{"id":83804,"date":"2014-11-04T08:00:28","date_gmt":"2014-11-04T14:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=83804"},"modified":"2014-11-03T17:05:17","modified_gmt":"2014-11-03T23:05:17","slug":"the-importance-of-increasing-professional-involvementengagement-among-library-support-staff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=83804","title":{"rendered":"The Importance of increasing Professional Involvement\/Engagement among Library Support Staff"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Lauren Bourdages, Senior Assistant, INALJ Ontario<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

The Importance of increasing Professional Involvement\/Engagement among Library Support\u00a0Staff<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"laurenbourdages\"<\/a>So I started a new job in August. I now work in a University Library where I divide my time equally\u00a0between the user services desk (our circulation and reference service point) and processing books and\u00a0articles to be put on course reserve. One day I was sitting at my desk, in about my second week, one of\u00a0the librarians came over to my work area, I\u2019d actually been hoping to talk to him, because we both serve\u00a0on the same professional association committee and I had asked him for some insider information about\u00a0the job when I\u2019d applied, but we hadn\u2019t had the chance to catch each other before then. As we were\u00a0talking he said something to me, something that I\u2019d always consciously been aware of but that didn\u2019t\u00a0strike me as the big deal it is until he said it. What he said was, and this is paraphrasing because I can\u2019t\u00a0remember exactly how he worded it at the time: \u201cYou\u2019re one of the most active and engaged library\u00a0technicians I\u2019ve known! You\u2019re so involved and that\u2019s a big deal, not enough library technicians are.\u201d<\/p>\n

I do consider myself active and involved, but I feel like I could be way better because I know I\u00a0procrastinate and can be veeeeeeeeeeery slow\/bad at responding to emails, so I don\u2019t feel like I\u2019m as\u00a0good\/effective in my involvement as I could be.<\/p>\n

My involvement includes: INALJ Ontario (In addition to being the Senior Assistant, I run the\u00a0@INALJOntario<\/a> twitter account), membership in the OALT, OLA, CLA, and ALA (specifically: LSSIRT<\/a> and\u00a0NMRT), a spot on the Canadian Library Association\u2019s Member Communications Standing Committee<\/a>\u00a0(where I met the colleague that inspired this post), a place with the NMRT Online Discussion Forum\u00a0group, the position of Moderator of the CLA\u2019s LTAN<\/a>, and most recently an appointment as the NMRT\u00a0liaison to LSSIRT.<\/p>\n

Even still, I feel like I\u2019m not at the same level as the likes of Michael David Reansbury<\/a> (the past President\u00a0of the OALT), Jessica Reeve<\/a> (the Current President of the OALT), Karen Hildebrandt<\/a> or Kathy Heney<\/a> (two\u00a0of the founding members of the CLA Library Technicians and Assistants Network). They are just 4 of the\u00a0most involved library technicians I know, and I was writing that, I realised the only super active library\u00a0technicians I can think of are the ones involved with the Ontario Association of Library Technicians and\u00a0the LTAN and I only know about them because I am a member of both groups.<\/p>\n

Disappointingly, at this time I know very little about the executive members of the other provincial\u00a0library technician associations, MALT<\/a>, AALT<\/a>, SALT<\/a>, and the BC-LTAS<\/a>. And that\u2019s what my colleague\u2019s\u00a0comment has helped me to realise. There are hundreds (if not thousands) of very vocal and engaged\u00a0librarians out there, but there aren\u2019t as many library support staff (that I am aware of at least!) who are\u00a0actively engaged in the profession\/industry and to me that\u2019s a huge disappointment and loss. The voices\u00a0and opinions of library support staff matter, they matter a lot and that\u2019s something a lot of people, even\u00a0the support staff themselves seem to forget.<\/p>\n

The CLA recently recognised just how important the contribution of all library support staff by declaring\u00a0October 17th\u00a0to be Canadian Library Support Staff Day<\/a>. This is a big deal, because I know through hearing\u00a0stories from support staff colleagues that we are not always valued and that there are work places\u00a0where the support staff are treated and regarded on a much lower level than the librarians; and in other\u00a0places our education isn\u2019t even recognised. The only way those things are going to change, the only way\u00a0library support staff are going to get that respect is to advocate for ourselves the same way librarians\u00a0do.<\/p>\n

This means putting yourself out there whether it\u2019s through a blog, or by getting involved with\u00a0professional associations. I want to challenge every library support staffer reading this to do just that,\u00a0and if you\u2019re wondering how, well here\u2019s some links to current opportunities to help get you started:<\/p>\n

\u2022 The Ontario Association of Library Technicians NEEDS<\/strong> Board members, make a huge difference\u00a0by checking the openings out here<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Nominations for the OLA Board of Directors & Division Council Elections are going on right now\u00a0(the deadline is November 15th\u00a0!) there are lots of great ways to get involved, check them out\u00a0here<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Speak<\/a> at the 2015 AALT Conference<\/p>\n

\u2022 Join<\/a> a national level CLA committee or task force<\/p>\n

\u2022 Follow the CLA LTAN<\/a> social media accounts, and those of the CLA Next Generation Network<\/a> to\u00a0get involved in their activities<\/p>\n

\u2022 Get started in the land of library blogging by entering the CILIP Blogger Challenge<\/a> or writing for\u00a0us here<\/a> at INALJ or write an article for Associates<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Or volunteer for one of the state and provincial pages, or another role here at INALJ, we\u2019re\u00a0always looking for great, eager volunteers<\/a>!<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t have to do everything, but you SHOULD<\/strong> do something. After all who knows more about\u00a0what library support staff do than library support staff? It\u2019s up to us, as a collective whole to fight for\u00a0ourselves and our work. The more voices we have out there the louder we will be.<\/p>\n

When I was still in the library technician program, I had to do a research project for my Research &\u00a0Reporting class, so for my topic I chose to look at the possibility of creating a CLA Student Chapter<\/a> for\u00a0my program. Doing that research I discovered only ONE library technician program in the entire country\u00a0has actually done this, the NSCC! My research also returned a split between people who would be\u00a0interested in being involved only if someone else did the work of getting it off the ground, and people\u00a0who had no interest in being involved in any professional association activities. Very disheartening\u00a0results and I want to see a change, we as library support staff NEED to see those attitudes change.<\/p>\n

My desire and goal, especially now that I am the Moderator of the LTAN is to encourage participation\u00a0and activity of library support staff in professional associations, to make us heard. I would LOVE to see\u00a0a CLA Student Chapter in every library technician program across the country, and I would love for\u00a0those same programs to become part of the LSSC<\/a>! Please, join me in making this a reality! Get involved!\u00a0You have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Professional involvement not only benefits the entire\u00a0group of library support staff, but it makes you as an individual more employable and gives you valuable\u00a0connections and resources!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Lauren Bourdages, Senior Assistant, INALJ Ontario The Importance of increasing Professional Involvement\/Engagement among Library Support\u00a0Staff So I started a new job in August. I now work in a University Library where I divide my time equally\u00a0between the user services desk (our circulation and reference service point) and processing books and\u00a0articles to be put on…<\/p>\n

Read more \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":28554,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[145],"tags":[69,3592,3603,6651,3841,6650,3931],"class_list":["post-83804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","tag-article","tag-blog","tag-inalj-ontario","tag-involvement","tag-lauren-bourdages","tag-library-support-staff","tag-support-staff"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/laurenbourdages.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1WoMK-lNG","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=83804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83804\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=83804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=83804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=83804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}