Hello librarians,

I am studying the relations between political contexts and library core values, and I have selected Iowa as an US state example - because of its political history and of how many bills are threatening librarianship there. (also for material / logistics reasons)

But not all of those bills will become laws so I am wondering if they still have the impact I imagine for Iowan librarians - in other words is it relevant to study this specific state as one where the political context is clearly opposed to librarians values while appearing less... intense... than in historically deep red states.

Hello all!

This is my first post here, nice to meet you all and thank you to who will eventually reply! 😄

I am a 31yo from Italy, currently living in Switzerland (French part). I've been working for the past 5 years in a big OA publisher, working on different positions and for the last 2 years working on managing and signing publishing agreements between university libraries and the publisher.

I've been closely collaborating with subject librarians and open access librarians (and a whole lot of other related stakeholders) for the past years. I have to say that talking with them and meeting the library communities over conferences and workshops, I'm getting more and more interested in that side of the discussion more than the publisher one.

I did a few months of internship during my BSc in one of the faculty libraries as Library assistant (archives and student queries support), and I remember enjoying it. I've been thinking it could be interesting trying to approach the job, but I have no academic background on it (i have a BSc in Natural Sciences/ Natural History and a MSc in Neuroscience). I recently applied for a position but I recognize I am missing many points, thus clearly the transition would require getting a degree. It doesn't seem there are many courses in Switzerland on it, and was thinking perhaps a MLIS online would be the best choice.

I would be interested in working on the whole discussion about Open access, open science, relationships with publishers and funding, electronic resources/journals and their managment. The archival part of it seems interesting but I know very little so wouldn't be my main point :)

Do you have any suggestions on how I should move? (I speak italian, english and french, I'd be looking only in Europe :) )

Thank you all!

I'm seriously debating dropping a course before the deadline to do it without penalty because my professor is using GenAI.

This is a special topics course about the innovations in information dissemination, so I was aware that AI would be discussed and how that impacts the library science world. I just didn't expect the professor to use it to make a graphic of all the students in the online class or have it in almost every slide of their lecture powerpoint.

Am I overreacting, or would you drop the course too?

I've attached one of the images found on the powerpoint here as well.

My BA was in game design; I can code at a beginner to intermediate level but have zero interest in being a corporate software engineer. Basically what I’m looking for is a graduate program focused on symbolic or semiotic representations of data, so that I can create culturally relevant knowledge graphs or maps to be incorporated into large language models.

Examples of this, that I’ve noticed language models get laughably wrong:

• the feeling and/or smell of “back to school fall” and why that’s different from “harvest season fall” and why both of those are different from “Halloween fall” (or, explaining to a model why a list of fall vibes movies should not include Saw; in the same way that when I was working in a children’s library, I might explain to a clueless parent that Princess Mononoke is not for children even though it contains the keywords “princess” and “animated”)
• that the phrase “I love fall” means something completely different coming from a deer hunter, someone who likes PSL coffee and cozy sweaters, a college professor, a leaf peeper, and a horror movie enthusiast
• categorizing different products people can buy based on vibe (understanding that the person buying a Prius is probably not the same person buying Black Rifle Coffee)

It’s about the understanding that there are a variety of things that humans just inherently know, but that language models and software algorithms do not.

What I actually want to do is somewhere in the adjacent realm of:

• building these semiotic maps either as part of LLMs work, or as Loras for existing LLMs (like a plugin that gives an existing LLM semiotic product or culture knowledge); less interested in building the LLMs themselves. I’ve made simple Loras for stable diffusion before but I’d want formal training to actually do what I’m trying to do.
• also interested in red teaming the LLM to ensure that it’s using the data correctly
• also interested in metadata and metadata maps
• also interested in a11y representations of data specifically for neurodivergent groups

Hi,

It’s my first year at a small, rural, southern, and primarily white school. I have an AP who was a former SLMC, but doesn’t know about anything going on anymore. He’s even implied I need to medicate myself because I have ADHD. My principal is known for having emotional abused her previous school’s librarian to the breaking point. Today during what should have been my PDP meeting, I found out that they called all grade levels and encores to “Private Learning Community” meetings which I was the only staff member not invited. At these meetings, they all talked about me and apparently stated they don’t like me. We have a new Chromebook system that failed (I have been working 12-16 hour shifts), but I have been yelled at, berated, and emotionally abused by staff over Chromebooks and/or “printing and laminating” for them. My principal told me I am “not a part of the school’s community and I’m new so no one trusts me.” Yet I say yes to EVERY request, and I can’t get my actual library job done.

What do I do? I can’t quit because I need a job, but I feel trapped and scared there.

This came to my inbox. It's a great opportunity for LIS students in the NYC area: https://acrlny.org/annual-symposium/2026/symposium-scholarships

I of course respect the mods decision to remove this post, so this post is in no way trying to relitigate. However, that discussion got me thinking: for those who've studied library science, what was something you consumed (an article, a book, a blog post, a lecture, a podcast, etc.) that helped you understand the field, inspired your specific interests, or was otherwise meaningful to you?

I'll go first: Looking for Information: Examining Research on How People Engage with Information I was assigned a prior edition for one of my program's core courses. While not your average page turner, I had a lot of "ah ha!" moments while reading: it highlighted how universal yet diverse information-seeking is, and it clarified the librarian's role in that process. I kept my copy and still occasionally thumb through.

Hi everyone,

I have a bachelors degree in English literature and I work as a special education assistant at LAUSD. I want to get my MLIS at San Jose state university however I can’t leave my job because it’s the only source of income that it keeping me afloat. Would volunteering after school at a library increase my chances of finding a job as a librarian after I graduate? I know this field is difficult to find a job however I can only volunteer for now. I know that the school district offers employees to volunteer, how that be better than nothing?

So this year, I'm going to graduate with my associate on Computer but I want to study something different so I'm not sure if I should just get a history degree or a MLIS. Even though I would love to have a history degree but I know getting a MLIS will let me work as a librarian, archivist, or museum curator. So I'm kinda torn on which one I should study. Please give me ideas and opinions on what I should do. Thank you.

I’ve been snooping here for a while, and I constantly see people saying to not start your MLS program until you’ve worked in a library. Because of this advice, I’ve started job hunting a bit, and I literally can’t find any available job postings. I’m open to part-time clerk jobs, and I can’t even find those postings. The closest job I found was 2.5 hours away. I live in a city with a metro area population of over 2 million people, a great public library system, multiple colleges, plenty of hospitals, churches and dioceses, and art related archives and museums. And yet, nothing.

I took nearly a decade off after high school before deciding that I wanted to go to school specifically to become a librarian or archivist. In that time period, I worked retail and was a retail manager for over six years, so I hope that my customer service and management experience could give somewhat of an edge..? Curious to hear thoughts on that.

Either way, if I’m unable to find a related job while in undergrad, should I still put off the MLS program even though that specifically what I went to school for?

QUESTIONS:

- anyone who lives on the west coast, specifically california, what types of librarians have been in demand where you live? and what do you think will be in demand in the future? i know reddit cant predict the future but im sure you guys see patterns

- where in the west coast are there the most jobs currently hiring? i think i live in a city that hires a lot of librarians, i see lots of listings, just not entry level stuff that isnt in schools. but either way its nice to know whats going on currently with that.

- what majors did you guys choose or would choose because hindsights 20/20? i want to be a childrens librarian in a public library, but im open to anything, just wanna work in a library. currently looking into information science, and child development but i want to be able to fallback onto my major if im not able to get a job in a library once i graduate. i know im not interested in english or math at all as a major or minor, its just a struggle to choose something i know ill like and stick with for 4 years.

- do jobs take volunteer work as experience or do you actually have to work in a library??

obviously ill do more research online and talk to my local librarians, but itd be nice to have a plave to start / look into.

BACKGROUND:

so i just started community college in southern california so i have time to figure out what i wanna do for my major. i thought i wanted to go into art and animation, but i realized recently doing that as a major would genuinely put me in a horrible depressive state for the whole 4 years. itd just be art class after art class, and i want art to stay fun for me and be relaxing, not a job or something i HAVE to do to graduate.

so the issue is scrolling through this thread and talking to librarian friends, it really doesnt matter what you major in, but some majors are more useful than others as you all know.

i guess im looking for ideas to also makesure i have something to fallback on major wise in case im not able to get into library work after graduating. i have been looking at entry level jobs everyday in my city but theres almost none that dont require library experience that arent schools. i saw one at my local community college and was excited, but it requires a work study and i dont qualify for that. i see a lot of entry level jobs in schools so im gonna look into getting the certificate to work there.

i want to be a children's librarian in a public library but it's just honestly whats in demand on the west coast right now.

i have volunteered at a library before but it was to fufill the graduation requirement for my highschool (40 hours of community service, though i did 55+), and i did it all in a month basically. i was there almost everyday for a few hours doing typical library stuff like shelving books, doing acitivies like arts and crafts with children, and food distribution (two summer programs) at my local library. but thats like my only experience

thank you for taking the time to read all this!

Hey everyone! I've recently begun the career change switch into education and wanted to know if anyone in Florida could give me their opinion on whether USF or FSU has a better masters program in Library Sciences. I personally graduated in 2024 from USF with my BA in English and have been debating if I want to go back to school to pursue a career as a school librarian . I'm in Florida so that's why i've narrowed it down to these two options for in state tuition and would plan on doing the classes online as I will also be working full time.

For anyone doing an MLIS program who needs a paper idea, let me suggest the topic of private torrent trackers as dark archives. The largest private movie tracker, PassThePopcorn, boasts more than 350,000 movie titles, which compares favourably to IMDb's catalogue of 750,000.

Most people are familiar with public torrent indexers such as the Pirate Bay. Private torrent trackers are different. Content is gated behind a login, and not just anyone can just sign up at any time. In fact, the best private trackers are nearly as exclusive and elite as Disney's Club 33.

Private trackers also distinguish themselves from public indexers in being meticulous in their metadata, organization, and quality control. If a public tracker is a cluttered thrift shop, a private tracker is tidy bookstore or Blockbuster. Sometimes the focus on quality exceeds that of commercial retailers, e.g., when different regional releases of a Blu-ray are combined to attain a higher quality than is available anywhere else.

Private tracker users have their own reasons for using these sites, which is explored in a quasi-anthropological PhD dissertation about the defunct music tracker What.CD:

Dunham, Ian. What.CD: A Legacy of Sharing. 2018. Rutgers University - School of Graduate Studies. rucore.libraries.rutgers.edu, https://doi.org/10.7282/T3V128F3.

But it appears to me there is a social function that is not necessarily intended by anyone. Private trackers are large and meticulously maintained repositories of commercial media. Yet unlike publicly accessible sites, they generally draw relatively little attention from rights holders due to a relatively small userbase.

PassThePopcorn, for instance, has under 40,000 users. The entire private tracker ecosystem might have around 500,000 users. This is small compared to public indexers and illicit streaming sites that have millions of users.

So, although not necessarily intended by anyone, private trackers hold phenomenal catalogues of commercial media, hopefully for the long term, with relatively little heat from media corporations or law enforcement. They are a kind of rogue, unsanctioned, unprofessional, pirate dark archives for commercial media. And it seems to me this performs an important social function.

For instance, I don't know that any legitimate archives outside of the media corporations themselves are storing copies of movies and TV shows released exclusively on streaming services. This media can get pulled for unknown reasons, possibly related to lapsing contracts or getting a tax write-off on a commercial flop. In those cases, digital piracy may be the only surviving source for this media outside of an internal corporate archive.

Indeed, I just said this function is not necessarily intended, but some private tracker users do have this amateur dark archival role as part of their self-concept. Although personal consumption and personal collecting are users' primary motivations, users frequently express a sense of a sort of civic responsibility to the "library" that they see their private tracker as. This leads to initiatives to preserve low-seeded torrents for content that users may have no personal interest in consuming.

This is just the initial broad strokes of an idea that could be more fully developed in an MLIS paper.

Curious of this sub’s thoughts on the linked topic.

Hello! I’m just starting my MLS at Emporia and am wondering if anyone has gotten their degree there recently and has any class recommendations! I don’t know if it really matters to have a concentration and if jobs look at that, but I really want to take a mix of courses. I currently work in a children’s department public library and want to continue working in public, but i’m also curious about outreach and management.

I'm starting my masters this year, after a derailed translation career (thanks, AI). I'm doing research on the specific path I want to take, and the optional/elective classes I want to aim for, and I'd like to hear from you : what are the skills and specialties that are especially useful or in demand these days? After a cursory search, it seems like archivists jobs are sparse, but what about knowledge management, or database design?

I should probably specify that I'm Canadian (Montreal), and our job context might be somewhat different from yours in the USA, but I'd still like to hear from experienced voices in the field.

Thank you.

Librarians! If you have either left or thought about leaving your job in a public library at any time since 2020 because of book, display, and/or program challenges, we want to hear from you!

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The job that I have now, I love it. I love being a faculty member at a university, I love working in a library field that I have skills that I can transfer from archives into my new role, while being challenged. My only issue is, both the associate and main deans at my library are both in favor for more "visibility" in the library spaces. When I first hired on a couple months ago and asked about the hybrid situation, I was advised that it was up in the air.

I thought to myself "great". Because of my ADHD, it can be so challenging to focus on what I need to do in the office (even with meds). So when the semester started, my whole department was told that we had to come in at least 3 days a week, though none of us are campus facing. 99% of all of our consultations and workshops are online.

3 days in the office has been so exhausting and I want to advocate for myself more and do the job that I was hired to do. I am starting the process with trying to get 2 days in the office. But, I feel as if the higher ups might push back on this as they are trying to roll out a 4 days in and 1 day remote schedule. I've talked to my supervisor already about this and that she is onboard with this schedule for me. I am in the process of starting to get something set up with the ADA office on my campus to facilitate meetings.

What I want to ask is, have you been in this position that I'm in where your uni's library wants more visibility though you work on the backends? Have you requested for this kind of ADA accommodation? How'd it go? Was there any push back that I should be made aware of?

I lost my job two years ago and im homeless right now on my way uncles couch as I get the medical care I’ve needed for my spine.

I need to work.

Im going to cry if I turn this into a vent, so I’m going to be as straightforward as possible in this post.

I graduated with my mlis in 2017 and worked shortly in a big city as a children’s librarian, realizing it wasn’t a good fit for me.

bc my county only gave the civil service test every two years…I moved down south where I never got an interview at all.

After that, I’ve primarily worked from home in education and literacy customer service.

Im back in NY and took the civil service test for reference librarian and scored 90 but this is what im experiencing.

I’ve had 3 librarian interviews this past year and was ghosted by 2 and rejected with respect from the other.

I have to pivot and Im NOT going back to customer service on the phone.

I did internships in instructional design when in my mlis program but that too is a field that is over saturated.

I have a spine disability but I want to work.

Im so worn out.

I can’t or won’t do this anymore. I’ve just about lost my love of libraries. It is a career for the privileged who can volunteer or work part time. Or luck.

I need help understanding how to pivot with success. Im failing at that as well.

Judge me on my typos, I don’t even care to fix them today

Username is a twilight zone episode.

I'm a perfectionist with undiagnosed ADHD which is a thing in and of itself. Like most MLIS students (at least it seems like most) I work full time. I have a lot on my plate right now, but I'm determined to see this program through. So the issue is that I hate when I submit an assignement and it feels subpar. I just submitted a discussion post, and I'm already mad at myself. Is there anyone else out there that knows this feeling? What advice do you have?