Consider this third installment of my Rising Generation series another wallop at the dead horse, but I'm finding this fascinating, so you'll have to bear with me for today. If you're tired of the rising generation, skip this and come back in a day or two when I post my American Libraries column analyzing the official mission of the ALA. Exciting stuff!
Someone calling himself Wally Whateley says he would LOVE to be a librarian. Apparently, he needs a job. "Sure enough, my employment isn't getting renewed. Not very many employment opportunities here in Lubbock, but we'll see. Maybe I can find the richest grocery store in town, and they'll pay me enough as a sacker to let me keep my car..."
When job hunting, he says, there are those jobs you might hate but take to survive, like truck driving or teaching school.
"But the worst ones are not the jobs that you'd hate but would do just to survive, but the jobs that you'd love and would be good at, but are not allowed to apply for. "
You can imagine which job that is--Librarian!
"I would love to be a librarian. I did it for a couple of semesters back in my freshman year in college. And I really thought it was pretty cool. I would love to try it again -- I love books, I love recommending books, I know my way around your average library, and I would dearly love to get to hang around hot librarian babes."
You see, he was a librarian for a couple of semesters as a college freshman. And, you know, he loves books. And he knows his way around your average library. Oh, and all the hot librarian babes! (Apparently he's seen that Cognotes photo of me in my Daisy Dukes, but hasn't visited the exhibit floor at a library conference yet.) He certainly sounds qualified. Perhaps more than qualified. And one would think if he was a librarian as a college freshman, he could certainly be a librarian as a college graduate. He should probably go back to that library and get them to hire him again.
He has a lot of other posts about his comic books, and he often makes highly intelligent statements like, "Why do Republicans want to make war on Fundamentalist Islam? They're basically the same damn thing, aren't they?" This just shows he's no elitist high culture snob and that he's a really critical thinker with informed and carefully reasoned views about the world. With that sort of brilliant political savvy, he would probably fit right in at the SRRT!
But then, depression sets in.
"But every time I look up the job requirements for any library jobs, they all say, 'Must have a Masters of Library Science degree.'"
After that it gets a little rude, but he asks legitimate questions:
"Is this whole 'Library Science' thing anything other than a scam to keep Library Science professors employed and to ensure that people who love books but never managed to go to the right schools will never get to work in libraries? Does insisting on Library Science degrees actually do anything to make libraries better?"
It may indeed be a scam to keep library science professors employed. What else could they do, after all? And it's a shame Whateley never went to the "right schools." In this context, I assume he doesn't mean Harvard or Yale, but more likely Michigan or Chapel Hill, or for that matter the University of Southern Mississipi or the University of North Texas, both of which offer genuine ALA-accredited MLS degrees. Yes, we librarians are an exclusive lot.
"Seriously -- take me into any library in the country, big or small. Give me a week to familiarize myself with the classification system, the filing, the layout of the facility, and how to check the books out, and I'll put my abilities to recommend books, file and retrieve materials, and keep general order up against anyone with a damn Masters degree."
Now take that, you overeducated librarians! The main job of librarians is recommending books, filing and retrieving materials, and keeping general order! You don't need no stinkin' MLS for that! Hmmm, except for recommending books, which to my knowledge is generally restricted to reader's advisory among public reference librarians, I'm trying to figure out which of these duties is typical of librarians. Depends on the size and type of library certainly, and what your function is, but I haven't done any work like that since I was a pre-MLS library clerk. Whateley sounds well qualified for such a clerkship. That's what we have clerks for, so that we important professional librarians can spend time doing high-level productive work like having multiple coffee breaks and writing our instructive professional librarian blogs and surfing the web. Other people surf the web, too, but when I surf the web, I'm surfing like a professional, baby!
I wonder if we gave him a week to explore the library whether he'd be able to catalog data, or develop an approval plan, or evaluate a database, or teach advanced research techniques, or maintain a server, or develop a website? None of them terribly difficult once you know what you're doing, but they probably couldn't be learned well in a week. We'll be generous and give him two weeks exploring his average library.
One of the commentors upon Whateley's post remarks, "I work in a library, would like to be a librarian, and I know what the librarians do, but no one needs a degree for that [poop]. It's just another scam, like the MBA or the masters in journalism (yeah, dropped out of that program, too). Just another way of eliminating the middle class by making decent-paying jobs unatainable."
Bravo to the commentator for noticing that master's degrees in library science and journalism are both intellectually suspect. The implication, though, is that she couldn't complete either degree. If you can't complete one of those degrees, what does that say about your own abilities? Maybe the purpose of requiring an MLS is to make sure that librarians were at least able to complete something, even if just an MLS.
Nevertheless, you probably noticed the most alarming point this commentator makes. That's right, professional librarians are working hard to eliminate the middle class, and I bet most librarians though that was President Bush's tax cuts! (Probably not most of the librarians in my readership of cranky conservatives, but just librarians in general.) I bet that's a charge you never thought would be brought against you! This is the first time I've ever been the focus of envy and resentment, at least because of my job as a librarian.
Consider the figures, though. The median weekly earnings for all Full-Time Wage and Salary Workers in the US in 2004 was $33,176 [latest data obtainable without having to search for more than two minutes]. Here's where we might start to feel a little better about our pay. According to my own investigative journalism from last week, the median wage of all librarians in 2005 was $50,274. Thus, on average, librarians are considerably better paid than other Americans. And how do we maintain this high status we have compared to your average American schmo? By building up a huge wall to keep out the riff-raff, that's how. And what is that wall? You guessed it, our prestigious and exclusive library schools!
I'll admit I live in a fantasy world located somewhere between P.G. Wodehouse, Evelyn Waugh, and Henry James, but now I'm feeling very exclusive indeed.
Consider also this statement from The Bell Curve, by Herrnstein and Murray:
"Think of your twelve closest friends or colleagues. For most readers of this book, a large majority will be college graduates. Does it surprise you to learn that the odds of having even half of them be college graduates are only six in a thousand, if people were randomly paired off? Many of you will not think it odd that half or more of the dozen have advanced degrees. But the odds against finding such a result among a randomly chosen group of twelve Americans are actually more than a million to one." [p.47]
If we consider the MLS an "advanced" degree, which I suppose we must for statistical purposes, I'm willing to bet that if you did the calculation, you'd find yourself in very statistically unlikely company, at least compared to the randomly paired off average American. (I avoid the randomly paired off average American whenever possible.) Despite the fact that library school is somewhat of an intellectual joke, even that minimal barrier keeps out many of the poor and beaten down and lets the rest of us enjoy the high-powered, privileged lifestyle of the professional librarian.
How do you feel now, you elitist librarian scumbags? Are you starting to feel a little guilty about your high pay, your juicy perks, and your exalted status? Nor am I.
We must beware the rising generation, because they want to destroy the exclusive privileges we have built up to protect our high salaries and cushy middle-class jobs. I want to make library school intellectually rigorous; the non-librarian Jacobins among us want to tear them down to make way for people who love books and stuff. We must be prepared for them when they storm the barricades shouting "Liberté, égalité, fraternité" and trying to beat us to death with our own book trucks. When the revolution comes, you'll be the first up against the wall!
Showing posts with label rising gen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rising gen. Show all posts
Monday, July 31, 2006
Friday, July 28, 2006
The Rising Generation Envies the Librarians
"Librarians make good dough." I bet you haven't heard that one before. In a continuation of my impromptu series of how the rising generation views the library, I have a blog entry from someone called OD, from whom comes the above quote. For him, becoming a librarian represents SUCCESS, or at least, WHAT YOU DO WHEN YOU'VE FAILED AT EVERYTHING ELSE. He wants to become a librarian and serve "up fools some bookworm action." I'm sure the library schools are salivating at the prospect of enrolling him, but there's one slight hitch: he thinks his GPA is below the minimum entrance requirment. I wasn't aware that library schools had entrance requirments, but then I didn't know librarians make good dough. But let's let OD speak for himself:
"The Master Plan
So OD wants to go back to school (like Dangerfield) to be a librarian. You heard that right, serving up fools some bookworm action. Problem is my gpa is below the minimum to get in. I need a good score on the GRE to get in. From what I can tell it should be pretty easy. I'm good at that standardized test thing and the practice questions seem easy enough. Letters of recommendation may be a problem though, getting in contact w/ old teachers and stuff.... So reactions everyone, I need that feedback. Small note, librarians make good dough. The lower 25th percentile make more than 40k starting out and from the course website it says that 88% of the grads from the school got librarian jobs within a year of graduation. Someone has to keep those manuscripts on lock down. I think OD is the man for it."
As you can see, he should make a fine librarian, once he gets into library school. Fortunately, he's good at that standardized test thing, though I think the GRE has added a writing section since I took it. Watch out, OD! And he probably shouldn't worry about letters of recommendation. I'm sure he made a fine impression on his professors, and they remember him well. (Letter begins: I'm writing to recommend OD for your library school. I assume he will do okay since library school isn't very challenging academically. While at Dungheap State, OD enrolled in many fine courses....)
Since OD is requesting feedback, the Annoyed Librarian will be happy to comply. First, I'm not sure where this information comes from about librarian salaries. Presumably it comes from the website of the library school OD is considering applying to. However, according to a summary of the ALA SURVEY OF LIBRARIAN SALARIES, 2005, the mean salary for "beginning librarians" is $36,486. That's the mean, you know, after you add them all up and divide them, if I remember my statistics primer correctly. If the mean is $36K, I'm pretty sure the bottom quartile isn't making over $40K, but I could be wrong. I don't have a strong math background.
Also, a "total of 24,814 salaries were reported, with a mean of $53,779 and a median of $50,274." Median. That's the salary right in the middle. Which means that half of all librarians make under $50,275. I suppose it's possible that the lowest quartile of beginning librarians makes over $40K and the median librarian makes $50K, but again, I wasn't a math major, so don't quote me.
For the real data, I had to check the print copy of the ALA Salary Survey. It would be a shame to just put that on the web and let me get it for my enormous ALA fee, but no. Okay, for all beginning public librarians in all regions, the minimum salary is $22K, the median is $35,735, and the first quartile is $34,550. For beginning academic librarians, the minimum is $17K, the median is $36,259, and the 1st quartile is $35,130. It sounds in general like the academics do a bit better, except the range for beginning publics was $22-85K, and academics $17-54K.
That maximum public librarian salary of $85K was in a "very small public library" (serving a population of less than 10,000). That has to be an anomaly. Some beginning librarian in a tiny public library in the North Atlantic region started at $85K? Somebody knows somebody is what I'm thinking.
You're probably thinking that the $17K was in Mississippi or somewhere like that, but no. Some beginning academic librarian in the North Atlantic also got a chance to skew the salary number by getting paid ony $17K/year. This is supposed to be for full-time professional work, right? Whoever this person is, undoubtedly their main identifying feature is that they are a complete loser. I doubt the person will be offended by my comment, because she or he is probably illiterate anyway. And since anyone who accepts a professional salary like this is doing us all a disservice, I also recommend an immediate spanking with a hardbound copy of the ALA Salary Survey.
The range for all librarians of course is huge. "The minimum and maximum salaries for non-supervising librarians had a vast range in all sizes of public and academic libraries, such as $14,000 and $175,500 for Universities." Personally, if I were OD, I'd want me one of them $175K jobs with no supervisory duties. Heck, I'd take one with supervisory duties, and the way I'm going I'll probably have one someday.
So my advice to OD would be, first, learn how to find salary information for yourself. By the time you finish library school, you'll be able to do this, but by then it will be too late. Second, learn how to evaluate information you find on the web. Apparently, with regard to whatever that library school is saying, Linnypooh was right--the information is bogus. Again, you'll be able to do this after library school, but....
To be fair to your prospective library school, it's probably not lying its enormous library school bottom off about everything. It may indeed be true that 88% of graduates get jobs within a year of graduation. A year's a long time. The 12% who didn't get jobs must have been really pathetic or else had serious geographic restrictions. Everyone I knew got jobs well before graduation, though naturally I associated only with the best and the brightest. However, most first jobs suck. I've seen a lot of resumes in my day, and to be honest, a lot of the second, third, and fourth jobs look like they suck as well. So be prepared!
I might also mention that most librarians probably work with computers more than books these days. Though I read a lot of books and in my job do a lot of things abstractly related to books, it's been a long time since I served up some bookworm action to a fool. Keep this in mind.
If, after this awakening, librarianship still seems like a good deal, because after all you're not doing anything with your life anyway, then go for it! Someone, indeed, as you say, has to keep those manuscripts on lock down, whatever that means.
"The Master Plan
So OD wants to go back to school (like Dangerfield) to be a librarian. You heard that right, serving up fools some bookworm action. Problem is my gpa is below the minimum to get in. I need a good score on the GRE to get in. From what I can tell it should be pretty easy. I'm good at that standardized test thing and the practice questions seem easy enough. Letters of recommendation may be a problem though, getting in contact w/ old teachers and stuff.... So reactions everyone, I need that feedback. Small note, librarians make good dough. The lower 25th percentile make more than 40k starting out and from the course website it says that 88% of the grads from the school got librarian jobs within a year of graduation. Someone has to keep those manuscripts on lock down. I think OD is the man for it."
As you can see, he should make a fine librarian, once he gets into library school. Fortunately, he's good at that standardized test thing, though I think the GRE has added a writing section since I took it. Watch out, OD! And he probably shouldn't worry about letters of recommendation. I'm sure he made a fine impression on his professors, and they remember him well. (Letter begins: I'm writing to recommend OD for your library school. I assume he will do okay since library school isn't very challenging academically. While at Dungheap State, OD enrolled in many fine courses....)
Since OD is requesting feedback, the Annoyed Librarian will be happy to comply. First, I'm not sure where this information comes from about librarian salaries. Presumably it comes from the website of the library school OD is considering applying to. However, according to a summary of the ALA SURVEY OF LIBRARIAN SALARIES, 2005, the mean salary for "beginning librarians" is $36,486. That's the mean, you know, after you add them all up and divide them, if I remember my statistics primer correctly. If the mean is $36K, I'm pretty sure the bottom quartile isn't making over $40K, but I could be wrong. I don't have a strong math background.
Also, a "total of 24,814 salaries were reported, with a mean of $53,779 and a median of $50,274." Median. That's the salary right in the middle. Which means that half of all librarians make under $50,275. I suppose it's possible that the lowest quartile of beginning librarians makes over $40K and the median librarian makes $50K, but again, I wasn't a math major, so don't quote me.
For the real data, I had to check the print copy of the ALA Salary Survey. It would be a shame to just put that on the web and let me get it for my enormous ALA fee, but no. Okay, for all beginning public librarians in all regions, the minimum salary is $22K, the median is $35,735, and the first quartile is $34,550. For beginning academic librarians, the minimum is $17K, the median is $36,259, and the 1st quartile is $35,130. It sounds in general like the academics do a bit better, except the range for beginning publics was $22-85K, and academics $17-54K.
That maximum public librarian salary of $85K was in a "very small public library" (serving a population of less than 10,000). That has to be an anomaly. Some beginning librarian in a tiny public library in the North Atlantic region started at $85K? Somebody knows somebody is what I'm thinking.
You're probably thinking that the $17K was in Mississippi or somewhere like that, but no. Some beginning academic librarian in the North Atlantic also got a chance to skew the salary number by getting paid ony $17K/year. This is supposed to be for full-time professional work, right? Whoever this person is, undoubtedly their main identifying feature is that they are a complete loser. I doubt the person will be offended by my comment, because she or he is probably illiterate anyway. And since anyone who accepts a professional salary like this is doing us all a disservice, I also recommend an immediate spanking with a hardbound copy of the ALA Salary Survey.
The range for all librarians of course is huge. "The minimum and maximum salaries for non-supervising librarians had a vast range in all sizes of public and academic libraries, such as $14,000 and $175,500 for Universities." Personally, if I were OD, I'd want me one of them $175K jobs with no supervisory duties. Heck, I'd take one with supervisory duties, and the way I'm going I'll probably have one someday.
So my advice to OD would be, first, learn how to find salary information for yourself. By the time you finish library school, you'll be able to do this, but by then it will be too late. Second, learn how to evaluate information you find on the web. Apparently, with regard to whatever that library school is saying, Linnypooh was right--the information is bogus. Again, you'll be able to do this after library school, but....
To be fair to your prospective library school, it's probably not lying its enormous library school bottom off about everything. It may indeed be true that 88% of graduates get jobs within a year of graduation. A year's a long time. The 12% who didn't get jobs must have been really pathetic or else had serious geographic restrictions. Everyone I knew got jobs well before graduation, though naturally I associated only with the best and the brightest. However, most first jobs suck. I've seen a lot of resumes in my day, and to be honest, a lot of the second, third, and fourth jobs look like they suck as well. So be prepared!
I might also mention that most librarians probably work with computers more than books these days. Though I read a lot of books and in my job do a lot of things abstractly related to books, it's been a long time since I served up some bookworm action to a fool. Keep this in mind.
If, after this awakening, librarianship still seems like a good deal, because after all you're not doing anything with your life anyway, then go for it! Someone, indeed, as you say, has to keep those manuscripts on lock down, whatever that means.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
The Rising Generation Views the Library
Inadvertantly, I came across a random blog post from what appears to be a 17-year-old Australian student who severely criticizes librarians (though I'm sure there are American examples of this kind of criticism). This is one (obscene) paragraph from a pathetic and incoherent longer entry by a member of the rising generation who calls hereself Linnypooh:
"Hmmm... I have a stupid geography assignment on Bali dued soon... T_T really - why Bali? I really hate going online - most, if not all, of the information online is bogus! And libraries - i don't do libraries! I hate how its all quiet.. the atmosphere in most libraries feel weird =/ (maybe i'm just weird haha) I HATE THE LIBRARIANS! rude and obnoxious bitches! Gosh i swear they sit there on their fat asses talking on the DAMN phone!! When you need their bloody service they give you the biggest dirty! Man i'd love punch them in the face x_X they all deserve black eyes!"
This seems too aggressive for someone named Linnypooh, if you ask me. It's reassuring that this person doesn't just trust everything found online, though the claim that most of the information is bogus shows a decided lack of information discrimination. Perhaps those librarians should bibliographically instruct her. Her observation on the size of librarian bottoms is, it seems to me, spot on.
But I love the next sentence--"I don't do libraries!" Considering the hostility of the final sentence and the threat of face-punching, I think we can all rest easier about her antipathy to libraries, especially those of us working in Australia. [For my Australian readers: Her profile has a photo of her. If you see her coming, keep your guard up. Unabridged dictionaries are almost guaranteed to stop any punch. Hold one up in front of your face at all times.]
It's interesting also to see the unexpurgated ranting of a disgruntled library patron, considering all the ranting librarians do about annoying patrons. I don't do much of that myself, of course, but there's plenty of good stuff by the Happy Villain or the Bitter Librarian to keep you company. I'm trying to imagine the humorous, vindictive, and yet occasionally touching post the Happy Villain might write if Linnypooh punched Lily or Celia. (Sorry to indulge. Happyville is my favorite library soap opera.) However, to be fair, the annoyed librarians among us are usually pretty specific about the annoying patrons. This girl hates all librarians.
Still, if Linnypooh is at all representative of the rising generation, the "nextgens" that some librarians are always trying to persuade to use libraries, then the librarians definitely have some hard work ahead of them. On the other hand, if you can persuade her, you can probably persuade anyone.
The most disturbing thing is not the danger to libraries, but the inevitable fact that, as the politicians keep telling us, the children are our future. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Hell.
"Hmmm... I have a stupid geography assignment on Bali dued soon... T_T really - why Bali? I really hate going online - most, if not all, of the information online is bogus! And libraries - i don't do libraries! I hate how its all quiet.. the atmosphere in most libraries feel weird =/ (maybe i'm just weird haha) I HATE THE LIBRARIANS! rude and obnoxious bitches! Gosh i swear they sit there on their fat asses talking on the DAMN phone!! When you need their bloody service they give you the biggest dirty! Man i'd love punch them in the face x_X they all deserve black eyes!"
This seems too aggressive for someone named Linnypooh, if you ask me. It's reassuring that this person doesn't just trust everything found online, though the claim that most of the information is bogus shows a decided lack of information discrimination. Perhaps those librarians should bibliographically instruct her. Her observation on the size of librarian bottoms is, it seems to me, spot on.
But I love the next sentence--"I don't do libraries!" Considering the hostility of the final sentence and the threat of face-punching, I think we can all rest easier about her antipathy to libraries, especially those of us working in Australia. [For my Australian readers: Her profile has a photo of her. If you see her coming, keep your guard up. Unabridged dictionaries are almost guaranteed to stop any punch. Hold one up in front of your face at all times.]
It's interesting also to see the unexpurgated ranting of a disgruntled library patron, considering all the ranting librarians do about annoying patrons. I don't do much of that myself, of course, but there's plenty of good stuff by the Happy Villain or the Bitter Librarian to keep you company. I'm trying to imagine the humorous, vindictive, and yet occasionally touching post the Happy Villain might write if Linnypooh punched Lily or Celia. (Sorry to indulge. Happyville is my favorite library soap opera.) However, to be fair, the annoyed librarians among us are usually pretty specific about the annoying patrons. This girl hates all librarians.
Still, if Linnypooh is at all representative of the rising generation, the "nextgens" that some librarians are always trying to persuade to use libraries, then the librarians definitely have some hard work ahead of them. On the other hand, if you can persuade her, you can probably persuade anyone.
The most disturbing thing is not the danger to libraries, but the inevitable fact that, as the politicians keep telling us, the children are our future. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Hell.
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