The Princh Library blog provides library stories and insights from around the globe. The blog is brought to you by Princh, the only printing solution designed specifically for – and with – libraries! Our user-friendly printing solution makes it easy for library users to print and pay from their own device. Try out our solution risk free for 30 days or watch a short video to understand how we can help your library here! Now let’s get to the blog!
The Role Of Library Technicians
Librarians around the world are often expected to fulfil many different roles and will likely take on multiple positions throughout their careers. It is not uncommon to find a librarian with the same title at another library having a slightly different tasks or role within the organization.
Does this foggy idea about what different positions entail create unity and strength? Or, could this potentially cloud the details on some roles enough to cause them to be considered with less respect than others?
In this week’s library blog, we have guest writer Michael Barry discuss the importance of library technicians from personal experience and information he has gathered throughout his career.
The importance of librarians
A lot has been said recently about the importance of librarians and teacher-librarians, especially in school libraries. Launched in Australia in late 2018, the Students Need School Libraries campaign has been bringing attention to the important impact that qualified library staff bring to school libraries, and the unique specialist skills and experience that librarians and teacher librarians bring to schools.
This is a wonderful campaign, I highly recommend everyone take a look at some of the fantastic articles, videos, and reports that the campaign has released on social media and on their website. The impact of qualified librarians and teacher librarians in schools is strongly supported by a huge number of studies and reports that all agree on the significant positive effects a properly staffed school library can have on literacy outcomes, digital literacy and research skills, problem solving and critical thinking skills, while also supporting struggling readers to improve.
But since attending the National Library Technicians Conference in Melbourne Australia last year, I have been reflecting on the importance and impact of library technicians in libraries. Library Technicians, according to Wes Young, one of the founding figures of Australian library technician education, were always meant to have “specialist skills beyond those of librarians” and should work alongside, and not be subservient to, librarians. Yet all too often library technicians are overlooked as “paraprofessionals”, or as performing a role that could be done by volunteers. In many schools, parent volunteers and teacher aides attempt to keep their school’s library operational absent of the specialist skills and knowledge of a library technician. According to ALIA, the Australian Librarian and Information Association, library technicians perform a range of technical specialised duties including cataloguing, classification, metadata and records management within the catalogue, and assisting with reference and loan enquiries.
Our amazing library technician, Mrs.Rynard, promotes a culture of reading with our students during library. #royalvalues @TLDSB pic.twitter.com/noXD4t5DVI
— Alexandra PS (@infoAlexandraPS) January 23, 2020
Library Technician
In my own role as the sole library technician in a primary school library, I also perform the duties of a librarian, such as sourcing and purchasing new items, managing the library’s budget, developing and implementing promotional events and displays, and assisting students and teachers with appropriate resource selection. These are all tasks that require extensive knowledge of the library’s collection, and a deep understanding of the technical skills involved in cataloguing, assigning subject headings and classification numbers, as well as selecting appropriate and relevant resources for a particular student’s or teacher’s needs. These are skills that took me a year of full-time tertiary study plus coming up to 3 years of workplace experience, to develop, and I still have much to learn. Not something an untrained parent volunteer, no matter how well-meaning or passionate, can replace.
Library technicians play a vital role even in libraries with qualified librarians and teacher-librarians, as well. They perform much of the back-end technical and day-to-day operations of the library, allowing librarians and TLs to focus their efforts on the specific functions of their own roles, such as developing and revising library policy and strategic planning; developing and delivering lessons to students about digital literacy, research, and critical thinking; working with teachers to assist struggling readers; finding and assessing the latest research to assist teachers or school policy makers with their duties; or being involved with curriculum planning to ensure a focus on literacy and information skills.
A well-staffed library does not only have a qualified librarian or teacher-librarian, but a team of specialised staff that includes library technicians, each role supporting the others in the library’s overall goals and strategic plan.
This week, our school Librarian Mrs Lane launched a very unique reading challenge for our Junior school pupils – “The 2020 Reading Challenge”.
The challenge is for pupils (as a group) to read a gargantuan total of two thousand and twenty books this calendar year. Good luck! pic.twitter.com/3twAanJTyf
— Hamilton College (@HC_Scotland) January 10, 2020
Different styles
As well as working in a school library where I am the only library staff member, I have also worked briefly in a school library where I was part of a team of library staff including both a librarian and a teacher-librarian working together. The difference between these two libraries is profound. In the latter, every class has class time with the teacher librarian working on research skills, digital information and technology skills, critical thinking and problem solving, and learning to assess the trustworthiness and value of information sources. The library is central to school planning and curriculum, and is continually active in the wider school community. In the former, my current workplace, the library is a fun and engaging room full of books where classes come in to read and borrow.
Now, I don’t want to put myself or my efforts down, and my school has been hugely successful with their literacy program in the last two years that I have been there, but I am no teacher librarian. And I am not a team of three. Just as parent volunteers cannot take the place of a library technician, a library technician cannot achieve the same as a team of library staff.
The impact of having passionate, engaged, and most importantly qualified #library staff in a school library is clear. Library staff can transform a room full of #books into an exciting literary wonderland, a place where students can… Share on XBut even still, the effects of my work and efforts in my little school library are made plain: in the smile of a student who has, from my recommendation, discovered their new favourite series or author; in the gleam in the eyes of the Minecraft group when I put the latest Minecraft Annual on display; in the hand-drawn Christmas card I received from a grade 5 girl thanking me for keeping the library ‘immaculate’; and in the sad smile of the ‘tricky customer’ I’d been working with for months to find books he would enjoy reading, when he had to leave the school: “I’ll miss this library. You’re the best librarian ever.”
Eight hundred-odd words is not enough to discuss the full range and impact of library technicians in the industry, whether they are in school, public, academic, or special libraries. A thousand words is not enough to explore the broad range of duties library technicians may have, or how they affect the community they serve, or how the specialist skills and knowledge they wield should afford them better respect than the thought that a qualified library technician could be replaced by teacher aides and parent volunteers.
But for me, the impact of having passionate, engaged, and most importantly qualified library staff in a school library is clear. Library staff can transform a room full of books into an exciting literary wonderland, a place where students can discover, learn, imagine, and create.
Author: Michael Barry
Library professional who works as a Library Technician
Twitter: @TheLiBarryan
Recent posts
Green Libraries: How Sustainable Design is Shaping the Future of Public Libraries
In this week's Princh Library Blog post, recurring guest writer Sam L. Bowman discusses an ever so important topic: sustainable design and [...]
Librarians Supporting Digital Literacy in the Community
In this week's Princh Library Blog, Nina Grant covers why digital literacy is important, the variety of ways in which librarians are supporting [...]
Great article Michael. I too am a proud Library Technician working as an eServices Specialist for a 4-library public library service. My previous role in a private school was as Manager Multimedia Resources. Yes, my library technician skill set & passion for libraries has seen me work way above what they used to call ‘para professional.’ Please note, ALIA no longer uses the term para professional. Library Technicians have earned the professional title.
I too was at the Melbourne Symposium & was in awe of what ‘living legend’ Wes Young had to say.
His statement “specialist skills beyond those of librarians” and should work alongside, and not be subservient to, was spot on.
And I fully agree with what you have said: ‘A well-staffed library does not only have a qualified librarian or teacher-librarian, but a team of specialised staff that includes library technicians, each role supporting the others in the library’s overall goals and strategic plan’.
The key is being passionate, engaged, proactive & continued learning.