@ucla.edu
As many of you know, this was certainly an important question in California several years ago, when both University of California programs were threatened. As you also know, they have both come back strong, in somewhat different arrangements, but both on the cutting edge of library and information education. The third program in the state, at San Jose State University, is thriving as well.
One of the reasons for the resurgence of the California programs was the active involvement from the beginning of the California Library Association. Under CLA President Joy Thomas, the association organized a Task Force on the Future of Librarianship, co-chaired by Linda Crowe and Luis Herrera. The task force consisted of representatives of academic, public, and school libraries, the heads of the three library programs in the state, the state librarian, Kevin Starr, and a current library student. (The LIS program heads at that time were Stuart Sutton of San Jose State, Nancy Van House of UC Berkeley, and myself, of UCLA.)
The task force not only met in session itself several times around the state, but it also held several public forums around the state, both before and after the publication of the task force's report, so that librarians and members of the general public could have input too. The final report was presented at an annual conference of the CLA.
As a consequence, the entire library and information community in the state had a common statement around which it could rally and fight for the profession. The report declared what the field is, the nature of its education, and the direction the Task Force saw the field and its education going, and should go. The text of the report was written in a way that should give it a relatively long life -- it did not describe specific tasks that comprise the work of the field, but nor was it just a warm and fuzzy general statement either.
If you're interested, the text of the report can be found at http://www.cla-net.org/pubs/future.html
You may join the discussion and look over the list of past and future topics.
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