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The institution (“Brick & Mortar” as well as”Click & Mortar”), the practitioners (i.e. “Librarians”) and the profession of Library & Information Science (the commitment to the organization and retrieval of information, including the responsible safeguard of materials as well as the fair dissemination of it)

Mark Cuban: Don’t Go to College to Study Business. Study the Humanities | February 18, 2017

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Career Advice | Higher Education

by John Feacuban

Johnson: So essentially what you’re making the case for is education and job training for grown ups.

Cuban: No, no. I think that won’t matter. What are you going to go back and learn to do?

Johnson: What it takes, right? Whether it’s finance, whether it’s software programming.

Cuban: No finance. That’s the easiest thing — you just take the data have it spit out whatever you need. I personally think there’s going to be a greater demand in 10 years for liberal arts majors than there were for programming majors and maybe even engineering, because when the data is all being spit out for you, options are being spit out for you, you need a different perspective in order to have a different view of the data. And so having someone who is more of a freer thinker.

Cuban’s forecast of the skills needed to succeed in the future echoes that of computer science and higher education experts who believe people with “soft skills,” like adaptability and communication, will have the advantage in an automated workforce.

Cuban highlighted English, philosophy, and foreign language majors as just some of the majors that will do well in the future job market.

Watch the entire interview here.

Libraries Serve Refugees | Resources by librarians – for everyone

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Library Services | Refugees | Outreach

Urban Librarians Unite (ULU)

ululogo

This is an effort to bring together resources and assets to help libraries serve refugees. This is a growing and developing resource and is an active space for developing services, programming, and resources. All input is welcome. We are particularly looking to build a body of experts in this area and connect them to libraries that are developing services to refugee populations.

We will be looking at best practices, toolkits, case studies, government resources, NGO partnership possibilities, and asset development. Please check back for regular updates and if you are interested in joining our research team contact us ASAP.

This list is meant as a resource and is far from exhaustive. If you have more information or other resources we are interested in hearing about it. Please contact us here.

This content has been broken down into:

FAST RESOURCES – General practical information including toolkits, govt reports, and webinars
TOOLKITS – Toolkits, just-add-water
GOVERNMENT RESOURCES – Official reports, practical guidance, watch for changes
LOCATIONS – Libraries that are providing direct support services to refugees
ARTICLES – News stories about libraries providing services to refugees

Link to website

 

[IFLA-L] Open Societies are Healthy Societies: IFLA rejects unjustified barriers to the free movement of persons

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Human Rights | Library ethics & Advocacy | Freedom of Movement

logo-iflaOpen Societies are Healthy Societies

Libraries are at the heart of healthy societies. By bringing people together – students, researchers, creators, citizens – they support learning, sharing, and the creation of new ideas.

They also support the delivery of key human rights, as set out both in national constitutions and international conventions, most importantly the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: freedom of expression and access to information, as well as the right to participate in cultural life and enjoy the benefits of scientific progress.

Libraries have long supported the flow of ideas and information across borders. IFLA has called for reforms to laws that hold this back. Evidence shows that such flows promote innovation and creativity, which in turn drives growth, jobs and equality everywhere.

However, arbitrary and unjustified barriers to the movement of people jeopardise this situation. Such policies run contrary to states’ obligations under international law, which prohibit discrimination of any kind on the basis of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status, as set out in the UN’s New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants.

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Read more:  www.ifla.org/node/11176

Library Policies Created By Patron Bashing

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Matt Smith's avatarLibrary Lost & Found

images-2Talking crap about patrons, as I’ve said before, might be the number one barrier to customer service in libraries. And when we talk about customer service we don’t just mean personal interactions at the public service desk – that’s the tip of the iceberg. We mean policies, procedures, services: from design to implementation. And sadly, a culture of patron negativity melts the iceberg (and prevents innovation).

Some examples (write yours in the comments):

Public service desks that look like military forts
I’m sure there’s some historical reason for gigantic public service desks – like we didn’t have computers back then or whatever – but c’mon. My library has an AV desk (“AV”, by the way, stands for “audiovisual”…that’s another discussion). Anyway, the AV desk is so large that helping a patron involves taking a short jog around the block. Showing the patron where a movie is – a hallmark of good customer service…

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Yes, Digital Literacy. But Which One?

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mikecaulfield's avatarHapgood

One of the problems I’ve had for a while with traditional digital literacy programs is that they tend to see digital literacy as a separable skill from domain knowledge.

In the metaphor of most educators, there’s a set of digital or information literacy skills, which is sort of like the factory process. And there’s data, which is like raw material. You put the data through the critical literacy process and out comes useful information on the other side. You set up the infolit processes over a few days of instruction, and then you start running the raw material through the factory, for everything from newspaper articles on the deficit to studies on sickle cell anemia. Useful information, correctly weighted, comes out the other end. Hooray!

This traditional information/web literacy asks students to go to a random page and ask questions like “Who runs this page? What is their expertise? Do…

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