LM_NET: Library Media Networking
On 1/12/1999 katrina yurenka wrote:
>Does anyone know of any other profession that by definition requires a
>Master's Degree and yet is frequently staffed (at least in NH) by anyone who
>enters the door and says they "like books" ?
>Lawyers? Teachers?
>Why is a degreed librarian worth/valued/appreciated so very little by so
>many Educators?
>
I think this is a very interesting question. I am currently trying to
write a master's dissertation on the professional (and social)
isolation experienced by many (most?) school librarians, at least in
the UK. I have been in my current school for 14 years and still feel
something of an outsider.
In England it is very rare for a school librarian to be qualified as
a teacher, but it takes just as long to become a librarian as a
teacher (usually first degree plus postgraduate diploma in both
cases). We are generally considerably less well paid (different pay
scales so it is difficult to be precise about how much we should be
paid, but surely not less than a basic scale teacher of similar
length of experience).
Is it simply a question of one profession having insufficient
understanding of the skills/expertise of another? But teachers
'respect' lawyers or doctors. Of course they are paid better. In an
information age, why are librarians seen as second rate professionals?
I don't want to get on my soapbox. I should really like to see a way
forward, not only because I should like more money (though I should),
but because I think it would be easier to work with teachers to
develop the information skills I think so important, if they actually
respected those skills and me as an expert in them.
(Having read some of the later posts on this topic I see that there
is considerable disapproval in the US for the idea that a non-teacher
can be a school librarian. However, it needs to be realized that
where teachers in the UK have responsibility for the library it is
generally on top of a full or nearly full subject teaching timetable,
and that an understanding of information skills is largely untaught
to teachers. When I have a class in the library I do not work alone
but with the teacher, each of us doing what we do best.)
I realise that this is only partly to do with your original question,
but I think it is relevant. If anyone who 'likes books' is seen as a
librarian, then respect for our skills is obviously going to be hard
to find. Or, to put it the other way, if respect for our skills is
lacking, then of course anyone will do to run a library.
My starting point for becoming a librarian was that I thought
information was important and that everyone had a right to become as
capable of handling it as possible. Information is power! I expected
to work in a school environment and chose the modules I studied with
that in mind. However other school librarians have come via other
routes, and while I think most of us would agree that school
libraries are different from, for example, public ones, the general
library skills we were all trained in are important and necessary to
our role in schools.
Yours,
EB
-------------------------------------------------------
Elizabeth Bentley
Head of Learning Resources
Northbrook C of E School
Taunton Road
Lee, London SE12 8PD
e-mail: info@northbrook.lewisham.sch.uk
Tel: (+44) 020 8852 1563
Fax: (+44) 020 8244 4590
email: sln-owner@egroups.com
ICQ: 11252617
-------------------------------------------------------
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