One factor essential to understanding the absence or disappearance of library jobs, whether you are just out of library school or an experienced librarian facing budget cuts, is that the problems behind getting or keeping a job these days has little to do with your professional qualifications, your ability to network, your resume, your experience or even the role you as librarian play at that place so often referred to as the heart of the school, the campus, the community. Yes, all these job-hunting regulars do play a very important role in getting a job (see Rosen for a typical perspective on the solution to joblessness) but the main problem has nothing to do with you and everything to do with the economy and decisions made regarding it.
“Duh…” one might say. “Of course it’s about The Economy.”
We might know this rationally, but how to we express our relationship to the elusive or bygone job?
“I can’t find a job.”
“I lost my job.”
“Maybe I just don’t have enough experience.”
“Maybe I was a failure as an advocate for my position.”
Well, Another Unemployed Librarian is here to tell you this – we are not losing our jobs, they are being stolen! Furthermore, if you are a new librarian, chances are you cannot find a job, not because you’re inexperienced or under-qualified, but because the jobs new librarians often got 20 and more years ago were actually given away through the process of deprofessionalization. Many librarian positions that were once considered “entry level” have been given over to paraprofessionals, and this process has been underway for the past two decades, even longer in some areas.
Consider this, the library technician (a wonderful, dedicated, and very competent person) with whom I worked, before my job was eliminated, is now virtually in charge of the library. She is paid around $12.00 per hour. My pay was just over $30.00. What budget-cutting principal could fail to see the savings to be had here? The replacement of professional librarians by paraprofessionals has been happening for over 20 years in all kinds of libraries, all across the country, the product of a combination of factors including budget cuts, technology, and "streamlining."
“What about all those librarians who are retiring?” you might ask.
Well, not only are they not retiring in the droves predicted, but there is another phenomena – the retire/rehires. I have no idea how prevalent this practice is, but in Washington state it is not uncommon, and just recently I met two school librarians who are retired, but who were rehired, one to continue in her former position, another to work part-time. Each receive both their retirement pay and a monthly salary. This means that the positions they occupy are not available to people wanting to enter the field. While the retire/rehire practice might provide many advantages for all concerned, it is completely unfair to the new generation of librarians (teachers, principals and administrators) who want, need and deserve opportunities to begin their careers, and also to those of us, still far from retirement, who want, need and deserve to continue ours.
If all the jobs that don’t exist right now, for all the people who need them, weren’t lost, then who stole them – or gave them away?
Was it deprofessionalizing Library Manager?
Was it number-crunching City/County Offical?
Was it making-happy-with-corporate-lobbyists President/Senator/Representative?
Was it ponzi-scheming Stock Portfolio Banker Man?
Stay-tuned next week for This Mess Has a History.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Introducing Another Unemployed Librarian
First – a note on truth in advertising: currently, I am an ex-unemployed librarian having been hired in October 2010 to fill a “leave replacement” position at an elementary school in Western Washington. The idea for this blog, however, came to me while anxiously awaiting a determination on my application for an extension of unemployment benefits. At the time I’d been jobless for 13 months and sans domicile fixe – without fixed residence, ie. homeless (but everything sounds better in French, non?).
Despite my current employed status, the idea persists. Maybe because September 2011 looms like a shadow. Will I still be employed? The possibility exists to remain in this job, the librarian who went on leave did so several years ago, then retired, but the position has remained in this “non-continuing contract” limbo for bureaucratic reasons. The librarian I actually replaced had the job for three years and left only because a position with a permanent contract became available in the school district. She jumped at the chance (and who wouldn’t) to live a life free of the shadow of “next September?”
All of which explains the persistence of this idea for a blog about unemployment and librarianship – from personal experience I happen to know that there is really nothing necessarily permanent about a permanent position, nothing necessarily continuing about a continuing contract. I had both and they were taken away, my position eliminated, along with those of three colleagues. RIF’d. Cut. Axed.
R. I. P.
So, why the blog?
For an experienced librarian, the sudden loss of one’s livelihood is traumatic. For a new librarian, the bleak job market is demoralizing. For librarianship as a whole, the current economic situation is a grave threat, not only to individuals, but to the library itself and to librarianship.
My purpose then, in offering this blog to the library community, is to provide a place for the consideration of librarianship and the economy on micro- and macro- levels, from practical, philosophical and spiritual perspectives, and for personal and political activism.
With future postings, I hope to
– describe the experience of unemployment;
– share information;
– consider ideas for a more sane and humane economic system; and, finally,
– help save librarianship, along with the rest of the world.
The plan is to post once a week. Today is Saturday, March 26, 2011.
Look for posting #2 next Saturday: Not Lost – Stolen!
Despite my current employed status, the idea persists. Maybe because September 2011 looms like a shadow. Will I still be employed? The possibility exists to remain in this job, the librarian who went on leave did so several years ago, then retired, but the position has remained in this “non-continuing contract” limbo for bureaucratic reasons. The librarian I actually replaced had the job for three years and left only because a position with a permanent contract became available in the school district. She jumped at the chance (and who wouldn’t) to live a life free of the shadow of “next September?”
All of which explains the persistence of this idea for a blog about unemployment and librarianship – from personal experience I happen to know that there is really nothing necessarily permanent about a permanent position, nothing necessarily continuing about a continuing contract. I had both and they were taken away, my position eliminated, along with those of three colleagues. RIF’d. Cut. Axed.
R. I. P.
So, why the blog?
For an experienced librarian, the sudden loss of one’s livelihood is traumatic. For a new librarian, the bleak job market is demoralizing. For librarianship as a whole, the current economic situation is a grave threat, not only to individuals, but to the library itself and to librarianship.
My purpose then, in offering this blog to the library community, is to provide a place for the consideration of librarianship and the economy on micro- and macro- levels, from practical, philosophical and spiritual perspectives, and for personal and political activism.
With future postings, I hope to
– describe the experience of unemployment;
– share information;
– consider ideas for a more sane and humane economic system; and, finally,
– help save librarianship, along with the rest of the world.
The plan is to post once a week. Today is Saturday, March 26, 2011.
Look for posting #2 next Saturday: Not Lost – Stolen!
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