Quite a lot actually, when you’re a librarian. A recurring professional issue in librarianship is defining what a librarian does to a member of the public. Laura (Theatregrad) recently blogged about her experiences as a librarianship student discussing her course with other students, giving a really interesting perspective.

What is a librarian anyway? We have the traditional stereotypes – the middle aged woman wearing a bun with a twin set and glasses on string around her neck. What does she do? Well she’s knowledgeable, but she’s a bit stuffy and reluctant to share information – you have to ask very nicely and you have to be very quiet when in her presence. I’ll admit that I held this perception of a librarian until I graduated from my undergraduate degree in 2005 and starting trying to find out about librarianship (this fact is ever present in my mind when I talk to people outside the profession).
Read the rest of this entry »

We’re coming to the end of Fresher’s Week and as the title says I am feeling shattered! We’ve spent a long time preparing for inductions over summer, and this week has been really hectic (with staff illness, last minute sessions, and general running around like a headless chicken!), so I can’t wait until I finish work today so that I can rest!

I always look forward to the students coming back though, and this year is no exception. The University seems so empty without them, and one of the most rewarding aspects of the job for me is working with the students.

This year is the first year I’ve done the induction week as a librarian (last year I was still in my old post), and I did my first big lecture group (approx. 180) which I was really apprehensive about. I needn’t have worried though, it was nowhere near as scary as I had thought it would be thankfully.

I think it’s all the extra stuff that tires me, during Freshers Week you are pretty much always on the go and spend so much time helping lost students, managing and organising unexpected groups of students (who always come at the worst times!), and going over the induction process over and over and over again. Don’t get me wrong, I love it – but I feel like I need to hibernate for a while to catch up on sleep/rest!

This year I’ve had a really busy summer vacation too including conferences (and my first time speaking at a conference), visits to other academic libraries (hopefully a post on these soon), establishing a department wide shared calendar for information skills sessions, major weeding and rearrangement of the Teaching Practice collection, and a re-vamp of our induction process and materials. Oh, and an actual holiday away too, which was lovely.

It’s a busy time of year for an academic librarian but I’m looking forward to the rest of the year – we have some really enthusiastic new students.