It's Academic

I posted a few months ago on this blog about a renovation project that was happening at my library. A lot of progress has been made and we’re getting close to the finish line BUT it’s not ready yet and we’re wrapping up our third day of class at W&J. I can’t say this has come as a total surprise – we’ve all watched HGTV and know that there are usually bumps in the road when it comes to construction. However, speculating the library wouldn’t be ready in time for the first day of class and having to communicate that it wouldn’t be ready were two very different things. We realized that we needed to decide what library services we could offer from our temporary location without our physical collection and other resources an actual building provides.

Over the summer we had been offering access to electronic resources, chat reference services, and Interlibrary Loan during regular business hours. We knew we needed to step up our game now that a new school year was starting. The first thing we decided on was expanding our hours. We didn’t feel it was a worthwhile use of staff to keep our temporary space open the same hours we would our regular library but we also wanted to make sure that we were able to serve our students in the evenings.  So, we decided to stay open until 9pm Sunday-Thursday which is when we’ve traditionally staffed our reference desk. This way students will still be able to find help from a librarian when they’ve been accustomed to finding it.

When we packed our library last spring we were proactive and asked faculty to identify items from our physical collection that they knew they would need at the beginning of the semester. A few faculty members took advantage of this offer and their items were packed separately from the rest of the collection in easily identifiable boxes. We were able to retrieve those items from storage and visit with the rest of our displaced collection while we were there. We also packed some of our ready reference items last spring, specifically the always popular CRC Handbook and citation style guides. Those items along with others that faculty have contributed make up our Reserves for right now. We have a book cart that can be wheeled out into the public space that is serving as our circulation/reference desk during the day and then wheeled back in to our lockable office at night.

As I mentioned we expanded our hours for offering chat and face-to-face reference services. Our temporary location happens to be on the first floor of the Tech Center, which is a computer lab/study space area that is open to students 24 hours a day. We have a little desk off to one side that is manned from 8am-9pm Monday-Thursday, 8am-5pm Friday, and 5pm-9pm on Sunday. Wednesday was the first day of class and I was the first librarian to take an evening shift. Normally we do not get many questions during the first week of school but because students are in this space and I was the only visible adult in the building, I got five questions! Two of which I would classify as honest to goodness reference questions, not just directions. We’ve considered the idea of having reference librarians work shifts in other locations on campus besides the library and my experience on Wednesday reinforced my convictions that this is a great idea. We know that not all students choose to study in the library and having a library preference somewhere other than library might help us reach those students. Once they’ve had a good experience with a librarian they will hopefully be more likely to take advantage of our services in the future.

We are also providing information literacy instruction services but without access to our library classroom we’ve had to get a little creative. We’ve been working with professors to secure other computer classrooms on campus, re-working activities to be able to be completed in groups so students can share devices, or coming up with sessions that don’t use devices at all. Looking on the bright side, this has opened a line of communication with the faculty when previously they might have just requested that we do, “…your normal library thing in the library”.  Working with faculty to determine what they actually want their students to get out of a session is beneficial to us for relationship building and ultimately beneficial to the students because their getting the information they really need. We’ve also been able to introduce students and faculty to more of our online resources, including our new discovery service. Communicating information to students about available library services has gotten us access to a few other classes where we may not have been invited to do a full information literacy session. Additionally, we worked with the Freshman Orientation to make sure that a stop at our temporary library location was part of their campus tours.

I don’t want to make it seem like everything is sunshine and roses; there is a lot of frustration about the library not being fully functional and our entire library staff is sharing one room for the time being. One of the faculty who came to visit us said we look like a public television fundraising phone bank (see picture below) and we agree with him. However, this renovation has given us a chance to prove to the skeptics that the “library” is more than just a building while at the same time reminding everyone how important it is to have access to the library building and physical collections.

Have you heard of the Sunday Scaries? The feeling of dread, angst, and anxiety you might feel on a Sunday night thinking about the work week ahead.

For those of us who work in an academic setting, beyond the Sunday Scaries, you might now be feeling the Back-to-School Scaries. It doesn’t mean you’re a bad librarian or that you dislike your job. But getting back to the school-year grind means, at least for me, that the relative quiet of summer (at least in terms of volume in the library) is drawing to an end. Time to do research and service projects will start to dry up as instruction and reference and collection development begins in full force.

It can definitely cause anxiety, even for the most seasoned academic librarian. I think it was worse when I first started.  At my first librarian position, we had a very long winter break. The library was very quiet. I spent much of that break working alone in my library, finishing random projects and helping the few community patrons with simple tasks. As it approached the time for students to return, I honestly questioned if I even remembered how to be a “real” librarian.

So what can we do to battle our Scaries? Maybe you’re used to helping your child or other young people in your life deal with anxiety about going back to school or other life changes — we help them plan ahead, and be prepared. Make a checklist of what you need to do, and take time each day leading up to the start of school to check things off and feel a sense of accomplishment. Get your supplies in order. Think back to going back to school yourself, and consider the Scaries your students are facing. Many of my students, in addition to starting college for the first time, are doing so in a new country, facing down a language barrier in addition to finding their way on a new campus full of new faces.

Let’s practice self-care as we head back into the academic year and battle our Scaries together. What do you do to battle your Scaries?

Summer is nearly over, and my students started classes for AY 2018-2019 today. But just a few months ago, I took a few days away from campus to participate in PALS (PA Academy of Leadership Studies) Leadership Academy, thanks to the generous support of CRD.

If you haven’t heard of PALS or the Leadership Academy before, here’s a quick overview:

PALS is a cooperative program between the Pennsylvania Library Association and the Office of Commonwealth Libraries that offers leadership training to librarians of all kinds from across the state.

The Leadership Academy is a 3.5 day workshop for librarians with an MLIS/MLS to develop their leadership skills. Participating Librarians are of any experience level and work in many kinds of libraries and are selected through an application process. Some scholarships are available from PaLA chapters and divisions, like the one I received from CRD.

Participants stay onsite at a hotel for the entire workshop, and learn about leadership styles, how to be an effective leader, how to apply leadership contexts to their positions and in their libraries, as well as career development and advancement. The Leadership Academy participants also agree participate in a PALS group project for one year. Projects vary from year to year based on the needs of the organization, but participants can find a project related to their interests.

During introductions, a lot of people did not consider themselves to be a leader. Few people held positions like manager or supervisor. But that is the ultimate message of Leadership Academy, and PALS in general — you don’t become a leader by being in a position of authority. You are a leader when you choose to lead. I think that is a powerful message. In a previous position, I was a manager, and I tried to be a leader in addition to my supervisory roles. I’m not a manager anymore, but I now can more easily see the ways I am a leader in my library, even if I’m not a supervisor. I can still choose to lead, and now I feel more comfortable doing so.

I appreciated that much of the leadership workshops focused on our individual libraries, positions, and contexts. Leadership is not one size fits all. We had lots of time during each session to think about what we learned and how we could make changes in our own lives and workplaces to be a better leader, and better represent our libraries to our communities and stakeholders.

But it’s not all work! Leadership Academy has time built in each day for fun and team building. We had a great time playing funny board games, bowling, and breaking out of escape rooms. I work in a very large library system, and sometimes it can be hard to meet other librarians who do not work in my system. It was really helpful for me to meet other librarians, both public and academic, so we could discuss the challenges and successes we have in our libraries and communities.

I really do want to be more of a leader in my workplace, and become a leader in PaLA over time. Leadership Academy was a great time to learn more about myself, my leadership styles, and PaLA. I would strongly consider librarians who want to build their leadership skills and grow in the profession to apply. You even get a great totebag!