ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

In the news

A common comment from librarians when faced with the unexpected challenges of a multifaceted, sometimes fly-by-the-seat-of-your- pants, position is, “They didn’t tell us about this in library school.”

Jina Choi Wakimoto returned to library work as a cataloger expecting to brush up on AACR2 and MARC formats. She ended up creating a new role for herself developing Korean exhibits at her library. “From cataloger to curator: the Korean exhibits of an accidental ethnic librarian,” describes the path she took to end up in this unlikely position.

Despite the fact that we are not taught in library school how to run exhibits and other special programs, many in the profession take on this role. Steven R. Harris provides another example of this in “Writers in the library: literary programming on a shoestring,” which describes the University of Tennessee’s successful Writers in the Libraiy project, a unique program in the realm of academic libraries. In

“Boosting libraries at university orientations,” D. Brett Spencer, provides helpful tips for designing a booth to promote your library.

“Subject access in an interdisciplinary environment” explores the possible options for dealing with interdisciplinary studies on campus. Anthony Vaver has discovered that standard subject headings seem to simultaneously help and hinder interdisciplinary work and comes to his own conclusions as to the best way to handle this.

So, they didn’t tell us about all of this in library school, yet librarians manage to successfully meet new challenges regularly. Most will attest that the support of colleagues, library directors, and administrators across campus has been crucial to their success. When you combine this support with personal creativity, drive, and commitment, the possibilities are endless.

—Stephanie Orphan, Editor-in-chief sorphan@ala.org