Survey of Librarians of Color

To All Librarians of Color:

Myself (Kawanna Bright) and two of my colleagues, Deborah Lilton with Vanderbilt University and Pambanisha King with Auburn University, will be presenting a session at the National Diversity in Libraries Conference in October 2008, entitled “When Diversity is Too Much: New Librarians of Color and Expectations for Involvement in Library Diversity Initiatives”. The focus of this program will be to discuss diversity initiatives utilized to recruit and retain librarians of color into academic libraries and how they can sometimes have a negative impact on the librarians they are designed to support. As part of this session we will be presenting information from published research, but the main focus of this session will be to present the results of a survey of librarians of color and their opinions on how these programs impacted them.

This is where you come in! If you are a librarian of color who works in an academic library (or has ever worked in an academic library during your career) we need you to complete our survey. This is your opportunity to share your thoughts on the different diversity initiatives that have been a part of your career, whether it was a recruitment scholarship to help you earn your degree, a residency program to launch you into the field, a leadership institute to prepare you for upward movement, or programs that happened internally in the libraries that you worked in, including diversity committees, diversity training programs, or cultural enrichment programs. We would also be interested in hearing about other experiences that affected you specifically as a new librarian of color.

The goal of this survey is not to collect information to “bash” these programs. The researchers agree that on the whole these programs are positive for the librarians who participate in them as well as the libraries that host them and the field itself. However, the possible negative impacts of these programs need to be discussed as well in order to help programs improve and to better prepare new librarians of color for careers in academic librarianship.

This survey is completely anonymous – no identifying information will be collected. We will not be collecting information on specific programs, and are asking participants to respond with generalities (the survey instrument reflects this request to not include identifying information).

The survey is available at: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=obT9ro6gb8sztIvaWtz4PQ_3d_3d and takes between 15 and 25 minutes to complete, depending on the number of experiences that you have had.

Your participation is greatly appreciated. Please also feel free to share the survey with colleagues that you feel would be interested in participating. All questions concerning the survey, the presentation or the project as a whole can be directed to Kawanna Bright, kmbright@ncsu.edu; Pambanisha King, kingpam@auburn.edu ; or Deborah Lilton, dlilton@gmail.com .

Sincerely,

Kawanna Bright, Pambanisha King, and Deborah Lilton

Upcoming eLearning Events from ACRL

ACRL is offering a series of eLearining opportunities.  Below are the titles and dates of upcoming courses.  Complete descriptions with instructor names are available from ACRLog.

Information Commons 101: Principles and Good Practices
July 22, 2008
11 a.m. Pacific | 12:00 p.m. Mountain | 1:00 p.m. Central | 2:00 p.m. Eastern

Copyright and the Library Part 1: The Basics Including Fair Use
July 14 – August 1, 2008

Leading Change
Live Webcast: July 15, 2008
11 a.m. Pacific | 12:00 p.m. Mountain | 1:00 p.m. Central | 2:00 p.m. Eastern

Designing Websites for the Academic Library
July 14 – August 8, 2008

For more information about these and other upcoming learning opportunities, visit the ACRL eLearning page. Questions? Contact Jon Stahler via e-mail at jstahler@ala.org or via phone at (312) 280-2511.

OCLC Minority Fellowship Program

OCLC Minority Librarian Fellowship program will provide opportunities for groups under-represented in library profession

DUBLIN, Ohio, June 30, 2008—OCLC has announced a new OCLC Minority Librarian Fellowship program designed to provide a unique opportunity for aspiring library professionals from historically under-represented groups.

The Fellowship program offers an opportunity to be part of the world’s leading library cooperative.  The 12-month program offers the selected Fellow two, three-month assignments within specific divisions of OCLC, and one six-month assignment with a specific operating unit within the OCLC organization.

“As part of OCLC’s strong commitment to inclusion and diversity, we are dedicating the resources to fund a one-year paid Fellowship at OCLC for a librarian from an historically under-represented group,” said Jay Jordan, OCLC President and CEO, announcing the new program during the OCLC President’s Luncheon at the American Library Association annual conference in Anaheim, California, today.

Mr. Jordan said that in this inaugural year, in honor of Duane Webster, retiring Executive Director of ARL, OCLC is opening applications first to participants in and alumni of the ARL Scholars Program, which has a strong diversity program for graduate students and librarians.

“The OCLC Board of Trustees is fully committed to fostering a culture of inclusion at OCLC that values and respects people from a variety of cultures and with diverse backgrounds,” said Larry Alford, Chair, OCLC Board of Trustees.  “The OCLC Minority Librarian Fellowship program offers a unique opportunity for individuals from under-represented groups to have an immediate impact on libraries worldwide through the OCLC cooperative.”

The OCLC Minority Librarian Fellowship program will offer:

• Three months working with OCLC Member Services, which includes orientation to the OCLC member community, assistance with governing projects and participation in the Jay Jordan IFLA/OCLC Early Career Development Fellowship Program, a 30-day program which provides early career development and continuing education for library and information science professionals from countries with developing economies.
• Three months in the OCLC Office of Research assigned to a research scientist.
• Six months in an operating unit working with an assigned mentor from that unit.  The 2008/2009 Fellow will work in OCLC Digital Collection Services, exploring opportunities to digitize historically important collections.

OCLC will begin accepting applications July 15, 2008.  Deadline for applications is August 29, 2008.

Applicants must have earned an accredited MLS/MLIS or other graduate degree (granted by January 2009) in technology with a special emphasis in libraries or other cultural heritage institutions.  For the inaugural year 2008/2009, and in honor of Duane Webster, retiring ARL Executive Director, the Fellowship will be open first to applicants who are current participants or alumni (with less than three years’ post graduate work experience) of the ARL Scholars Program as part of the ARL “Initiative to Recruit a Diverse Workforce.”

The applicant must have a demonstrated awareness and sensitivity in issues of inclusion/diversity; strong organizational skills which include the ability to organize workplans and processes toward a targeted outcome; exceptional communication skills; and the selected individual must represent historically under-represented groups (defined in a manner consistent with the 2007 EEO-1 reporting classifications).

More information will be available on the OCLC and ARL Web sites by July 15, 2008.

About OCLC

Founded in 1967 and headquartered in Dublin, Ohio, OCLC is a nonprofit library service and research organization that has provided computer-based cataloging, reference, resource sharing, eContent, preservation, library management and Web services to 60,000 libraries in 112 countries and territories.  OCLC and its member libraries worldwide have created and maintain WorldCat, the world’s richest online resource for finding library materials.  For more information, visitwww.oclc.org.

Get The Picture

During our f-2-f meeting at ALA Annual, the residents took part in an active learning exercise called “Get the Picture”. The complete instructions for this exercise are available as Appendix C to our June ‘08 Meeting Minutes, but here’s the gist:

Participants pair up and seat themselves back to back. One person will be given a picture and then will describe it to the partner. The listening partner is to draw the picture exactly as it is described. The drawer, however, cannot ask any questions. Draw only what you hear.

Here are the pictures the residents were asked to draw:

Picture 1

Picture 2

And here are the drawings the residents produced:

Drawing 1	Drawing 2
Drawing 3	Drawing 4

Not quite the same huh? I think we learned quite a bit about the ambiguity of language, even under the most conscientious of conditions. When the entire group gathered after our small breakout sessions, one of the coordinators pointed out this is not just an exercise in active listening. It’s also an exercise in direction for people who give instructions (library administrators, for example). Not only do we have to pay attention to what we are hearing and anticipate ambiguities; but we also have to be aware that our instructions (or our emails, as the case usually is) may give rise to alternative interpretations.

We were reminded very quickly during the course of this exercise that we weren’t as smart as we thought we were. In one instance, the partner was told to draw an isoceles triangle, not just a triangle. Clever? Yes, but there are two kinds of isoceles triangles: acute and obtuse. The drawer made the latter. The picture was of the former.