Friday Jams! (12/19/2014)

Rachel:

Well, it's hanukah. חג חנוכה שמח as we say. (wow, blogger, that's where you're going with a hebrew font? wow.)

I can only think of two hanukah jams, so I will share them both with you.  First is this which I am not sorry at all about  HAHAHA.

Second is Matisyahu, of course. You can't say no, just try. see? you can't.

Well that's all a little ridiculous.

Erin:
As the end of 2014 approaches, I have been reflecting on my favorite albums of 2014. Teeth Dreams, the sixth studio album from The Hold Steady, is certainly on that list.

In February 2014, I went to The Hold Steady's 10th anniversary show. At that show, the filmed the video for the first single off Teeth Dreams, "I hope this whole thing didn't frighten you." They asked the audience to film the performance and the final edit of the video is a mix of professional footage and fan footage.

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Magical Thinking

In academic libraries, we've come to winter break.  If we're not actually off work, we have some time when there are no students and no faculty. I know that public libraries have a different schedule but surely there are similar times when the routine of the day to day calms enough for a librarian to start thinking.  Thinking big.

It is so tempting to think of all of the things that you can get done over break, or over the summer. I, for instance, according to this list, am going to catch up on my reading for an outside course, completely clean my house decimating the number of things I own, write two papers, outline a book, completely cull and reorganize my email, plan all of 2015 with subgoals any waymarkers, work on the library at my synagogue, apply to business school, do a 4,000 piece jigsaw puzzle while catching up on netflix, and, of course, catch up on all of my email and do budget planning for the next three years. Oh, and I have to also do that conference presentation.

It's break! I can do anything! I can do everything! It's break!

Now. Friends. I submit to you that whatever plans you have for break it is impossible to do them over break. It is possible that it is impossible for any person in any period of time to complete all of those things that you thought of. You simply cannot do it. I know I can't do it.

Even as I wrote the above paragraph I thought of about four more things that I can do can't possibly get done over break. So two things about the magical thinking of break:

There is a middle ground between doing all of the things you can never do and eating cookie dough in front of netflix for three weeks. Making the most of break means actually making it more relaxing and recharging for next semester. I've, sadly, found that eating cookie dough while playing Doctor Mario all day long is not the most reinvigorating. How do you, personally, reach a place where you're able to make progress on the things that are important to you while still making the most of break? It's different for everyone, so just think about that.

What other time are you able to sit down and think about all of the things that you need or want to make happen and still remain in a good mood than thinking about break? When the broad expanse of break is before us, possibilities are open. We can think "what WOULD I do, if I had all the time in the world?" Don't waste that feeling. Go ahead and make that list that not even an alien from the future could complete. Harness your dreams.

Knowing that I can't get all of this done over break and figuring out what is most important to me will let me set goals for each day where I am easily able to get everything done on my list, feel great about my productivity, and still chill out. I think I will be able to get more done AND feel more refreshed going in to next semester.

What's your plan for break? What is the thing that you're gonna get done? What is the thing you can't possibly accomplish?

Keep Rockin',
Rachel

All that you can't leave behind

In advance of upcoming renovations, MIT Libraries asked its users what library spaces should look like. The full list of notes from that session provides some really interesting insight into what academic library users want from their Libraries. The five-page document might not be entirely applicable to the work your library does, but it's well worth your time since it provides an enormous amount of insight into what your users might want your space to look like.

The tl;dr version of these notes comes from the summary blog posts. Generally, the feedback that MIT students gave is that:

• Library spaces should support a variety of activities
• The Library environment should be inviting and comfortable
• Library spaces should support technology.

Cool. I agree with that. Libraries should be inviting and comfortable spaces that support a variety of activities, including technology support. Well done, MIT students!

In the full list of notes, the students offer a variety of suggestions on how to accomplish these three goals, mostly through a mix of noise-levels and seating types. But also through a mix of activities, some of which are not Traditional Library Activities. My favorite piece of feedback from the full list of notes is "Mix fun and studies to attract people to the Library."

What the students are asking for is a Third place. It's not a new concept--create a place for people to spend time that isn't their workplace or their home. Or, in the case of college students, a place that isn't a classroom/lab or dorm/apartment/sorority or fraternity house.

It seems like we're always trying to get students into our libraries. We build coffee shops and makerspaces and large, open collaborative spaces for students to work. We are present on social media and engage with our users there. We build relationships with faculty and do outreach in their classrooms. We are present (and active) in the communities we serve.

But I wonder how much of this engagement from users is about getting them to consider the library as a third place and how much of it is to get students to make use of the collections we pay a lot of money to acquire.

So how do we do it? How do we "mix fun and studies to attract people to the Library?"

I suspect that the answer lies in the balance between our space and our collections/services. I think we have to loosen our grip on the notion that a Library is for housing collections and, in doing so, really open ourselves to the idea that a Library might also be for creating spaces for users to play games, take naps, and work together to create and display art. And that, in doing so, we will bring people into our libraries who will never make use of our collections.

What is one thing you can do right now to make your library a more third place-like space to people who have never stepped foot in your library before? Do it. Today.

Friday Jams! (12/12/2014)

Rachel:

I will make one concession to Christmas.  It is this GAP add from back in the day with Luscious Jackson. This one:

Okay but also there was the other thirty second spot that made me JUMP UP from however I was laying on the couch and RUN across the room to turn up the television volume. For this 26 seconds of pure joy: Yeah Yeah Yeah.

Erin:

I can't really compete with Rachel's awesome Luscious Jackson jam. So I'm taking it in an entirely different direction. 

I'm still stuck on 'do what you can to make a difference with what you have' jams. Say what you will about Phil Collins-era Genesis, but Land of Confusion is a great jam for when you need to dig a little deeper for the energy and enthusiasm to make a difference.

When I was looking for a version of Land of Confusion on YouTube,  I found this awesome Mashup of that song and Michael Jackson's Beat It. So it's not all seriousness here today, I suppose.

Actively Reject Complicity: On Radical Compassion

Our chancellor recently sent out a message about injustice, student protests, change, and caring.  One of the parts of the message that touched me the most was the phrase, "we must actively reject complicity." She also stated "we must and will hold one another accountable for instances of ignorance and cruelty."  Hearing these words from positions of power is meaningful. Leaders saying the right things doesn't always mean that things happen, but it does mean something.

Let's talk about actively rejecting complicity.  What does this mean for us in our lives and in our work?  I know I write about this a lot, and it is because it needs to be talked about over and over. So I'm not going to apologize about talking about the same stuff again.

Last week, Erin talked about radical hospitality, about "standing up and meeting the needs of your community" and how that will mean "putting the needs of your users ahead of your own comfort." You need to know, and be a part of, your community to be able to offer this radical kind of hospitality, and they need to know you so that you can build the kind of trust that creates change.  We shouldn't be afraid of taking the steps we need to take to be the kind of libraries we want to be. In fact, doing anything other than more and more meaningful interactions our communities results in increased isolation and obsolescence.


Actively rejecting complicity means, at first, realizing where there is complicity with injustice through what we do or think. Step one is hardly enough (although hard enough), what we need to do to get to an active rejection of complicity is to stand up and negate that complicity, to fight against assumptions, unthinking actions, and against injustice.

I do believe that fear is a huge barrier to actively rejecting complicity, because complicity isn't doing something, it is letting an injust system stand, which doesn't take any effort at all. We can confront that fear by reminding ourselves of the damage we do when we do nothing.

Above all, I think that actively rejecting complicity engages radical compassion and empathy. We need to step outside of ourselves and understand other stories (which is why I shared one of mine), we need to allow for nuance and diversity within all groups. We have to step back from ourselves.

It is so enticing to stand on what professional knowledge we've developed through education and experience. When we are working for change against systematic injustices, that knowledge is only one small part of the solution. It is definitely not the first step: the first step is listening, hearing, understanding. It is stepping back from all you know professionally, all you know personally, everything you know, to try to deeply understand the experiences of another. To understand their needs on their terms. Listen. Hear. Understand.

Stepping back and practicing compassion works on all scales. It helps us provide the best reference service to a student who, in the midst of finals weeks, doesn't need you to teach them how the scanner works, just needs you to scan the thing because one more thing is the last thing. It helps us develop the best instruction programs that are responsive to curricula and student experiences, centered in the life of the researcher instead of being centered in the library. It helps us notice where we fail to meet the needs of minorities in our community and see why that hurts our entire community. It helps us speak authoritatively on issues that are important to us and to our communities. It helps us sit down when we need to sit down and stand up when we need to stand up.


Any practitioner of meditation will tell you that this takes practice. So I encourage you to practice. A practice that is centered around a difficult problem, a difficult solution, and slow moving change also needs support: share your successes, your stories. Let us practice together.

I want us to be leaders. And leadership isn't about us. 

Work Hard, & Keep Rockin'.
Rachel

Take your passion (and make it happen)

Being the change you want to see isn't just about the change you affect in your own library. It's also about finding ways to contribute to librarianship. There are a lot of organizations, professional associations, and causes that need people to care deeply about them and you're only one person with a day job and a life to manage. If you're a passionate person, it can be easy to over-extend yourself by committing to too many things.

Tenure can make the waters of being an active professional even murkier. Being on the tenure track means you have to balance your passion with the kind of service that your institution values. It's also possible that your institution values other things (like publications or presentations) over service.

I thought about trying to give some advice on how to choose where to get involved, but thought better of it. Ultimately, being professionally active looks different for everyone. Ideally, it should be guided by the issues and ideas about which you feel passionately. Practically, it should make the best uses of your energy, resources, and talent. So I came up with four questions for you to ask yourself. You know yourself better than I know you, so let those answers be your guide.

Four questions to help you decide where to direct your professional efforts:

1. How many of your resources are you willing to part with?
When I say "resources," I mean: time, energy, and money. Some activities have rigid participation requirements that ask you to contribute a significant amount of time. Some activities require you to attend conferences, a task that your library may not be able to support financially. How much of your own dime are you comfortably able to part with and how much time can you comfortably give? Tailor your activities to that, and know that it's okay to choose not to be active in ways that require a lot from you.

2. Are you okay with giving your time to a large, bureaucratic professional association?
Even the smallest professional association is often a bureaucracy. If you choose to volunteer in one of these associations, you will probably be placed on a committee. Most of these committees do rewarding work, but some of them do work that doesn't provide an immediate payoff. And some of these committees do work that doesn't really feel rewarding at all. It's also worth noting that these associations often require that volunteers pay dues before joining committees, which may also serve as a barrier to your getting involved.

3. Do you prefer to act locally?
There are probably organizations in your community that could use your help and you have quite a few skills as a librarian that can help them. Volunteering at a school or for an on-campus organization is just as worthy an activity as being on a committee buried deep within the organizational structure of a professional association. Your efforts are often more immediately felt and helping people accomplish things they couldn't do without you is unbelievably rewarding. And not having to attend conferences or pay dues means that these acts of service are easier for people to do. It's also possible that you can find other areas of your library beyond your own department in which to be active. If you're in cataloging, consider doing reference hours or teaching a class.

4. What are you most passionate about?
In the end, the ideas and issues you love are where you should give your time, talent, and resources. Are you passionate about information literacy? Great! Are you passionate about library website usability? Right on! Are you passionate about making libraries inclusive spaces? Awesome! Identify what matters most to you and figure out where the people who also value that thing are. Often, that's where you should be, too.

A final thought:
This post presumes that you have the time and/or money to be professionally active. The truth is that some people don't have the luxury of giving away their time or their money. If you're lucky enough to have the time or money to spare, don't be a judge-y jerk about what other people are (or aren't) doing to be active in librarianship. Instead, direct that energy into finding ways to remove the barriers to entry for professional activities for other people who want to be active but can't.

Stay positive,
Erin

Friday Jams (12/05/2014)

Rachel:
Now that I have an increasingly administrative position, I feel much more like this. There's a lot of misconceptions about administration. I mean, we're not going to eat your eyes.

Erin:
This is my favorite Ben Harper song. And I feel like maybe we all need to be reminded that as small as we feel sometimes, there's always something we can do to make a difference.

Christmas is the Worst

I couldn't be in deeper agreement with the wonderful School Library Journal opinion piece by Kendra Jones, Ditch Holiday Programming.  In summary, her argument, which you should read and consider deeply, goes, you aren't expert enough to offer any holiday programming and your attempts at inclusion are misguided and possibly offensive.  I'm telling you, it's true.  I don't want your token menorah. I really don't want your tree and there is no language that makes me believe your tree isn't Christian.

Here's the thing, though. Christmas is the worst. The. Worst. And I don't even care. There is a reason why we let Christmas slide when it is (because it is?) the most all-encompassing and DEEPLY religious time of year. There is a lot of talk about how there is this secular Christmas. Look, you just said "secular Christmas," so it isn't secular. It's Christmas and even non-religious, agnostic and athiest Christians celebrate it. There are hundreds of winter holidays. Their presence in the same season does not imply that they are related to one another. Conflating other winter holidays into a Holiday Season is an erasure, a sublimation, an added slight.

So Christmas is everywhere, but I don't even care. I mean, whatever. Have it. I grew up in a non-religious American family. I got winter presents. There was a tree. I wouldn't do those things now, but I feel no need to stand up and demand a space at this time of year. I mean, it's great if you want to advocate to your peers on my behalf, but this is not a moment when I want to stand up and shout about what it feels like to be systematically excluded and to have my faith elided into yours. (Ḥanukah is NOT CHRISTMAS, it is not even close, not even in the same town.) If you ask me I'll explain (or refer you to the article above), but I'm not about to pitch a fit about it.  It's not important to take a stand on this hill.

Not on a hill that will be defended to the death. Why would we chose that moment, that thing, to take a stand on? No, it's a time for retreat every year. Because there is no way that we'll ever win this in a way that will mean anything really. Meanwhile, there are real things that we need to stand on: Can you adhere to your religious obligations without taking vacation days (are you allowed vacation time for this?)? Do you have to explain yourself if you do get to take time off work? Do you breathe a sigh of relief every time you see your religious building still stands, is not vandalized? That's just this fall, that's not counting every day things, and not counting the people that literally want me dead. So take the tree. It's a good reminder that I'm never truly welcome here. I'm not going to fight it. I'm saving my energy for a fight that matters, a fight that may save my life or livelihood.

Helping people to Do Awesome Things

My friend, @winelibrarian, writes a really great blog about Boss Stuff. Basically, she blogs about all of the things you wish your administrator would talk to you about.

Yesterday she wrote a blog post about learning to let go of control when you're in a management position and can no longer do all of the things. She points out that even when you have staff that Do Amazing Things, it's still not easy to let them do it. One of the things that struck me about this blog post was the list of "resolutions" at the end of the post--especially #3: If you think someone in your organization cannot do something so you'll just do it yourself, get them the training they need.

In librarianship, it seems like we go to great lengths to work around the people who we think can't (or, perhaps, can no longer) do the jobs they were hired to do.  Departments are restructured and job duties reallocated to work around people. We play Org Chart Twister to the point that when people look at how our institutions are structured, we have to explain how a certain decision was made because so-and-so doesn't do their job well. Sometimes I think we do this because we can't stomach the thought of letting people go who don't meet our expectations or do their share to realize our library's mission. Other times, structural situations like tenure make the decision for us.

Working around people to get things done is hard on everyone. People who have to absorb additional job duties have a harder time getting excited about coming to work because we teach them that being a conscientious, skilled worker leads to having more worked piled on you. People who have job duties taken away from them have a harder time getting excited about coming to work because they feel isolated and like their contributions to the organization don't matter. It's a lose-lose situation.

What if, instead of taking people's responsibilities away from them, we assess what they need to succeed and then provide them with as many resources as is reasonably possible? What if we identified the problems that hold them back and got their buy-in in identifying and implementing solutions?

I recognize that this approach won't work with every person in a library. Some people don't want to improve or can't be helped with any amount of resources. But what about those people who can be helped? Don't we owe it to each other to put our colleagues in a position to be successful?

I get it. This kind of coaching takes time--time that you don't have. You're being pulled in a million different directions by people and projects who compete for your attention and your resources. But the people who work in a library are, perhaps, it's most valuable asset. And what would it be like if we could put them in a position to Do Awesome Things?

Stay positive,
Erin