A Wandering Eyre

The New Swing

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre.

I am a lucky girl. I have friends and family and a roof over my head. Going to New Orleans put things in perspective. It was nice, though I did grump a bit, to have the Gulf Coast Librarians at the Bloggers’ Bash to share their stories. Actually my grumping was for the formality, not the actual content, but that is a different issue.

Back to the task at hand. I am going away and will be unplugged. May your 4th of July be filled with fireworks, good food, drink, laughter, and friends. I know mine will be. Cheers.

I like my job. A lot. I am a Reference and Instruction librarian who does technology in her spare time. This job, a Technology Innovation Librarain, has been making the rounds. That is what I want to do next. That. Right meow.

–Jane, a girl can dream, can’t she?

Discussing policies in libraries is always an interesting endeavour. Usually, we discuss the ways in which we make policies, meant for the good, that harm our patrons. A library makes many other policies which affect staff, and can eventually affect users, in ways that can be even more damaging than a wayward food and drink or fines policy. There are three main ways that bad policies are born: they spring forth with much thought but are never revisited (though it is obvious to most that it was faulty from the beginning or has become so over time), they are created as reactions to one incident, or they spring forth from the mind of a single person, without consultation or knowledge of how this policy might effect the organization. I am going to talk about the latter.

This person always means well. They want something to happen, some action to be standardized, to make the institution a better place on the inside and for the institution to be perceived well on the outside. They make a flaw along the way, however, which results in either the total breakdown of the policy or the policy being rigorously enforced in a population that has become unruly. The flaw they make is to not solicit advice or to create a committee to discuss the ramifications of a policy.

Regardless of size or structure, oligarchy or democracy, it is never a good idea for one person to mandate policy with no guidance from the minions below. When this kind of mandation occurs, the peasants erupt and eventually the king loses his head. This beheading is easily avoided by simply asking people what they think and then listening to the words coming out of their mouths in a thoughtful manner. A single question and concerned listening are sometimes all it takes to tip the scales in the direction of a policy.

The concerns of the masses have to be taken with great weight. The masses are the ones that must understand and enforce the policy. It must make sense to them or they will be ambivalent or hostile, depending on the amount of pressure from above. If a large number of your very intelligent staff is grousing loudly about a policy, dismissing them out of hand or coming up with some inane excuse for their behavior is a very bad idea. Remember that these are people that you think are smart and thoughtful. Why would they consider this particular policy faulty? When you asked them, did you actually listen and try to understand? Are there tangible ways that their concerns can be addressed?

If a policy is created, by a committee of one, and is then rigorously enforced in an organization, regardless of valid concerns shown by the other members from all levels of the structure, resentment and breakdown will occur. It is inevitable. There should never, ever be one person, regardless of rank, making decisions without thought for other members’ concerns. What will result is on ongoing, ugly battle which causes members or staff to lose heart which in turn will affect both their output and their service to users.

I know that leaders must often make tough decision. That is what leaders are created for and asked to do, but a good leader, a fine leader, makes decisions after they have listened to many people whom that decision will affect.

This post is not the reaction to any one instance or ongoing battle. It is just something that has been rolling around in my head. I am a lowly peasant who hates mandates being given to me. I have a big mouth and a lot of opinions and I expect my leaders to listen to me. I can point to numerous situations in which the policy was given on high, in my life, professional organizations, and even in MOPW. Policy mandating happens, sometimes regardless of good intentions, but we should be aware when it is happening and strive to curtail its negative effects.

If you are a higher up, with power, in an organization, use your power for good and not evil. Listen to people and try to understand. We just want to have a say.

–Jane, this blog is the only place she gets the final say

I am sure this will come across many, many listservs, but in support of New Orleans getting back to business: Tulane has multiple positions open in their library. New Orleans is not quite my bag of tea, though I do love to visit. If you would like to take up residence in a city that knows how to have fun and always has something new to offer, apply today!

–Jane, raises a glass to a quiet hurricane season in the Gulf

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre.

Thanks for the hospitality!

I still have a couple of things that I did not get to share on the LITA Blog or in this space yet. I stayed home today to get all of my conference writing finished so that tomorrow I can start preparing for Immersion which is happening in two weeks, holy crap.

Without further ado.

Things that rocked about ALA 2006

• New Orleans – The city was so genuinely glad that we were there spending our money, everyone was over the top nice (except for a guy who cursed at me for not turning right on red per the sign, whatever), and the food was fabulous everywhere I went.
• Meeting new people – Always a pleasure to do, especially when you get to meet hilarious people like this
• The food – jambalaya at The Gumbo Shop, beignets at Café Du Monde, a Fried Green Tomato with crab at The Court of Two Sisters, a turkey burger at Lucy’s, and a shrimp poboy at Mother’s. Yum. Yum. Yuuum.
• The Dark Horse Comics booth – These guys have my favorite booth every year. At Midwinter they had Serenity posters and this year I got a copy of Vampire Hunter D and Fray for free. Anyone that will give me Whedon products has my undying affection. I am that easy. I big huge heart Dark Horse.
• My hotel was perfectly in the middle of everything.
• Hurricanes – the drink not the weather phenomenon
• Abita – the local brew
• Next Stop Blogging – The BIGWIG panel I moderated went great, thanks to our three great presenters, Jason Griffey, Karen Coombs, and Steven Bell.
• Oh the Networking! I went to less sessions than I normally do but I did a lot more talking to people. As a result, I met some fabulous new folks, including someone who is actually going to pay me to write! More on that later. Suffice it to say, Teresa Koltzenburg is one of my new favorite people. We had drinks at the Carousel Bar, which revolves while you sit on it. It does not, thankfully, have any of those strange flying animals on it.
• Leslie Burger’s Blogger Bash – The prez was in rare form and barefoot! It was a fun party, as always.
• Free Wifi all the time. ALA you have just raised yourself a notch. Now can we make this a habit?

Things that rocked a bit less

• It was freaking hot as Hades with 100% humidity. I am from Houston, but geez, I thought I was going to melt into a puddle of goo. Why can’t ALA have conferences in the south when it is nice and cold down here? Do they not know that we southerners like to hide from the heat, not traipse about it in all day?
• ACRL President’s Program – see my previous post for the monstrosity that was this program.
• The Blogger’s Bash – It was very late, which made it hard for some people to get there and it felt a bit like the bloggers were being co-opted into being reporters for Leslie Burger. We blogged about the Gulf Coast librarians’ plight as asked, but that was never the original intention on the Blog Salon. I hope OCLC takes it back at Midwinter and Leslie Burger comes to mingle. Do not take this the wrong way. We bloggers do appreciate her support and do not mind supporting her, but the Blog Salon should be a bit less formal. The informality of the thing is the reason why we love it so much.
• Top Ten Tech Trends from LITA - When can we start talking about getting some women on this panel? There are plenty of women doing interesting things with technology. Why do we keep perpetuating the myth that only men do tech?

–Jane, glad to be home

ACRL President’s Program 2006

I am always amused when an organization uses a program to hand out awards and do business type things. You have an audience that is here for the program, a captive audience before which you can present awards to people, because then you will have someone to clap while you take the “shake hands and smile picture.” I like that LITA presents their awards separate from a program.

This debate has the longest title of any program I have ever attended. The Emperor Has No Clothes: Be It Resolved That Information Literacy Is a Fad and a Waste of Librarian’s Time and Talent, a Debate. Seriously, that is the entire title. I should have known from this beginning, that it was going to be an arduous path.
Affirmative:
Jeffery Rutenbeck
Associate Professor and Director, Digital Media Studies, University of Denver
Stanley Wilder
Associate Dean, Library, University of Rochester

Negative:
Gary Radford
Professor of Communication Studies, Fairleigh Dickinson University
Julie Todaro
Dean, Library Services, Austin Community College

The moderator, Jim Neal, spends a great deal of time explaining why they decided to do a program that directly challenges a sacred cow of ACRL libraries. [I think it is imperative that we look at our values and policies. What good is a sacred cow if you do not know what you can make with it? In another sense, what good is faith that is never tested? What good is faith if we can not explain it? Questioning our values helps us to understand them better.]

[I am in a corner and can not see the screen but whatever.]

Stanley Wilder is the first speaker: Affirmative
Information literacy was born in the 80’s [actually is was first discussed, in regards to teaching librarians to be instructors, in literature in the early 70’s] and has been around too long to be a fad. There is an absence of faculty and student support. There has been no empirical testing to prove that IL is successful. A student’s objective is their coursework. [yes and IL helps students do their research.] He asks if it helps students do better course work. [the literature says it does] Search complexity is not a teaching moment. [He is right about that.]

[There is a librarian in front of me drinking from the kind of bottle you use in chemistry, the opaque plastic ones with the tiny mouth and screw top lid. No kidding. Plus, there is a woman right behind him with these crazy see-through puffed sleeves who falls asleep about halfway through the program.]

[Stanley Wilder is saying that IL does not help students with assignments or help faculty to create better assignments, but that is what we do with IL at my library.]

Julie Todaro gets up and speaks to the negative.
Five types of scholarship
Scholarship of discovery, integration, application, teaching, and artistic endeavor
Julie gets it right that IL has been around almost a century, under different names.
Is this a waste of our time? It is one of our primary responsibilities, seamless integration into the curriculum. Seamless delivery, under the radar.

[There are cheerleaders and the audience participates. I do not participate, but I inwardly groan. This is what my brother and I call cheese wiz for the old people. Predictably, the audience appears to love it. *sigh* This is when I decide it might be time to leave soon. I am not the target audience for this.]

Jeff Rutenbeck: Affirmative
[I am at the point where everything now sounds like blah blah blah]
There are many kinds of literacy. The idea of literacy is “washed out” and washed up. Literacy is something you do at a moment in time; it is not something you have. Literacy is an ideological practice and favors particular ways of thinking and organizing. What does our current info lit structure favor and benefit? [I am sorry, how is this an argument? These things are true. The idea of literacy does keep changing quickly. So what does this have to do with teaching or not teaching? No matter what trendy name we give it, people will still need certain skills to write better papers and do better research. I wonder if he would argue that Math is washed up?]

Gary Radford: Negative
These efforts are crucial to faculty being successful by helping them to get students to experience the wonder of discovery. Good scholarship breeds healthy skepticism. Students have to be taught to effectively use information: information literacy. Info Lit is about teaching a changed attitude. It is a way of being in a world of changing information. We need information to understand information. Librarians should not give up on the students. They need to learn and be pushed to understand information better.

[I decide I am tired of sitting on the floor with legs falling asleep for a program whose "interludes" make me want to find a sharp stick and poke out my eyes. Because that would be actual fun. I am going back to my hotel to write.]

Later: I am not sure that the gimmick of the debate worked. It would have helped if the debaters were using actual statistics, but I did not hear one statistic the entire time I was in the room. I am a little appalled that the dean of a library would actually think that teaching students information literacy, regardless of label, has only existed for 25 years. I was very disappointed in this program, which had an interesting premise but fell short. I think for me, the “Interludes,” meant to lighten the mood, only drove home that there is a huge disconnect in ACRL between the NextGens and the older librarians. Yes, I just made a huge generalization and not everyone will fit into it, but it is there none the less.

At the beginning of the program, the ACRL president gets up and says she wanted a program that people would be talking about for years to come. I think that will happen pretty definitely, though not in the way she intended.

–Jane, shakes head and sighs to self

One non-ALA post today:

The hotels for Internet Librarian are filling up fast. The Days Inn, down the road from the conference hotels, is cheap and they still have single and double rooms as of noon today.

–Jane, room booked, check

Info Lit Cheers

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre.

I am not sure what to say about this photo. If you went to the ACRL President’s program you saw this too. I have a write up but frankly I am too tired to edit it.

I am going out on the town tonight to celebrate a successful conference.

–Jane, ready to raise a glass

Mona Lisa Pizza

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre.

Last night we trekked to the end of the French Quarter to eat at the Mona Lisa. I have not had pizza that good for a long while. It was cheap, well worth the walk, and was swimming in character. The walls are covered with different variations of that mysterious woman. Some are disturbing. Some are beautiful.

After dinner, I went to the Innovative party. There were drinks (of which I had a couple) and desserts (of which I had none).I ran into some LITA folks and some of the librarians from MPOW. I was hoping one of the Innovative employees would come around so I could talk to them about some of the changes they are making with their product. Alas, it did not happen.

Then began the comedy of errors. I went to the Hilton on the Riverwalk looking for the Party for the Bootcamp people. The room number I had did not exist in that hotel. I double checked my schedule and realized I was at the wrong hotel. I sweated my way down to the Marriott by the convention center, only to be told I was yet again at the wrong place. Why do you two Marriotts in the same city with the exact same name?

I finally found the right place and all was well. The ALA L2 Bootcamp group was tired but lively. We talked about the technology, what we learned, the things we do at work, and the things we are looking forward to doing. It was nice to put faces with names and relax.

I dropped into bed a little before 1 am and slept soundly. I am now biding my time until the program I am moderating starts at 10:30: Next Stop Blogging. It should be great.