Anne Silva LIS 600 Professional Values Statement Introduction When I first started this program, when someone asked me what my goals were after graduation I would have told them I wanted to be an academic librarian at a midsized public university. Throughout this first semester I’ve been forced to reevaluate my goals, my assumptions about the profession, and the motivations behind my tentative decisions. I know that I belong in a library, I often joke that I’m not good at anything else. I love to learn new things and have a relative fear of monotony, and while the course of a general day may be the same, the questions are different, the potential problems are different, and the people you meet vary greatly. I never thought that the opportunity to help people would influence my career or the way I thought about myself as a future professional as much as it does. At the end of the day, if we haven’t helped people within libraries, at the core there is no point in our existence as professionals. I believe that as a future library or information professional I have the ability to do both good and bad within the community I serve and to either stifle or encourage and individual’s quest for knowledge and understanding. Personally and professionally, I believe I should always strive to do good. I often think that librarians should adopt the beginning of the Hippocratic oath, saying, “First, do no harm.” For the purpose of this paper I will look at three areas that mean a lot to me as a professional and my ability to help the community in which I serve. First, I believe in open and equal access to information and library services in order to meet the needs of information seekers. Second, I believe that library collections should be well rounded and open-minded, and that librarians should not censor. The library should be a place where users can exercise their intellectual freedom absolutely. Third, I believe that in order to do the most good I need to advocate within the profession to encourage other professionals and paraprofessionals, as well as to the public in order to communicate the worth and value of libraries and those who work inside them. Access to information According to Nickolas Belkin, user’s seek information in order to reduce uncertainty. He coined the term Anomalous State of Knowledge (ASK), which describes a missing link in the knowledge of a topic or situation. (Case 2). Uncertainty is an uncomfortable feeling that can cause stress, anxiety, and fear to the point of motivating users to seek information. Brenda Dervin studied information seeking in respects to sense making. This focuses more on every-day life information, and on feelings rather than cognitions when people search for information (Case 2). While every-day information is sometimes
considered more trivial and “easy”, it can have the ability to change lives and help people make sense of the world around them. Because information seeking is such a big part of people’s lives and acquiring the information and knowledge sought can have such a big impact on users, access to information should be at the forefront of what librarians do. By helping to providing a place to access reliable, unbiased information to the community I will have the opportunity to reduce uncertainty and help users make sense of what is going on around them, and that can make a big difference in individual lives as well as the community as a whole. The first principle of the ALA code of ethics states “We provide the highest level of service to all library users through appropriate and usefully organized resources; equitable service policies; equitable access; and accurate, unbiased, and courteous responses to all requests”(ALA.org). In order to do the most good for the most people, I need to do whatever I can within my library setting to make it inviting, to make it a comfortable place to seek information, and make accomodations for users who may need them. Censorship and Intellectual Freedom In order to provide the best services to information seekers I need to do whatever I can to have a well rounded, open-minded library collection free from censorship in a place where all are free to exercise their intellectual freedom without fear of judgement by library staff. In the introduction to the Ranganathan readings, he says: I believe that censoring library materials can do more harm than good. By removing or failing to acquire certain subject matter can have a detrimental effect on everday library users. I might be too trusting of the world or a little naive, but I do feel as though the naturally curious users outnumber those who wish to do harm with controversial information. I also believe that even if the information in question isn’t available in a library, those who wish to find information to do harm will go to great lengths to find it elsewhere. Censorship of library materials does not protect people or add to the greater good, it simply stifles curiosity and helps the library fail in producing answers to information needs. Susan Nevelow Mart, in her article ““Let the People Know the Facts: Can Government Information Removed from the Internet be Reclaimed?” discusses this phenomenon in relation to government information being removed from online resources. In her introduction she states, “much of the information removed has had little effect on national security, but its loss has had a deleterious effect on vitally important public issues, such as local environmental contamination, women’s health and employment parity, and civil rights
issues.” This is a perfect example of how censoring materials doesn’t help anything but can hurt mass populations. ‘ The ALA code of ethics in principle two says “We uphold the principles of intellectual freedom and resist all efforts to censor library resources” and principle seven goes on to say that “We distinguish between our personal convictions and professional
duties and do not allow our personal beliefs to interfere with fair representation of the aims of our institutions or the provision of access to their information resources” (ALA.org). As a future professional I will stive to put my own opinions aside in order to provide the best information on a particular subject and strive to develop a collection that reflects as many points of view as possible in order to best meet user needs. Advocating for Libraries and Library Professionals and Paraprofessionals In order to best serve the needs of users and do the most good, I need to encourage and respect fellow librarians and paraprofessionals. I also need to advocate for library resources and help express the library’s worth and value to the community, as well as the worth and value of those who work in them. Supporting fellow professionals and paraprofessionals creates a sense of community and connects people with similar interests. Being active in professional organizations is a great platform for this. Professional organizations also help keep professionals up-to-date on what is happening and supports participation in professional development. By supporting and connecting with peers, it makes it easier to work as team to advocate for librarians and the library profession, expressing our value and our worth to the public as well as showing the value of a library to a community. While there is a lot of talk about librarians being underpaid for their level of education, the underlying issue is how much librarians and libraries are valued within society. In most libraries, pay for librarians can only increase if library budgets increase, and libraries usually get the short end of the stick financially. “What we really need to be doing is training groups of librarians to be advocates for libraries in general, and proving their worth and showing how valuable they are to the communities that they serve” (Burger and Lynch 1-2). It’s easy to understand why librarians are so misunderstood. People don’t see what goes on behind the scenes, they don’t know that we have advanced degrees, and they usually can’t distinguish between librarians and paraprofessionals. They think our jobs consist of reading books, stamping date cards, and shelving books. So, in the mind of the general public and those who decide our salaries, our jobs don’t entail that much skill and we’re essentially getting paid for reading, so why pay someone a lot for doing what they like to do anyway? (Manley 1). In order to be a well rounded professional, I must advocate for the profession and the future of it, both within my own community and on a larger scale working with other professionals. Higher budgets for libraries and higher compensation for librarians will help provide more services and resources for the community in which we serve, resulting in the greater good.
Conclusion “…the librarian must be a man of acquisitive mind who closes his mind to no subject of human interest. He is always a learner; he must always be awake to and welcome every development of human thought and every adventure of the human spirit. He must, however, be a man educated not only in the general sense but in every operation and process of libraries. He must be a lover of men”(Ranganathan xxxi). I’ve adopted this Ranganathan quote as a sort of a personal professional values statement because it hits on everything that is important to me as a future library professional and everything that I strive to become. I believe that as a librarian I will be a public servant, and that my goal should be to foster a place where curiosity is welcomed and information needs are met with a well-rounded collection, provided by a non-bias, open-minded professional. I also believe that I must stay active professionally and advocate for the support of libraries financially by expressing the value and worth of libraries and the people who work inside them. At the end of the day, I should strive to make a positive impact on the community and in the lives of the individuals that I serve.
Works Cited Burger, Leslie and Beverly Lynch. “Pushing for Higher Library Salaries: Now or Never?” American Libraries. 34.1 2003. Dillon, Andrew and April Norris.”Crying Wolf: An Examination and Reconsideration of the Perception of Crisis in LIS Education.” Journal of Education for Library and Information Science. 46.4 2005. Manley, Will.“Six Reasons Why We Are Underpaid.” American Libraries 33.10 2002. Mart, Susan Nevelow. “Let the People Know the Facts: Can Government Information Removed from the Internet be Reclaimed?” Law Library Journal. 98.1 2006. Ranganathan, Shiyali Ramamrita. The Five Laws of Library Science. London: Edward Goldston, LTD 1931. Case, Donald D. Looking for Information, Second Edition: A Survey of Research on Information Seeking, Needs, and Behavior. Emerald Group Publishing Limited: 2006. "Code of Ethics," American Library Association, July 07, 2006. http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/proethics/codeofethics/codeethics.cfm (Accessed November 24, 2010)