This post is written for Round 6 of the Library Day in the Life project where librarians across the world share details of their daily activities.
I am the Research and Development Librarian at Kansas State University Libraries. It is a recently created position in a recently created Office of Library Planning and Assessment. I am beginning my 3rd year as a professional librarian.
So, what does a R&D Librarian do? I’ll chronicle my activities this week to hopefully give you an idea of this new position in librarianship.
QR Code for the K-State Libraries website
6:30am After completing my goal of watching 365 films in 2010, my new goal for 2011 is to get through 2 cycles of the P90x work out program. Though I’m definitely not a morning person, it seems that waking up early to work out is still more feasible than trying to exercise after a full day of work. Hence, the 6:30 wake-up time.
9:00 am 17 °F here in Kansas. Brrr. Arrived at office. Checked and replied email. IM with a friend from another library who is waiting and waiting for news after a job interview last month. I completely understand her frustration. I have been in the same boat. But at the same time, I have been in several search committees. There are so many steps and so many different offices to go through, it’s really not uncommon to take months and months before a hiring decision can be made.
10:00am – 12:00pm Speaking of search committees, K-State is looking to fill quite a few positions at the moment, and there will be many more searches. Therefore,the university created a Search Committee Training course for people who will be in search committees, which I attended. There was a lot of good information, and the emphasis was on attracting a diverse applicant pool, which is very important for libraries in general. I am actually involved in several programs, including the ALA Discovering Librarianship program, and other initiatives to help diversify our profession.
Lunch - No Butter Chicken
12:00pm 1-pm Lunch. Our staff lounge got some water damage last week from a major water leak, so I had lunch in my office. I made some Indian food over the weekend (it was delicious, if I may immodestly say so myself) which I brought to work. But I forgot that Indian spices have quite a strong aroma. So, oops, sorry to my officemates!
1:00pm – 2pm Department Meeting – We welcomed a new member to our department who is just starting today. It’s exciting that there are many new faces in the library after a wave of hiring last semester. (Did I mention I was on a whole bunch of search committees?) This was actually our first official department meeting since our library’s major re-organization, and it was a good meeting.
2:00pm – 2:30pm Finished my notes for the Midwinter ClimateQUAL™ Partners Meeting for our Dean of Libraries, as I represented my library at the meeting. Oh Midwinter, oh San Diego. Went to weather.com and saw that it’s 66°F in SD today.
2:30pm – 3:30pm QR Codes Meeting. QR Codes are all the rage right now in the library world. It’s probably a bit too early for the masses, but I’m very excited to experiment with it in the meantime, and see where it leads us. My job as the R&D Librarian is to play with new ideas and try them out quickly before deciding whether to devote resources to further develop them.
3:30pm – 4:30pm A busy day today with several meetings, and this was the first time I got to slow down and catch my breath a bit. Replied some emails and collected my thoughts to write this blog post.
