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Accidental Systems Librarian
by Sarah Nesbeitt
I'm one of those librarians you hear about but rarely see, particularly when it comes to someone with my job title: I originally became attracted to the profession because I enjoyed reading books. The attraction of doing research, and the library atmosphere in general, were other factors in my decision. Eight years ago, I had just received my second rather unemployable humanities degree, and knew that I had better make up my mind on some career (any career!) sometime in the near future. And so I began investigating library programs, with the intent of working in the subfield that appealed to me most - reference librarianship.
But in library school, particularly at the University of Michigan, I found out that there were more computers in the classroom than books. While taking one of the required classes, an introduction to computers and the Internet, the instructor found out that I'd previously held a job while I was an undergraduate as a computer help desk attendant. She convinced me that I really should consider working as a supervisor and trainer for the library school's computer lab. Then, in my final semester in library school at Michigan, I became one of a small number of participants in a new course entitled "Internet Resource Discovery and Design." At that time, gophers, Mosaic, and Lynx were the latest thing, and all students were required to create subject-based web pages as part of the course requirements. The final projects of this course became some of the first subject-oriented guides in what's now known as the Argus Clearinghouse. While my specialization at Michigan was still Reference, somehow technology kept finding me.
For going on six years now, I've been employed as a librarian at the Maxwell Library of Bridgewater State College. Originally, I was hired as a "straight" reference librarian, although the job announcement asked for someone with an interest in information technology. Again, while I enjoyed dealing with students at the reference desk and teaching library instruction classes, my knowledge of information technology tended to put my skills in high demand. Although I wasn't specifically hired to do so, I ended up spending a good deal of my time installing software, answering computer-related questions for my colleagues, solving printer problems, and creating a set of web pages with links to useful ready-reference resources. When the campus was ready to develop a web site of its own, the library director put me in charge of maintaining the library's section. And finally, when the director decided to hire a non-librarian professional to take over system administration duties for the library two years ago, he asked me if I'd like to take on the role of this new person's supervisor - and I agreed. Since then, I've had a split title - reference/systems librarian - and split responsibilities.
In my book, having one foot in each camp has had multiple advantages, both for me personally and for the library as a whole. A systems librarian who works at the reference desk knows firsthand of the problems that students, faculty, and staff experience with using the computers, printers, databases, and web pages. And a reference librarian who also has responsibility for systems means always knowing who to call when a computer malfunctions (the disadvantage, of course, being that I occasionally end up being the person who has to fix it).
Working in two different areas means dealing with constant change from multiple directions, often simultaneously. As an example, in the summer of 1999, Maxwell Library migrated from a terminal-based library management system (DRA's MultiLIS) to a brand new, client- server based, web-compatible one (Endeavor's Voyager). For my systems responsibilities, I had to learn to speak MARC in a short period of time in order to oversee the actual data migration and communicate better with the cataloging staff. For the reference department, I had to quickly develop relevant handouts and consider how best to integrate our new library catalog into bibliographic instruction sessions. Although I wouldn't jump to work on such a project again (at least not in the next few years), it was definitely a learning experience - one which convinced me that all reference librarians should have a fairly good understanding of MARC format in order to search their own catalogs most effectively.
All in all, while I became a systems librarian mostly by chance, it's something I've found very rewarding - and if I were to start looking for another job at any point in the future, chances are that I'd be looking for something with responsibilities very similar to the position I have now.
Sarah L. Nesbeitt is currently Reference/Systems Librarian at Bridgewater State College, Bridgewater, Massachusetts, where she's been employed as a librarian for the past five years. Though originally hired solely as a reference librarian, for the past two years she's also had responsibility for overseeing the Systems department. Visit her home page at: http://webhost.bridgew.edu/snesbeitt/index.htm.