In the recent thread over in Cafe Society, we are disussing the merits of Librarian: Quest for the Spear on TNT. In it it was mentioned that the main character probably doesn’t have a library sciences degree, which, AFAIK, is an MS.
So why is this needed to be a librarian? I know there are people on the boards who are/want to be librarians, and they talk about how hard the school is, and that it;s hard to get a job (I can easily see how hard it is to get a job, cause it doesn’t seem like an industry with a lot of openings.)
So why do they need to go to school for 6+ years? I don’t know much about libraries, so all I ever assumed one needed to know was the Dewey Decimal system, which to me seems like it would take 10 minutes to memorize.
So what else is there? Obviously if it takes a lot of schooling there are duties and knowledge one must have I don’t know about. Cure me of my library ignorance.
Why do you need a Masters? Because we librarians want it that way! (I’m not being flippant. That’s one of the main reasons.)
First of all, it’s not a particularly difficult program IMO. The hard part is finding a school. There are fewer and fewer. But many offer remote classes, so that will help.
Second of all, it is a lot of specialized knowledge. However, a lot isn’t particularly well-tailored to working at a reference desk in a library. So you get a lot of people who can create some great web pages, but not really know how to help people find a book to help them cook a turkey.
Third of all, are either of my first two points anywhere near being coherent…?
If you’re really interested in what you learn in library school, you can ask your local librarian. Programs vary widely in what they offer and what they specialize in.
But once you get a degree, you’re in. There are no further continuing education requirements. It’s not like being a doctor, lawyer, or teacher or most other professions.
So you tend to get people who know exactly what they learned when they graduated and many aren’t too keen on expanding their knowledge, which to me, is the most annoying thing about my coworkers.
Well, the first four years are spent studying history, literature, or even, occasionally, science or engineering–basically, whatever your undergrad major was. They have nothing to do with librarianship per se. So the would-be librarian only gets two or maybe even one year of actual library science*.
So you might be asking, well, why do they want you to have the bachelor’s degree at all, and why not make the librarian degree a one or two-year associate degree program? Simply because you need to possess a modicum of scholarly erudition if you are to function creditably as a librarian. You’re there to manage the collection and guide your patrons to the best possible use of it. You need to arrive at library school already being able to communicate at the level of a college graduate; very few newly-minted high school grads have that ability.
The work in library school is not terribly difficult, usually, but they give you a lot of it.
*I used to deprecate the use of the phrase “library science”, mistakenly believing it to be an attempt at aggrandizing the field by association with science. Instead, I now consider science in this context simply to mean scholarly knowledge in any academic area, and hence appropriate.
That’s a natural development, and I’m sure most lawyers and doctors, feel that their colleagues ought to have the JD or MD or they’re not genuine practitioners. But do you believe that librarians could be just as effective without a master’s? What amount of training would you suggest? My questions might seem ignorant; I have the degree but haven’t worked in the field much.
IIRC, even the early library schools, associated with large public libraries rather than universities, drew their applicants from students who had graduated college.
If you’re a librarian, you have an MLIS, a Master’s in Library and Information Science. (Actually that’s the newfangled name–it used to be a MLS, without the Information, back before computers got so big.)
A librarian is expected to be able to do a lot of different things, and knowing the Dewey Decimal system (or the LOC, as the case may be) is a tiny part of it. In library school, I took courses on
Management and budgeting
Library history
General library/society stuff
Children’s literature and selection
YA literature/resources
Collection management
Databases
Reference work
HTML
Issues in public libraries
Cataloging (there’s a lot to know besides Dewey numbers)
and an internship and two thesis papers, on XML and YA literature
I didn’t take a whole bunch of other courses, like Reader’s Advisory or Special Library Work or Javascript or Law Libraries or whatever.
A librarian’s job involves being familiar with a whole slew of stuff that most people don’t know exists. We select books for the collection, which have to be appropriate to our patrons and within a tight budget, and the collection needs to be balanced, up to date, and contain accurate information as well as all PsOV. We run programs of various kinds. We have to be able to find all kinds of information at a moment’s notice, so we keep tabs on all the different resources that exist and where they can be accessed, from where to get free legal help to local water legislation to how to find a tiny magazine published in Kentucky. We do a lot of different things. Ideally, a librarian should know something about everything, and if not, where to get it.
I’ve just been accepted at a school to get my Master’s in Library Science–I sign up for my first two courses on Jan. 11. Wish me luck! Three years of taking two night classes/week. I have no illusions that employers will be lined up at my door, but at least I’ll be more marketable than I am now.
When my adviser asks me, “What branch of studies to you want to go into? Public libraries? Corporate? Museums?” I’ll say, “Where are the jobs?”
That depends upon the state. Georgia (PDF file), requires 10 hours of continuing education every two years to maintain licensure. The original license can be based on the master’s, but you’ve got to keep learning if you’re in a job that requires the license.
What did I learn in library school?
Basic cataloging/organization of information
Basic reference skills - but I also gained a lot from working in the university library reference department while I was in school.
A general introduction to the profession - and I learned what areas interested me most.
Collection development - the principles behind selecting and weeding books.
and a lot more. Could I have gotten a lot of this by working in a library for several years? Maybe, but the chances of getting a job where I would be exposed to that many aspects without having the degree was small.
The difference in Georgia is that the state is giving out a license to be a librarian. Very few states require a license. All that happens is that the hiring authority (some level of government) or even a private employer, just says, “You must have an MLS to get this job”. And either you do or you don’t. But if you do, it doesn’t matter much when or where. It’s just that you have one.
I don’t know of many states that do require a professional license (which is different from a degree) to be a librarian.
Mine required both; I went to SJSU, which seems to be known as a fairly solid hands-on program. I’ve been told that libraries like to hire San Jose grads because they graduate knowing how to run a library, as opposed to a lot of “academic but perhaps not very helpful in practical terms” stuff. Yep, it’s halfway a trade school, but we’re handy to have around.
Best of luck! With your background/life experience, you will be light years ahead of 98+ percent of other students. It’s quite likely those same attributes will put you on the fast track once you graduate.
First off there are the LC classifications and such beyond Dewey…
Really, that sort of thing is just the tip of the iceberg. Library work is a lot more than sorting and filing. How are you to decide how to index a given book (or more general work)? Once you have it indexed, how do you store it? Which sources are put in the active stacks and which in deep storage? I’m not a librarian myself, but I can tell you there’s a world of difference between a mediocre librarian and a good one.
If there’s one thing that makes me tear my hair out, it’s “You need a masters’ degree to shelve books?” Most people think that everybody who stamps dates on their books in the library is a “librarian” - not true. They also think that’s all there is to being a librarian - also not true. Patrons who know a little more about libraries still often think that the only sort of librarian is a reference librarian, which is also not true. By training I am a cataloger or preservation librarian, I’m just stuck having to look for jobs in reference because the market sucks where I am.
At USC (South Carolina, not Southern California), there’s a core curriculum of six courses you must take, which are:
Introduction to librarianship - current issues, ethics, etc
Intro to technical services
Intro to reference
Management
Intro to information technology
In addition one took six electives; mine were:
Cataloging
Subject analysis
Digital libraries
Preservation
Serials
Government information services
And something else I can’t remember right now.
I also chose to take an internship at the conservation lab and I worked as a graduate assistant in the business library and a book repair volunteer. Obviously my masters’ degree is pretty heavy on the tech services - I was a little irritated that the people who took classes where you read a bunch of kids’ books came away with the same degree, I admit. While I have an infinite amount of respect for good childrens’ librarians, I guess that’s more of a “learn it on the job” sort of thing. In fact, all of it is pretty heavy on the “we expect you to get a background here but really learn stuff when you get out there in the workforce.”
I was at UC Berkeley and I took only 10 classes (10 1/4) in two semesters and summer school.
Fall:
Bibliography (Basically how to find stuff)
Cataloging
Programming in PASCAL (woo hoo that was useful)
Management of non-print media
Spring:
Advanced reference
Legal bibliography
Management of special libraries
Database management (I learned how to use dBase!)
1 unit reference internship
Summer:
Gov Docs
Collection Development
Does every employer (I’d say mostly government) make this requirement? After all, I know that in some States you can (or perhaps recently could) just challenge the Bar exam without taking a single course.
You don’t need a teaching certiticate or degree to be a teacher. (it helps!)
And I doubt if being a “Librarian” has the same sort requirements as being an Attorney.
(However, since he had '22" degrees, it wasn’t unlikely one of them was a MLIS.)
