Roles and expectations for staff are changing. As we redefine those roles and expectations, are we placing a burden on our newer, younger staff to become the role models for the “new professional?” Are we looking to our more experienced staff to provide direction and mentorship to their new colleagues? Who’s helping to lead change at your institution?
-Sue Wawrzaszek
One of the questions I’ve been asking myself as I look forward to our pre-conference seminar is just how to talk about the changes that are percolating through higher education and society these days. That is, what are the shaping characteristics of the higher education context in which our library and technology organizations find themselves? And if you agree with me that the salient characteristic is change — change in higher ed that parallels the change happening in society at large — how do you describe that change in a nice concise way, boiling it down to its essence, such that it might fit on a slide, for instance?
Here’s what I’ve got so far: it’s all about information and communication. Much, much more of both, and more KINDS of both are happening. When you think about data sets and library contents going online, the information part is easy to see. And on a basic level, email alone represents a massive cultural change in frequency of communications, without needing to add to the picture the complex variety of media that exist. Where it gets interesting is when the edges of information and communication break down. When you start to think about software (i.e. information) helping sort and organize the unmanageable amounts of information that are being created; information, as it were, communicating something valuable about information. Or when you start to think about communication — i.e. social networking, collective intelligence, collective authorship — being key to the process of evaluating and understanding information. Communication becoming information.
David Wedaman
Today I was checking the links on the Suggested Readings list, and discovered that one link is apparently no longer valid (the dreaded Error 404). I went poking around a bit, and saw that other sites linking to the same document also came up empty. [I’m not telling you which document it is — you’ll have to look at the list!]
In the March 11 NYT, an editorial talked about “White House E-Mail Gone Missing.”
If part of the mission of a library is to preserve knowledge and information, what’s a library to do when information goes missing? Granted, plenty of print records have never made it into archives. But isn’t the problem of preserving information compounded by the digital format? On the other hand, can we really get rid of digital information when we want to? Can we strip our ILS databases of all user information? Can’t we dig up any old email that we want to?
- Posted by Susan Wawrzaszek
What set of skills and knowledge is needed to offer library services today? Tomorrow? Where is the “librarian” in the future? Are librarians being displaced by instructional technologists? How do you offer library services without a robust and stable technology infrastructure? Are the network and systems specialists part of your library team?
- Posted by Susan Wawrzaszek
Used to be, you knew what to expect when you walked into a library. A dignified space. A quiet space. Lots of books on shelves, protected by a shelving & classification system that took a bit of effort to learn. But that was where the books were. That was where the information was. What’s happening to libraries now that information is no longer constrained to printed books? What happens when the library is no longer the place to go to get information? Do you have an “information commons” in your library? We do. How much longer will this sort of space continue to attract students to the library? What will make “the library as place” relevant in the future?
-Posted by Susan Wawrzaszek
Why are we talking about The Future of the Library? Why is this such a hot topic? What emotions (and there is a lot of emotion surrounding this discussion!) have been triggered? How do we get past the emotions to a discussion of what’s happening?
In the 2005 OCLC Report, Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources it was noted that “’Books’ is the library brand”, even though 53% of the respondents indicated that they felt the main purpose of the library is information. Is the primary disruption to libraries the advent of digital information, and easy access to that information? What else is going on in the world that affects the role of libraries, and perceptions of libraries? How significant is the divide between perception and reality?
- Posted by Susan Wawrzaszek
On March 10, 2008 I and a group of Directors from Brandeis University Library and Technology Services (LTS) will lead a seminar on The Future of the Library. Let me introduce us!
LTS is a merged organization, or, as we like to say, an integrated organization. LTS was created in January 2005 with the integration of the University Libraries and University Information Technology Services. We have approximately 104 staff in our organization. For more information on our organization, please see our website at http://lts.brandeis.edu/
Brandeis University has just over 5000 students (undergrads and grads), with a liberal arts college and three professional schools. For more information on Brandeis, see: http://www.brandeis.edu/
We’re excited to be leading this pre-conference seminar, and look forward to sharing our thoughts and planning with you.
Susan V. Wawrzaszek
Chief University Librarian
Library and Technology Services
Brandeis University
Preconference Seminar
Monday, March 10, 2008
1:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Room 552 A/B
Presenters:
Amira Aaron, Brandeis University
Lori Dembowitz, Brandeis University
John Turner, Brandeis University
Susan V. Wawrzaszek, Brandeis University
David G. Wedaman, Brandeis University
Information and technology support organizations in higher education face a future of dramatic and constant change. Digital information creation and delivery is challenging what we know about learning and teaching, and what we assumed would be our roles in higher education. To continue to support scholarly communication, delivery and preservation of digital information, and online teaching and learning environments—to continue to be relevant and helpful to the academic mission—we must radically redefine the services we offer to the academy.
This session will offer an interactive review of the fluid landscape of the changing world of libraries, IT, and higher education, and will draw on the presenter’s experience of leading a forward-thinking merged information service organization. Topics will include defining a new learning/teaching professional, reallocating staff, defining priorities, staffing institutional repositories, finding skilled cross-functional leaders, supporting data-rich scholarship, defining critical literacies for the new millennium, inserting library and technology staff into the curriculum in radical new ways, supporting community learning and learning outside of courses, matrix management organizations, cross-breeding research and social software, and thinking beyond the course management system.
Participants are encouraged to read at least one of the items listed in this PDF fille. Bring your ideas and opinions — we’re creating the future together!