Annotation #9

Steele, P. (2006). Blurring of lines: academic and public libraries revisited. Indiana Libraries, 25(3), p. 6 – 8.

This article focuses upon the user feedback received via Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources: A Report to the OCLC Membership. The information for this comprehensive user feedback report was gathered in the spring of 2005 and released late 2005. The author, Patricial Steele is in the unique position of “having strong associations with both a vital public library and a large academic library.” She is a trustee of MCPL as well as the interim dean of IUB Libraries. Steele reports that according the the OCLC study, there has been a shift in the manner in which libraries exist within the information landscape and that this shift has led to a certain commonality among different types of libraries.

Steele asserts that the growing commonality of libraries has to do with both technological and economical developments. Because information is more freely available via the web and electronic resources and because their are more commercial competitors that provide viable and affordable alternatives to traditional libraries of all kinds. Also, because many of the information resources that were previously available only within the walls of academic libraries have become available electronically, users can choose the most comfortable and convenient destination for them. These changes have also influenced the manner in which public and academic libraries have altered their collections and services. For example, while outreach once was a concern only for public libraries, academic libraries now see outreach as an essential part of their mission and are concerned with “more agressive integration into curriculum development and new teaching methodology.”

Another area where academic and public libraries are blurring is in the question of funding and accountability. Whereas public libraries have long been held to a closer scrutiny by their funders, the taxpayers, the academic library was largely immune to these immediate concerns. However as university funding models are changing and budgets are tightening more than ever, a focus on the accountability of all academic units has forced libraries to define their role and justify their existence “in ways never considered in the past.”

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I very much agree with the sentiments of this article. In fact it is one of the things that I have wanted to write about for a long time. I have had the great fortune to work in many different types of libraries in many different types of capacities; from an assistant to an archivist at a historical society to an instruction librarian at a large academic institution to the reference desk at the local public library and more. Having these many and varied experiences has only proven to add value to any single situation I have been in. I am always amazed when librarians (and I say librarians because we are the only ones who do this) insist on categorizing types of librarians by the institutions in which they are currently (or potentially) employed. To me, that is completely counter-intuitive. I believe that librarians should be organized by their users, their communities, their interests, their strengths, and their experience not the building in which they work. I was shocked when, while attending my first ALA conference this past June, I was repeatedly asked what my ‘focus’ was – academic or public. Each time that I was asked this, when time allowed, I patiently explained the fact that I am deliberately not focusing upon a specific type of institution. Instead I am focusing on the user, the technology, the resources, and the community of any libraries that I might be involved with – they are no longer really so different as some believe them to be.