Internet changes field of library science

[curr at mnsinc.com]

The raticle below just came out:


Internet changes field of library science

Copyright c 1997 Nando.net
Copyright c 1997 N.Y. Times News Service

(Jan 6, 1997 10:36 a.m. EST) -- What is the gross national product of 
Belize? Who invented polyester? How smart is the average pig?

Five years ago, the best way to find answers to questions like these was 
to go to a library and ask the librarian for help in finding the 
appropriate books and periodicals. Today, the same information is 
available on the Internet, but finding it may still require the 
assistance of a librarian.

As technology has made more data available than can be bound in books or 
cataloged by the Dewey decimal system, the field of library science has 
changed drastically. While it is still a discipline dedicated to 
finding, filtering, organizing, evaluating and presenting information, 
it now requires a great deal more technical expertise with electronic 
information and computer networks. These new demands, in turn, have 
opened a raft of new career opportunities, attracting considerably
more people to the profession over the last decade.

In response, many universities have converted their schools of library 
science into schools of information and library science or, 
increasingly, just schools of information. "Information has always been 
the focus of library studies, but recent technological developments
mean that there are now vast stores of information beyond what is 
contained within the walls of libraries," said C. Olivia Frost, 
associate dean of the University of Michigan's School of Information
in Ann Arbor. 

As a result, becoming a degreed librarian these days means taking 
courses like Implementation of Distributed Information Systems, Web Site 
Design and Network Management. "A third of the titles currently on our 
list are about the Internet; that's up from zero six years ago,"
said Patricia Glass Schuman, president of Neal-Schuman Publishers Inc. 
in New York, a supplier of textbooks to library and information science 
schools.

With their technological expertise, fewer recent graduates of library 
and information science programs are actually becoming librarians. Take 
John Powell. After graduating from the University of Michigan School of 
Information last year, he became data base manager and Webmaster for the
State Appellate Defenders Office in Detroit. "The field is rapidly 
expanding to include a wide range of career opportunities," he said. 
"It's not just cataloguing books anymore."

Powell's duties include maintaining a World Wide Web site linked to a 
data base of legal research as well as conducting Internet training 
seminars for defense lawyers throughout the state.

Although there are no comprehensive job placement statistics for 
graduates of library and information science schools, officials at the 
American Library Association have noticed a marked increase in the 
number of professionally trained librarians pursuing nontraditional, 
technologically oriented careers. "More and more, we're hearing titles 
like cybrarian, information specialist, Webmaster, knowledge navigator 
and data base manager," said Elizabeth Martinez, the
association's executive director.

Administrators from top library and information science schools report a 
similar trend. "A growing percentage of our students graduate to work 
outside traditional library settings," said Brooke E. Sheldon, dean of 
the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University 
of Texas in Austin.

She estimated that nearly 25 percent of last year's graduating class 
went on to nontraditional library jobs like information brokers and 
network managers, while her counterparts at the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Michigan and the 
University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana gave numbers of 30 percent 
and 40 percent. In the late 1980s, only 2 percent to 9 percent of 
library science graduates took such nontraditional jobs.

"There is high demand today for people who understand how to find, 
organize and distribute knowledge," said Lois Remeikas, who as director 
of knowledge and information management for Booz Allen & Hamilton, a 
consulting firm, has watched her department double in the last two 
years.

Companies like Monsanto, Ford Motor, Microsoft, Intel and CNA Insurance 
have begun to intensively recruit library and information science 
graduates to fill such positions as scientific searcher, configuration 
manager, records management analyst and graphic multimedia designer.

In a shift from the past, corporate representatives now show up 
regularly at library and information science schools to attract students 
and, in the case of CNA Insurance, have even set up special internship 
programs.

"Industry has come to realize the competitive advantage of hiring 
professionals who not only know how to find strategic information 
quickly, but how to evaluate its validity and present it coherently,"
said Lynn Eastabrook, dean of the University of Illinois School of 
Information and Library Science.

The recent increase in job opportunities for library and information 
science specialists has inspired more people to enter the field. The 
American Library Association's figures indicate that this year's
total enrollment at schools of library and information science in the 
United States and Canada is up 47 percent from 1986. And membership in 
the association itself has swelled to 58,112 in 1996 from 42,361 in 1986 
-- an increase of 37 percent.

The trend is even more striking at some individual institutions. For 
example, the University of Texas has twice as many library and 
information science students now as it did in 1990. And applications
for admission to the University of Michigan's School of Information are 
up 50 percent for the latest class over the previous year's class.

Also, more men are showing interest in what was once considered a 
woman's career. Most library and information science schools report a 10 
percent increase in male students within the last five
years. 

Powell, at the Appellate Defenders Office in Detroit, said the field's 
new emphasis on information technology, particularly related to 
computers, had changed the image of library science. No longer is
it seen as the occupation of spectacled spinsters who delight in telling 
people to hush.

"Because of the important and crucial role they are able to play in this 
complex information age, there's new zip to the stereotypical profile of 
a librarian," Dean Sheldon at the University of Texas said.

Cliff Urr
E-mail: curr at mnsinc.com
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Galaxy Scientific Corp.
Crystal Plaza One, 2001 Jeff Davis Highway,
Suite 1107 Arlington, VA 22202
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Personal Home Page: http://www.mnsinc.com/curr/
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"But convergence is inevitable: All media will be the Web, 
and the Web will be all media."

- Andrew Leonard, HotWired
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Date: 1/6/97
Time: 12:19:32 PM