Ups and Downs, but Mostly the Same

(This is the "middle of the road" scenario.)

It had been another long day in another long week, but it was over, and Jim was on his way to dinner with some of his good friends from other libraries.

When he arrived, one of his friends was already there and waiting. They exchanged pleasantries while the waitress took their drink order.

“So, who’s going to be here tonight?” Jim asked.

“Well, Jane’s on reference, Tom’s teaching, and Celia is home with a sick kid, so it just leaves you, me, and Amy,” his friend replied.

As if on cue, Amy walked in. They waved her over and as she joined them she said, “So few? I don’t think there’s been just three of us for years.”

Jim thought back. Yes, they had been getting together like this for almost five years now, and they almost always had five or six people. The quarterly gatherings were important enough to people that they usually cleared their schedules. Somehow, some quality book geek time with other librarians seemed to serve a purpose.

“Jane’s on reference?” asked Jim. “I thought they had turfed off evening hours to the parapros in her building.”

Amy answered. “Oh, yeah, they had, but they have a new director who is really back-to-basics and wants a librarian on the desk whenever they’re open.”

Jim and his other friend goggled. “Wow. Aren’t they open until 1AM? I wouldn’t want that shift. What else are they doing?”

“Well, Tom’s email said he wouldn’t be here tonight because he’s teaching, and he and Jane are in the same library. Jane was telling me it’s one of their new goals for each librarian to teach at least three bibliographic instruction classes this fall. It’s internal outreach. Aren’t you guys doing that?”

Jim’s friend snorted. “We aren’t doing much of anything like that. We moved all of our BI online a couple of years ago. We found that the number of people who access the modules is about equal to the number of people we were teaching in person, and we only have to update them once a year.”

She continued, “We are running a new collection use analysis, though, and it’s showing some really interesting trends. We’re trying to break up a couple of journal packages and just by the really high-impact titles.”

“Hey, that sounds neat,” said Jim. “Are you hoping to save money?”

“Actually, no,” his friend replied. “We’re just trying to streamline our interface and only give people what they really want. Any cost savings would be a bonus.”

“What a concept,” said Amy. “Actually buying less to improve access. Hmm.”

“Actually, that’s not so unreasonable,” said Jim. “When I was in the public library, there was a rule that weeding your collection would improve circulation, and it really worked. I don’t see why it wouldn’t happen the same way online.”

Amy and the other librarian nodded. “Weren’t you in the public library, like, 10 years ago?” Jim’s friend asked. “We were young when you were a public librarian.”

Jim laughed, but then sobered as he thought about it. “Oh, boy, you are right. Time flies. You know, that’s one of the things about this profession that just boggles my mind. It seems like we do the same things over and over; we just tweak this or alter that. The basic concept remains the same.”

Amy nodded. “That’s one of the things that I like about librarianship, though. There’s a sort of consistency and constancy about us. We collect things, we organize things, and we provide access to things. It’s been that way for thousands of years, and it will be that way for thousands of years more.”

“I agree,” Jim’s friend said. “There have been a lot of changes, but the fundamental mission remains the same. Whether you’re my library trimming titles or Jane’s library adding librarians, we’re both trying to improve access. The end result is the same, but the how is just window dressing.”

The waitress arrived to take their order and interrupted the flow of conversation. Jim sat back and thought. He loved these dinners, because he always came out of them so energized and firmer in the belief that librarians are good people doing good work. There were challenges in his library—there were challenges everywhere—but the fundamental mission was always the same. Amy and the other librarian started chatting about the latest bugs in the latest iteration of federated searching, and Jim just listened to them and smiled.