The Twenty-First Century Art Librarian

Terrie Wilson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• eBook ISBN: 9781317955764
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Library & Information Science
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Meet the challenge of operating a successful art library!

The Twenty-First Century Art Librarian examines the unique challenges and vital administrative issues that are at the forefront of current art librarianship. Librarians working in a variety of settings (art, academics, architecture, visual resources, and museums) address professional change and technological challenges, including inadequate staffing and the need to wear multiple hats to cope with day-to-day responsibilities. The book focuses on common practices in the field as well as the individuals who work in art libraries and the collections they maintain.

Instead of the standard primer on art librarianship, this book is an insightful look at how art librarians are unique in terms of the clientele they serve, their subject knowledge, and the variety of environments in which they work. The Twenty-First Century Art Librarian examines pressing everyday issues, including operational management, staff recruitment and training, managing collections, public service and patrons, and developing a personal care plan.

The Twenty-First Century Art Librarian also addresses setting-specific topics, such as:

• developing staffing standards at all levels
• working solo in small art museum libraries
• integrating digitization into visual resource libraries
• handling special collections in architecture libraries
• how culture and mission distinguish academic art libraries from their museum counterparts
• and much more!

The Twenty-First Century Art Librarian provides library professionals and academics with a unique look at current trends in art, architecture, and visual resources librarianship.

The Art Library Professional

Staffing Standards and Core Competencies in Academic Art and Architecture Departmental Libraries: A Preliminary Study

Sarah E. McCleskey

SUMMARY. The nature of academic departmental libraries frequently requires that professional, paraprofessional and student staff perform a variety of overlapping job functions. Literature is reviewed regarding staffing standards in academic departmental libraries and the blurring of responsibilities between professional and paraprofessional staff. The author presents results from a survey of heads of academic art and architecture libraries. The survey focused on differing levels of staff in art and architecture libraries, types of training received, and core competencies in library skills and resources for employees at the various levels. The survey was not intended to produce conclusive results, but rather to gain information, explore trends, offer observations, and provide clarification of topics that could be considered in further research. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: <[email protected]> Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.com> © 2003 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.]

KEYWORDS. Academic art library, acquisitions, access, accreditation, AMICO, architecture, architecture libraries, ARLIS, artists, ARL, branch library, cataloging, circulation, competencies, databases, departmental libraries, instruction, paraprofessional, professional staff, public services, reference, reserves, skills, solo librarian, staffing standards, student staff, support staff, survey, training, visual resources

Does your library have enough staff? Just enough? It’s doubtful many would answer that they are overstaffed. Do you have the right type of staff members to carry out your mission? The nature of academic departmental libraries frequently requires that professional, paraprofessional and student staff perform a variety of overlapping job functions. Often there is only one “professional” librarian, and job responsibilities can become blurred between work performed by professional librarians, visual resources professionals, paraprofessional or clerical staff, and student employees. After reviewing the literature regarding staffing standards in academic departmental libraries and the blurring of responsibilities between “professional” and “paraprofessional” staff,¹ the author will present results from a survey of heads of academic art and architecture libraries. The survey focused on differing levels of staff in art and architecture libraries, types of training received, and core competencies in library skills and resources for employees at the various levels. The survey was not intended to produce conclusive results, but rather to gain information, explore trends, offer observations, and provide clarification of topics to be considered for future study. For purposes of the survey, academic departmental libraries were defined as those affiliated with main library systems but housed in remote locations or working as a separate entity within a main library; it did not include collections integrated with main library holdings.

A literature review must cover a dual range of topics for the present subject. The first is the area of staffing standards in academic branch libraries. There have been several studies in this area, the most significant for this topic performed by the Art Libraries Society of North America (ARLIS/NA). A second area concerns staffing competencies and job responsibilities. Literature in this area is geared to libraries as a whole with the exception of proceedings from an ARLIS/NA conference session on staff training issues. There are different opinions and data for levels of staff and their abilities to take on certain responsibilities, and the present study will address not what the various levels of staff should be doing, but in fact what they are doing.

Staffing Standards

Library literature has been somewhat sparse in its treatment of staffing issues in academic branch libraries. Robert A. Seal’s 1986 chapter “Academic Branch Libraries” in Advances in Librarianship confirms what this author found in attempting to research staffing issues in branch libraries: “Services, collections, staffing, faculty involvement, and other concerns have all been considered in the literature, though not with the frequency nor the intensity of the centralization debate.”² A section on staffing includes numbers and levels, although there are generally too many variables for a specific formula to be used to determine adequate numbers of professionals and paraprofessionals.³ Seal also discusses personnel management, attributes the departmental librarian should possess, problems of staff coverage, and relations with local faculty and the main library.⁴

In 1984-85, Carolyn A. Snyder and Stella Bentley of Indiana University Libraries, Bloomington, Indiana, conducted a study to examine staff utilization in four branch libraries (Fine Arts, Biology, Journalism, and Library and Information Science).⁵ The purpose of the study was to compare public services staff’s perceptions of the utilization of their time with the actual recorded use. Responsibilities were divided between public services, technical services, collection development, and administration; estimates were provided for time spent on these activities by professional staff, support staff, and student assistants. To determine actual time utilization, staff recorded activities for fifteen minute segments of time on a form devised by the conductors of the survey and by personnel in the branch libraries. Each library showed a much higher percentage of time spent on public service than on the other activities.

An interesting figure shows that while branch heads estimated an average of over 33% of time spent on public service, in reality the time ranged from 4.9% (Fine Arts) to 17.2% (Journalism) with an average of 8.4%. Branch heads spent most of their time in administrative activities; this finding may be relevant for the present study, especially for libraries with a solo professional attempting to be an administrator and a reference librarian simultaneously. Conversely, branch heads estimated that they spent 30% on administrative activities when in reality they spent 70.8% on average.

The study showed that since branch heads spent most of their time on admistration, support staff and students held primary responsibility for public services. Biology and Fine Arts (the larger branches) employed support staff for public services as well as technical services, and their time estimates were accurate for public services but not for technical services and administrative activities. Supervisory support staff spent a greater amount of time on administration than estimated; generally this time was spent on supervision and planning.

The study also examined the role of student hourly employees. Most of their time was spent on public service, especially circulation, shelving, and reserves. The smaller libraries, Journalism and Library and Information Science, used students for a broader range of activities.

The summary for this study is relevant to the topic at hand and should be allowed to speak for itself:

This study shows that there is a need to examine further and assess the functions being performed by various staffing levels within branch library units. It is important to determine what functions are appropriate to each staffing level, and to insure that proper training is provided for all employees. The key public service role of student employees requires that they must be trained and prepared for such work. Support staff must be given adequate training to develop the necessary skills for the variety of tasks and responsibilities needed in a public services unit. Finally this study strongly indicates the necessity for librarians to have administrative abilities. Clearly, both preservice and inservice education must provide the background and skills required for individuals who are so heavily involved in administrative functions.⁶

In 1995, the Staffing Standards Committee of the Art Libraries Society of North America completed a study begun in 1988, a revision of an earlier study of staffing standards for Art Libraries and Visual Resources Collections.⁷ The standards were designed to assist art libraries and visual resources collections in determining staffing needs. This thorough study embraced the need for self-study, examining institutional goals, and reviewing the mission of the specialized collection within the institutional context. Additionally, tools for establishing local criteria for self-assessment were suggested.

The standards stress the need to set staffing goals and objectives within the context of the parent institution. By assessing the current environment and resources, art libraries and visual resources collections can determine priorities for the collection and strategies for achieving them. The process of setting goals should involve representatives from all relevant constituencies; communication is vital to the success of such a project. Self-assessment and strategic planning should produce guidelines for the library or collection to outline its staffing needs in a manner consistent with institutional and local goals. These documents might be used to justify requests for increased staffing, retention, or reorganization of current staffing levels.⁸ The study provides an appendix that can guide libraries or visual resources collections in self-assessment and goal development.⁹

Staffing standards for professionals, paraprofessionals and technical staff, and other support staff are outlined. Professionals are expected to have graduate-level education, knowledge of library and information management, and specialized knowledge in the field of art; these requirements would vary based on the responsibilities of a particular position. Examples of professional-type responsibilities are outlined in Appendix B (goal setting, personnel management, collection management, budget administration, reference services, cataloging and classification, systems management, circulation, public relations, participation in the institutional community and in the professional community).¹⁰ Paraprofessionals and technical staff are defined as higher-level support personnel. They normally would be supervised by professionals. Their job duties require special knowledge, skills, abilities or education as well as decision-making abilities. Examples of responsibilities include reference and patron assistance, access services, cataloging or processing, collection development, supervision of clerical staff, collection maintenance, and daily operations.¹¹ Other support staff generally perform process-oriented tasks not requiring higher education or special skills. These tasks might include daily operations, circulation, acquisitions, processing, and supervision of students. Student workers can be expected to perform process-oriented tasks as well.¹²

The main goal of art or architecture libraries in academic systems is to support the mission of the institution and the curriculum of programs served (for example, studio art, architecture, history of art, etc.). Collections and services must comply with accreditation standards. The ARLIS/NA standards discuss differing scenarios for collections in academic institutions and state that as a minimum requirement, these collections need professional level subject specialists to work on collection development, public service, and library instruction, and to serve as faculty liaisons. Ideally they should hold faculty or tenure-track positions.¹³

A recent Association of Research Libraries (ARL) SPEC Kit, “Branch Libraries and Discrete Collections,” examines several aspects of branch libraries through a survey of 54 ARL libraries.¹⁴ The survey examines evolving circumstances and technologies to determine why organizations decide to close, add, or merge branch library collections. Staffing is only a small part of the survey but an interesting finding relates to percentages of FTE staff in branch libraries. Of the 54 libraries surveyed, 26% of staff were professional librarians, 43% were support staff, 22% were student assistants, 5% were clerical staff, and 4% were other professionals. This distribution mirrored distribution of employees among total library staff; 88% of branch libraries had a professional librarian working on site.¹⁵

Division of Responsibilities: Varying Viewpoints

A hot topic in librarianship is the blurring of responsibilities between professional librarians (MLS holders) and paraprofessionals (non-MLS library staff). For example, paraprofessionals may work at reference desks, perform original cataloging, or serve in capacities such as head of serials acquisitions. This discussion can cause heated debate and often some rancor between the two groups. In branch libraries, where most employees must know how to perform most tasks, the lines are even more blurred. Much has been written, and no doubt will continue to be written, on the topic. The reference desk has been a particular point of debate. It is an appropriate subject for this study as branch libraries frequently rely on main libraries for such services as cataloging and serials processing, whereas reference service must be provided onsite. A brief survey here will present a study with unfavorable results regarding paraprofessionals working at the reference desk, some arguments and factors affecting success in this situation, and some practical examples from an Ask ARLIS session on training paraprofessionals and other support staff for performing quality reference work. In Ask ARLIS sessions (held at ARLIS/NA annual conferences) three to four panelists discuss a v...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• ABOUT THE EDITOR
• Preface
• THE ART LIBRARY PROFESSIONAL
• MANAGING AND SERVICING COLLECTIONS IN AN ART AND ARCHITECTURE ENVIRONMENT
• THE BIG PICTURE: COMPARING PRACTICES IN ART LIBRARIES
• Index