The Kickass Librarian--What a hoot!

Looks like librarian videos are improving and getting funnier.  This one is priceless!

Enjoy!

And now for something low-key and inspiring...

Weeding through the library and librarian videos on YouTube is a daunting challenge.  It seems everyplace and everyone wants 15-seconds of fame.  However, when I find one that inspires me, the world becomes as magical as any library's stacks.

Take this one for example.



I particularly like the cop at the beginning and the parallel between house cat and World Cat.

Maybe libraries should stop trying so hard

You know, this is a really good idea that doesn't quite measure up.  Maybe less is really more.
(And how typical do all these people look as librarians?)

What a Reference Desk Should Look Like

No question about it. Reference desks should mirror their users' purpose. This one made out of recycled books does. It's definitely social repurposing! To see more photos of it go here.

Even more Librarilicious...

How can we look at his grades when we can look at HIM???

Hubba, hubba! Brought to you by the library...

"Stop throwing pigeons?"  Oh, no!  Too funny!

Can I borrow....?

Although this post says that the circ desk provides all the stuff patrons want, at SCC the stuff is provided by the reference desk.  Either way, this is a wonderful diatribe--except for the slam at romance novels, of course.

The Whimper

This may have been my last day as a librarian since I don't have an assignment for the fall.  Wow, that was a quick career!  And Sandburg had it right:  it ended peacefully, not with a bang.

How swiftly life travels!

You Can Do It!

I'm appalled by the number of older women who come into the library apologizing because they aren't computer literate or because they aren't library savvy.  Not only do I show them how to use the online catalog and the school's databases, but I end up giving them a pep session.  You can do it!  You can!

Two women in a row came in today, both beginning the ref session with apologies.  I've decided to add to my usual beginning spiel a little pep session to reassure these women that using both the online catalog and the databases is easy and not to be feared.

Now if I can get them to believe me before I walk them through using them.

Noise and More Noise

Why do college students--by some standards adults--decide to come to the library to sit together and yell?  I don't get it.  Our junior college has a perfectly good, usually empty, student center and WiFi.  We also have study rooms.  Yet the same groups of supposed adults come in almost every day to sit, study (their term, not mine), and talk loudly to one another.

This, of course, forces me to be the mean "Shhhhhh!" librarian since many of the students (okay, some of the students) using the computers nearby are researching for papers and/or taking tests for online courses.  Some of these students complain--to me.  What this means is the same students get chided time after time.

Do they not get enough attention at home and among their friends?  Do they get joy from "pushing the librarian's buttons"?  Sometimes I let the sound level build until it sounds like a stadium during the World Cup.

But mostly I ask myself why.  Why is this obviously fun for them?

What should the ref librarian do?

So if you're a person walking up to the ref desk, what would you rather see the ref librarian doing?

1) Reading a book.  (Well, it is a library after all!  And since I'm now reviewing for Booklist, I have galleys to read.)

2) Writing on a piece of paper or typing on a keyboard.

3) Staring intently at a computer screen.

Since I'll be working five hour shifts this summer, I'm just wondering what activity would put students more at ease when they approach the ref desk.  Staring off into space and surveying the room don't really work well.

I Love This Instructor

Thursday night at the beginning of exam week I'm sitting at the SCC ref desk when a young man approaches.

"I have to find some resources for a paper I'm writing.  My teacher said I could write this paper and hand it in for one of the essays I missed during the semester."

"Okay," said I, even as I thought "too much information!"  "What's your topic?"

He hung his head and softly replied, "Procrastination."

Do I love an instructor with a sense of humor or what?  We found a few books and a few hundred articles on procrastinaation.  I hope he actually wrote the paper and turned it in.

Marketing the Library

It's a slow night, so I'm reading posts from The M Word which more or less gives lists of marketing do's and don't's specifically aimed at libraries.  The May 5 post, for example, looks at how to promote a library newsletter.

Okay, first off, I'm surprised that ANY library has a newsletter that's in print form these days.  I contribute to The Reader, SCC's former newsletter, now blog.  While The Reader has some readers, it doesn't have as many as I would wish.  And this brings me to my constant dilemma:  As a part-time librarian who works two nights a week, should I suggest some ways to promote The Reader and the library?  (I was a publicist for a book publisher from 2000-2003, so have some experience in this realm, experience I'm happy to share.)

My answer in the past has been seek out the librarian under whose venue a project falls and to offer to help.  My suggestions of ways to improve the library's perceived presence on campus, however, haven't been met with much excitement or acceptance.  Although I must admit that The Reader editors have let me suggest and write a few blog postings.

I'm ambivalent about all of this.  I'm annoyed that so few instructors and my guess is no students are reading the blog.  Few instructors take advantage of library orientations for their classes.  Few students know what the library offers and how to access its materials and services.  So what should I do as a part-timer?  I wish I knew.

Dealing with the Clueless

Dealing with the Clueless might just become an on-going feature of this blog.  Who knows?  At any rate, here's the latest story from the reference desk:

Sitting at the SCC reference desk, librarians get a panoramic view of the lobby as well as the circulation desk and many other interesting library sites.  (Okay, maybe not all that interesting!)  At any rate, we can see the elevators which are integral to this story.

So I'm sitting at the ref desk about 6:45 p.m. on a quiet night when there's not much noise and everything seems to be humming along rather well.

Approaching the elevators are two women who are talking up a storm--quietly, however.  They get into the elevator.  The doors close.  A few seconds later, the elevator dings, the doors open, and the women get out of the elevator, still talking.  They look around, turn, and re-enter the elevator.  A few seconds later, the elevator dings, the doors open, and the women step out again.  They look around and return to the elevator.  The process occurs one more time.

This time they walk over to the reference desk.

"The elevator's broken," one of them announces.

Library Juice: 4-26-2010

Rory Litwin in her April 26, 2010, blog post for Library Juice asks what the role of a librarian in an academic library should be and comes up with the idea that because academia has embraced SLOs (Student Learning Outcomes) that librarians should in effect be teachers.

I find this very funny since I just spent three years getting my MLIS after teaching English composition for over 20 years with my MA degree.  What this breakthrough means to me is that I'll go from teaching to. . . teaching!  The big difference, of course, is that I won't be taking stacks of student papers home to grade--maybe.

Because SLOs must be measureable, librarians have to come up with some way of proving that students have "learned" something.  Teachers do this all the time by giving tests, but traditionally librarians aren't test givers.  Librarians are answer givers; they don't ask students to give them answers.

Live from the Reference Desk

It's 11:30 a.m. and the CRC library is in full swing.  I just helped a student print her transcript from the e-services computer and am watching another student do so.  Two students in front of me are looking up reserve textbook call numbers in the e-catalog computers.  A young man in a pristine North Face jacket just punched a key on a computer--trying to use it?  But walked away when the sign-on screen came up.  Evidently he isn't a student here but was trying to mooch on the account of someone who left without logging out.  I've helped 8 students look up the call numbers for textbooks so far.  No interesting research questions today, alas.

Just a typical day at the reference desk.  Sigh.

Picture = 1,000 Words

The big assignment that sent many of Friday's students into the CRC library was one related to art.  The students were to find a few pictures of paintings by either the artists listed in the assignment (the usual suspects--Picasso, Miro, Van Gogh, et al.) or an artist of their choice.  Using the style of the artist, the students are to draw a cartoon.

Talk about teachable moments!  As the students filtered in, I went through how to look up books using the online catalog, then explained how to find which books were available at the CRC library, and finally how to find these available books on the shelf.  Since these were art books, some of them were kept with the glut of circulating books on the second floor (actually the half floor upstairs in CRC's case) and some of them were shelved with the oversized books on the main floor of the library.

The big gap in the collection came when one student wanted a book about Scottish artist Jack Vettriano.  We couldn't find

How would I do in her country?

A very charming, very petite Asian student approached the desk, almost apologetic in her demeanor.

"Could you help me please?"
"I'll try."
"My professor said that we may use visual aids to give our presentation.  But I don't understand visual aids."
"Oh, they...," I began, but she cut me off.
"I look up the words.  But I do not understand how I should have glasses for the presentation."

Well, it made sense.  Glasses = visual aids.

Gently--well, as gently as I know how--I explained what visual aids really are.  And I showed her the CQ Researcher database which has a section of maps and graphs in case she didn't want to construct her own visual aids.

"I don't think I ever understand English," she commented after thanking me.

I wonder how many of us really do.

Frustration's Cure: A Reference Librarian

This scenario has played and replayed at both libraries where I work:

A student came up to me, frustrated that his database search wasn't working out well.

"I need to find some information about some companies for my business class," he told me.
"What sort of information?"
"Well, like how much money they make and stuff."
"Where have you looked so far?"
"Ebsco, you know, Academic Search Premier.  And we've found a lot of articles, just not what we need."
"Okay, I have another suggestion for you."
Big sigh on his part.  I could almost read "What now?" flashed above his head.

Ouch, Ouch, and Double Ouch!

It's been a while since the last post.  Part of the reason is that this has been the semester of health problems.  I don't know if this is because my body is reacting to the letdown of graduating from SJSU or what.  The good news is that after a few visits to the doctor and to a physical therapist, I'm finally feeling much better.

All of this reminds me of one of the recurring themes in grad school: the reference librarian's job is to answer questions and only ask them in order to answer them.  In other words, don't pry.

Turns out I have patello/a-femural syndrome, which I'd never heard of before.  If I were the patron instead of the librarian, I'm not sure I would have gone up to a reference desk and asked about my condition.  Yet patrons ask us about their diseases and conditions all the time.  Sometimes I just want to say, "Whoa!  Too much information!"

Where is the other lady?

Okay, so one of the oddest questions of the past week was asked by an older student who came up after the librarian on the previous shift had left.

"Where's the other lady who was preparing a list for me?"
"A list?"
"Yeah, she was making me a list of sources for my research paper."
(Yeah, right!  And now pull the other leg!)  "What's your research paper about?"
"Like love or marriage or something."
(Ah!  That reference list!)  "Well, I don't know about a list, but I'll be happy to show you how to use the library catalog and databases so you can do your own research."
(BIG pause.)
"No, that's okay."

And she left.  Huh.

Curse of the Copy Machine

They don't teach you how to unjam copier paper in library school.  They don't tell you how much of a headache it is to explain to adults how to make copies on a copy machine.  They don't offer a Psychology of Copy Machine Idiots course in grad school even though it should be a required class for all librarians.

They don't explain how to add copy paper quickly and efficiently.  They don't demonstrate how to shake the urinal so that more copies can be made.  They don't tell you that during some shifts your entire job will revolve around a malfunctioning copier and have absolutely nothing to do with answering reference questions, working on collection development, cataloging the odd book, or any other activity that you do study in library school.

And finally, they don't caution you that you may one day have to be part of a police sting operation to catch a copier thief like the one that went down at Tyson's Pimmit Library in Fairfax County in the 1980s.

How Can Librarians and Cyberlibrarians Save Us All?

Author Marilyn Johnson in her new book This Book Is Overdue: How Librarians and Cyberlibrarians Can Save Us All has decided to tell us.  After reading The New York Times review of the book this morning, I decided this was a must buy.  And Amazon provided a Publishers Weekly starred review as well.  (Having been a PW reviewer for about 15 years and knowing how much extra trouble reviewers go through to make something a starred review, I sat up and took more notice.)

Being the very, very happy owner of a Kindle, I immediately bought a copy (delivered in under a mouse's breath) and will read it after I finish the Lynn Kurland and Betty Neels novels that are in the queue before it.

Suspicious, suspicious...

This week a student walked in asking for a list of alternatives to standard fairytales for a paper she was writing for class.  I proceeded with the typical reference interview:  What did she mean by alternatives?  Retellings that were slightly different?  (Idries Shaw's World Tales immediately came to mind.)

After some back and forth, after I suggested The True Story of the Three Little Pigs by A. Wolf, Wicked and a couple of other perfectly hilarious retellings of traditional children's tales--not necessarily fairy tales--she decided what she really wanted was a feminist retelling of a fairytale or children's story.

At that point I was stumped although in the back of my mind I could remember some writer who studied children's stories from an alternative viewpoint, which I thought was feminist, and I vaguely remembered this author as having mentioned feminist fairytales/children's stories in her books.  (I since realized I was thinking about Jane Yolen.)

Why work in a library? Isn't it boring?

Today the answer came to me--literally.  A huge black guy came charging up to the reference desk today.  He was scowling and looked more like he wanted to beat me up than talk to me.

"I need to read The Color Purple," he barked at me.

I typed the title into the online catalog, coming up with a number of hits.

"This one is an electronic book.  You can read it online from any computer that's got Internet hookup.  This one's on the shelf and hasn't been checked out," I told him, pointing at my screen.

"I'll take the real book," he said, still glowering.

I wrote down the call number and explained how to read it and where he could find it on the shelves.

A while later, I was standing by the reference desk, having helped another student at her computer.  Suddenly, I felt someone behind me put his arms around me.

It was the Alice Walker reader.

"I found it!" he said hugging me.  "Thank you so much!"

He was smiling--and quite handsome now with the ugly expression wiped off his face.

"Enjoy the book," I answered, giving him a quick hug back.

"Oh, I will!  Thank you!"

And that's why I want to work in a library.  Yes, it's boring.  But when it's not, it's wonderful.

CRC vs. SCC

Yesterday was my first stint as an adjunct reference librarian at Consumnes River College, another of the four colleges in the Los Rios Community College District.  After teaching at Sacramento City College for around twenty years, I was eager to see what another of the Los Rios schools was like.

Surprisingly, it was a wonderful experience, and I think this semester there will be wonderful.  I'm surprised because I thought I'd be a fish out of water--unable to cope with the questions or students since I don't really have a grasp on where everything is on campus, what each group does, and where to refer students.  In fact, CRC is very similar to SCC in student population and beginning of semester questions asked.

Adding to this blog...

As you can see on the right, I've added a couple of things to this blog: LibraryThing and PaperbackSwap.  (Don't you just love how spaces between words seem to disappear with technology?)

So far I've list a few of my favorite books on LibraryThing and plan to add more as time allows.  You can link to LibraryThing by clicking on the covers and read others' reviews of the books.  Should even more time allow, I'll add my own reviews.

PaperbackSwap is a wonderful way to acquire PB books.  I've belonged almost from the beginning and have been really, really happy with them.  If you're a reading junkie, it's a way to manage your habit without bankrupting you.

Saturdays in the library

All jobs have their ebb and flow.  Some parts of the year are busy, some slower.  The longer a person's in the job, the more familiar she gets with the rhythms.  Finding one's feet as a librarian is dancing in tune to the library's rhythm.

Saturdays at all the public libraries where I've worked were always the busiest days.  School-aged children were intent on getting their homework done, their parents beside them either helping or hindering.  Adults roamed the new book shelves and the video racks, eager for something to spark their interest.

Some Saturdays were so busy that we ended up putting older books on the new book shelves because all the new books had been checked out a half hour to hour after we opened.

At my local public library (Belle Cooledge Branch of the Sacramento Public Library) I've noticed Saturdays have brought out the turtle club, the gardeners' clubs, and other groups who use the community room to have sales or clinics.

All in all, I've noticed that Saturday is still a happening day at my branch of the public library.

Reading Jumanji

Chris Van Allsburg's Jumanji is one of those wonderful children's books which sparks the imagination when read aloud and which was ruined by being made into a major motion picture. 

It's one thing to imagine a lion in one's house or the gang of monkeys in one's kitchen--in fact any child who's seen a nature documentary can fill in the blanks wonderfully well!--but the fun and adventure are sadly missing when one actually sees the ferocious lion or the evil-looking monkeys.

Is the lion that ferocious in a child's mind?  Or is the lion more lost and confused?  Are the monkeys evil?  Or are they more rambunctous and child-like in their curiousity as they encounter the pots and pans?

The beauty of reading is that the reader and the listeners can make up their own minds.  No one is dictating

Charles Starkweather, serial killer

When I was growing up in Lincoln, Nebraska, Charlie Starkweather was our garbage man, and when he went on his killing spree, our neighborhood took it personally and was scared out of its mind.

Until I worked at the Northeast Branch of the Lincoln Public Library, these facts were just something relegated to my childhood memories.

But in the summer of 1968, I worked as the substitute head librarian at the branch while Sammie, the branch's librarian, had her baby.

Northeast was a classic one-room Carnegie library with stained glass windows, a place that reminded me of being in a cathedral when the sun slanted through the windows in the late afternoon.  Standing at the librarian's desk and looking straight through the main door, the librarian had the children's area to the right and the adult's area to the left.

Hitting the library

Okay, so this really has no bearing on the ref desk per se, but it's a true story centering on my life in and around libraries.

My first car accident occurred when I was a page at the South Branch of the Lincoln (NE) Public Library.  I backed into the library from a parking spot.

I thought my father would be furious.  Instead he was incredulous, even a little amused.

"How could you hit the library?" he asked.  "Was it moving?"

I don't think so.  But it would be worse if it was, wouldn't it?

Saga of the Short Classic

This is one of the most vivid memories I have of working the reference desk at Tysons-Pimmit Branch Library in the Fairfax County Library System.  (This was way before Tysons was a huge regional library, but when it was housed in two ground-floor apartments in the high-rise complex nearby.)

The English class students at the neighborhood high school had been assigned to read a classic contained on a reading list--not an uncommon assignment for librarians to deal with.  We had a copy of the assignment and knew which books were included on the list.  To save time, we had pulled many copies of the books from the fiction shelves and had them available near the ref desk.

A sturdy young man walked up to the desk while I was working and asked how he could find the classics.

I was young.  What can I say?  I was trying to be helpful.

What's the point?

I've been working in libraries my entire life--starting as a page in the 1950s at the Lincoln (NE) Public Library System.  In 1969 I read Theodore Roethke's poem "Dolor."  The poem changed my life. 

Instead of enrolling in library school, I enrolled in the University of Nebraska's education program and then the theater program.  Like Roethke, in school and public libraries I'd "seen dust from the walls of institutions,/Finer than flour, alive, more dangerous than silica,/Sift, almost invisible, through long afternoons of tedium."  I didn't want my exciting future life to become covered in dust.

But libraries are the opiate of readers.  I couldn't stay away.