Hey, it's me. I just got off the train.

<Extremely Remi Malek voice> Hey, it's been a while. Here's what's new.

My good friend and colleague Jessica Olin had been asking me to contribute an interview post to her blog, Letters to a Young Librarian. I was concerned that it was too similar to a "This is How I Work" meme post (in the Dawkinsian sense, not the cats who can or cannot haz cheezburgers sense) that I wrote in late 2014, also because Jessica asked me to. I got settled, I think, at the new job, and tried to be self-aware enough to focus on what I do now as opposed to how I worked in 2014 at a previous job. So in that vein, here's a similar post. Compare and contrast.

Building on those posts, I'm making a conscious effort to do a few things differently at this job, with varying degrees of success.

• Not eating at my desk: I know there are and will be days when I'll have to hunker down and get stuff done at my desk. Eating anywhere other than there is good. It gets me out of the library. It puts me in contact with other people I work with, and with people who either use or may use the library. 
• Leaving the library more often: even if it's just to crash an event and get free food, and for the reasons mentioned above. 
• Much more outreach: I'm just a boy, leaning into my discomfort, with talking to people about the library. 
• Going for more walks: easier when your workplace has paths and trails that look like this 

Sour oranges. I may pick a couple for masitas de puerco.

Not sure if that's a Little Yellow or Sleepy Orange butterfly.

Earlier in the year, Dr. Sarah Clark and I discussed critical librarianship, or "critlib," on Steve Thomas' podcast, Circulating Ideas. I abhor the sound of my voice, but maybe you don't. She wrote about it, too.

Topics included diversity versus inclusion, information literacy, and cataloging critically, among other things.

Source

Coming up, more blogging! Really. Because I have a book chapter to plug. And maybe I'll expound upon those bullet points.

The Beerbrarian Moves On

I am not my job I am not my job I am not my job I am not my job I am not my job I am not my job I am not my job I am not my job I am not my

— F. W. Popov (@jacobsberg) May 17, 2015

Over the course of eight years, I held three positions at my former place of work (MFPOW). For more than half that time, I served as Director of Library Services. I started as a paraprofessional, with "Specialist" in the title, got an MLIS on the job, and worked my way up. I'm grateful to them for the opportunities and growth, and I hope they're as proud of what we were able to accomplish as I am. No doubt they took a risk in making me a director. Working with other library and university staff, faculty, and academic administration, we were able to

• modernize the library, including adding discovery services and a link resolver.
• promote the use of open educational resources (OERs) to the point where every introductory science course uses them, saving our students a lot of money.
• hire, train, promote, and maintain a diverse library staff 
• break down silos by cross-training all library staff on both public and technical services, with robust documentation.
• create a culture of experimentation, where staff aren't afraid to fail and learn from it.

But all those things cost a lot. They cost political capital. They cost emotional labor. And after those eight years, I got the sense that there wasn't much more I could do except maintain. I got the sense I wasn't wanted anymore, but I tried to stick it out. I was lonely as a middle manager, operating between university administration and library staff, and balancing those two often-competing roles was tough. I wasn't happy. I let it get to me. To their credit, the powers that be realized this. The timing wasn't perfect, but hey, it rarely is. I should have started my job hunt earlier, and I shouldn't have taken MFPOW for granted-- if you're thinking about going on the job market in "six months," start now! Though we occasionally disagreed on strategy and tactics, the mission of my former place of work remains a worthy one, and I wish them the best of luck. It's telling that the staff who remain, including the current university librarian, are people I hired and trained. It's a nice legacy to have. Onward. 

I came to librarianship as a failed academic, having dropped out of a political science PhD program. This new job gives me a chance to put that other Masters to good use (I applied for pretty much every Political Science Librarian position on the east coast, but never got past phone or Skype interviews--more on this later), and is right in my wheelhouse in terms of what my dissertation was to be: an examination of the role, or lack thereof, the globalization of the English language plays in state language policies, if you're wondering. I'll also get to work with area studies materials and other resources from my poli sci days.

In addition, I hope to bolster my skill-set. Some front-end web development, often involving integrated library systems (ILS) and learning/content management systems (the LMS is the scene of one of my better failure stories); more project management; more committee work; and maybe more instructional design. Also, a chance to turn a weakness, marketing and outreach, into a strength; and an opportunity to explore what critical librarianship looks like in a special library, as this position is in the academic wing of a federal library.

That being said, it's not an academic library, at least not in the traditional sense. I want to find out what I like more: librarianship or higher education. I want to make sure I'm not in the former as a way to stick around the latter.

I wasn't the job I left. I am not the job I just accepted. We are not our jobs. Not the ones we left. Not the ones we want to take. You are not your job.

Let's see where the day takes us.

I could go the rest of my life and never make a slide as good as this one. #claps2016 #critlib #sneakpeak #spoilers pic.twitter.com/Y7DmWlvAoj

— Kevin Seeber (@kevinseeber) November 20, 2015

Guilty as Charged, or Yet Another MLIS Post

The Library Loon has glibly captured the sentiments, if not the actual words, of the Beerbrarian within the first sentence of her most recent post on rigor in Masters of Library and Information Science programs. The Loon's chief complaint with the Beerbrarian's suggestion on improving library schools is that doing so would make them more like regular graduate schools. On this point, the Beerbrarian is guilty as charged, hence, his apologies to those who've already seen this deceased horse, the title of this post.

The Beerbrarian has worked in many libraries, all of them academic in nature. The Beerbrarian is also a product of a liberal arts education and a Master's program in addition to his MLIS. The Beerbrarian has cognitive biases. He sees academic, regular graduate school nails with his cognitive hammer. That should not have happened, and will not henceforth. The Beerbrarian is most grateful to commenter Eric on this point, and to the Library Loon for hammering it home, if you will, the next day.

And yet, the "soulless bankrupt moribund enterprise" that is regular graduate school prepared the Beerbrarian well for an MLIS. Perhaps too well. The MLIS was, with a few notable exceptions, much easier than regular graduate school for the Beerbrarian. He maintains that the student population he encountered in regular graduate school seemed, on balance, more intelligent than his MLIS cohort. Just as troubling, the MLIS program was nowhere near as stimulating for the Beerbrarian, though he admits your mileage may vary, and it is damning with faint praise that each of these Masters programs seemed equally divorced from reality in his eyes.

The Beerbrarian also pleads guilty to "the union card" critique. The Beerbrarian, prior to entering a library and information science program, had already worked in circulation; preservation, including digitization; and cataloging at a variety of academic institutions, large and small. He also arrived with five years of teaching experience at an R1, albeit the majority of those as a teaching assistant. He knew to advance he needed an MLIS. The Beerbrarian did not arrive at an MLIS program with a chip on his shoulder, but did arrive with an ego, perhaps justifiably so when compared to many of his 22-year old colleagues, so many of who seemed unsure of the real world, united only by their love of reading. Could the Beerbrarian have learned more with a more open mind? No doubt. Did the Beerbrarian work as hard as he could have? No. Disdainful and entitled? To a degree. Lazy? At times. On these last two matters, the Beerbrarian guesses he was not above average in either of these conceits among his cohort. Did the Beerbrarian take only the easiest classes and skate by? Absolutely not. He took courses on what interested him and on what skills he did not already have or wanted to improve, such as copyright, adult reference services (the former), digitization, information literacy, and research methodologies (the latter). He sought out people who would put in their fair share on group projects and assignments, and is pleased that he is still friends with and collaborates with many of these colleagues.

The Beerbrarian is also pleased that this discussion is taking place, for it is one worth having. He asks you to please read commenter Eric's and The Library Loon's suggestions for improving the Masters experience in library school, such as portfolios, capstone experiences, and assignments with grounding in the real world of librarianship, among others. For academic librarians, and possibly others, the Beerbrarian maintains that some trappings of regular graduate school are necessary, and that some combination of theory and praxis is ideal for all. He knows that on this, the Loon agrees. He also knows that the ALA is made up of librarian members, all of whom have a vested interest in the profession of librarianship, in the many forms that may take. He encourages each and every one of us to do what we can to improve MLIS programs, be it at the national level, or a local one, such as teaching at a library school or mentoring new and prospective library(-ish) professionals.

In light of the above, the Beerbrarian is thrilled to learn that the ALA is considering some changes to its accreditation regime, and hopes that these are both procedural and substantive in nature. He also hopes that instructors like the Loon share what works in terms of MLIS instruction. The Beerbrarian guesses that within hide-bound MLIS programs, there are quite a few innovative instructors, assignments, and teaching methods to be publicized and celebrated.

CicerOWN'D

On February 14th, 2012, the number of Cicerone.org Certified Beer Servers (CBS) reached 10,000. As a present to all of us, the next day the exam was $10 instead of the usual $69, which triggered something like an exam stampede as over 700 people took the 60-question multiple choice exam on all things beer. 


Backstory: the word Cicerone® means "guide" in Italian and becoming a Certified Cicerone® is vaguely analogous to being a sommelier, which translates to "wine steward" in French, but for beer. Cicerone.org Certified Beer Servers are the first level of credentials handed out, the next being Certified Cicerone®. The final level earns one the title of Master Cicerone®, and the organization is notoriously stringent with its trademarks, which they are entitled to be.


I'm waiting for the final tally, but I know that February 15th was the busiest day ever for the Cicerone.org website, which at times wasn't able to handle the traffic. The website allows one to view the number of CBSs by city, so we'll soon find out how DC stacked up among those 700, but an informal tally via twitter reveals that at least 26 people in the #dcbrews community took and passed the exam. Meridian Pint lead the way, as 6 of their staff joined the ranks of Cicerone.org Certified Beer Servers. Coming in second as an institution was yours truly, DCBeer.com, with 4 CBSs now on staff, including myself.


I took the exam over a period of about 10 minutes, and for the first third of it I was working with a staff member on scheduling, so it wasn't exactly taxing, though there were a few questions that genuinely stumped me. I think of it as a feather in the cap, a sign that my beer knowledge is up to snuff. Ten dollars isn't a lot to pay for that validation, but I am ambivalent about the Cicerone® program. I don't think this is something you need for external validation, and it saddens me when people think that way. Blind item relating to this point: once I interviewed a restaurateur who lied about being a Certified Cicerone®, the next level up. It's mystifying that someone I talked to for several hours, who clearly knew what they were talking about when it came to beer, would misrepresent themselves like that. When I asked this person about being a Certified Cicerone®, I was told

That’s a very interesting question. For me it was mostly a business decision. There are a lot of [redacted] companies in [redacted] and I thought this could really help with marketing and finding a niche, and it did. I think that some people will take you more seriously with these kind of credentials. At the same time, it’s nice to have this piece of paper that shows what I know, what I’ve been working on for a long time.

When I found out (this information is easily accessible on the Cicerone.org website), this person confessed via twitter:

Ouch, had always used that as a means of conveying my expertise, never again. Self taught. IAdmire your thoroughness #lifeslessonsinhumility

We haven't spoken since.


There is a tension between making beer accessible to all - and I think most people agree that beer is more accessible than wine, which is one of its appeals - and acting as a gatekeeper to that knowledge, and that dichotomy is inherent in the program. I'm also surprised that Ray Daniels, who runs the organization, is the only person doing this. It strikes me that there's room for more than one of these operations, even though I'm not sure these operations need to exist outside of my, and our, need to validate and codify what we already know. 


What did you think of the exam, or of the Cicerone® program, or of the accreditation of craft beer? Does this make you more likely to sign up for a Certified Cicerone® exam, the next level up? Let me know in the comments, and if you were one of those who passed the exam, congrats!


[UPDATE: approximately 900 people took the CBS exam and passed on February 15th. Approximately 100 of them are from the DC-metro area. DCBeer has written about it. Also, please read JP's comment below, which could be a post on its own.]