What does a system librarian do?

Posted on Tue 22 November 2011 in Libraries

Preface: I'm talking to my daughter's kindergarten class tomorrow about my job. Exciting! So I prepped a little bit; it will probably go entirely different, but here's how it's going to go in my mind...

My name is Dan Scott. I’m Amber’s dad. I’m a systems librarian at Laurentian

University.

Today you’re going to learn what a systems librarian does. Exciting, eh?

I bet you have all been to a library. When you think about a library, what do

you think of first?

  • Books

Yep - books! I do a lot of work with books! Can you guess what sorts of things

I do with books?

  • Choose which books to add to the library: Selection

  • And when we get new books, where do we put them? : Organization

  • And when we have too many books, choose which books to give away: Weeding

But there’s more to libraries than books! What else can you think of that are

in libraries?

  • Movies

  • Music

  • Magazines

  • Newspapers

  • Puppets

    • Yes, puppets

  • Computers

Ah, computers. That’s where I really spend a lot of time. When I was a little

boy, I was a voracious reader - I would read anything, including cereal boxes

and encyclopedia - and I was fascinated by computers. Completely obsessed.

So, naturally, when I went to high school I also got a job at the children’s

library as a "computer page". I was a big kid, and I helped all the little kids

use the computers at the library.

Now that I’m grown up, I’m still doing pretty much the same thing - except now

I’m helping the adults use computers. Except now I’m helping them by making it

easier for them to get the books or magazines or music or movies or puppets

(yes! puppets!) that they need; and a lot of the time, they don’t even have to

come to the library. They can read or watch or listen to whatever they need

right on their computers - and sometimes they need help, but that’s what I’m

there for.

Coding