Preaching, Teaching and Presenting

2014 has been a hectic year as far as making a difference in the lives of people. Being involved in Information Literacy as a Training Librarian never leaves a dull moment.

Using my God given gift of teaching and preaching, I have over the years developed InfoLit courses because it used to freak me out when students came to the Library and did not have a cooking-clue of what it was all about and trying to teach them life-skills on a one-to-one basis is soul destroying.
Honestly one student had the mouse on the screen of the monitor trying to ''click'' on the catalogue button.

The existing content when I arrived around 18 years ago ran for 30 minutes, was presented at first on a hand-written transparency and was bogged down with library terminology and information overload. Having taken photos and moving to a slide projector the training at least had some visual content even though all the librarians had to march in, stand down the wall of the training room and smile - it was a start.  Once PowerPoint appeared on the market and I leaned to tweak it - we started to fly. Evaluations show that the students enjoy the training and would recommend it to others to attend. 

Over the years different people moved in and out of the curriculum development scene leaving their stamp and expertise intermingled with my modules - including since the merger of a whole lot of institutions to form Tshwane University of Technology an "Information Literacy Committee". I love their brains.

Today I have what I feel is an user-friendly, suited for 1st years from city or disadvantaged rural communities, Information Literacy course made up of 6 modules and ever expanding to YouTube as well.

It is blended with interactive sections, games, videos [some self-made], quizzes etc.  I am no longer the 'king-pin' but have a deep sense of satisfaction that I birthed almost 18 years ago - will around 2015 or a year later, become a full academic subject on the time table of every student at TUT.  The feeling is almost as good as when I put the first 386 desktop PC down for students to use and the whole Librarian body was up-in-arms - ''how dare I allow a student to touch a computer''. Later when I suggested we try to be a bit more creative with the interior design as the infant Internet slowly made an appearance - they nearly passed out. "We are academic, we have an image to keep" mmmm - like black and white bullet pointed PowerPoint presentations, flat shoes and a bun in the hair, glasses on the nose, suited clothing - is what they meant. Man a lot has changed LOL. Those were the days. Lest we forget.

Today I sit next to a 64 computer lab in the library [one of many on the different campuses], - guide students in using Internet from an academic perspective and introduce them to the secrets hidden in the databases we subscribe to, plus I keep redeveloping the methods and content in the modules.

This year I won the award for best speaker at the OCLC flash talks in Cape Town covering the story of a library I started in a rural school in Soshanguve, gave a workshop covering advanced PowerPoint training for Trainers that includes how to bring life to PowerPoint when teaching students [would make those initial baby-boomer librarians turn in their graves] and have trained over the years in excess of 20 000 students making them independent researchers who now find security in the library, love the online libraries of the world including ours and understand how to reference correctly and evaluate content - no longer needing the librarian to provide the information but only to guide them to the information.

Goals for the future - to make online tutorials [just taught myself Camtasia] and online assessments in Blackboard.  Look for new methods for the changing generations and their learning preferences - immaterial if its a baby-boomer who came for training and is asking 'what happened to the books and journals'? Even a X-generation. Immaterial if its a left or a right brained person, a 1st year who could be 18 or 38 years or a post graduate - myself being a right brain, dominated by a left brain baby-boomer,  I am flexible enough to adapt and old enough to have empathy.  That is why I love what I do. They say only 20% of the world is in a job they love, it's great to be in the minority. Two more years then I pension - wonder what doors will open up after that. Can't wait!!

The death of the "Ordinary Librarian"

The Death of the Ordinary Librarian aka Ordinary Librarian, Research Librarian or Personal Librarian - which one are you?  

LIASA 15^th - Annual Conference in the mother city Cape Town.

Institutions like a major correspondence Institution dominated many of the papers on the future of Librarians and the role they are going to play in the new playing fields of libraries.

Research is obviously a key factor in South Africa not just to place it on the global map but also to enhance the world we live in and bring credit and funding to any institution, so the focus of the librarian as a support system to the normal run of the mill student body, seemed to take an insignificant place in the order of things at the LIASA Conference 2013.

I remember thinking – oh my word if they had it their way they would close down all institutional libraries that assist undergraduates and just concentrate on researchers – it was as if in their minds “everyone is born a post grad”.

In fact one library has removed the word ‘support’ completely from its job description for librarians almost as if ‘support’ was dirty and undesirable.

I listened fascinated as the papers were presented and started suggesting that the emergence of the Research Librarian would cause that the qualifications needed could be up to a PhD because the argument is, and maybe rightly so, – if you are assisting post graduates who are busy with ground breaking research in let’s say engineering, then at the very least you need a qualification one higher than they have. It even seemed to be suggested that in a case like this a PhD in engineering was more important than a PhD in Library Science. In fact I would go as far as to analyse that this is the route some of the larger institutions are considering taking.

The other title branded about was that of the Personal Librarian. Librarians were encouraged to ‘go to the users’, some had even been given an office in the faculty where they could operate from a few times per week. These Personal Librarians would hold the hands of the lecturers who were doing research and almost inclusively be used by them much in the same way as a personal secretary.

I found it hard in today’s economic environment, budget cuts and streamlining of posts with possible downsizing of many libraries; - to separate what was fantasy from reality in these papers. Which library in all truth can afford to take a large chunk of its Librarians and offer them up as sacrifices on the altar -  solely for research and/or as Personal Librarians situated away from the reference desk.

I realise that many of our upcoming users are bypassing the library when it comes to finding information and as Librarians one will have to keep rethinking the role you play in a changing digital environment. But honestly – this is Africa not every student walking through the door is a digital native and from what I see in the training room many are first generation students who come with massive gaps in knowledge and research skills. I do believe the new Chat-Line for students with their General Librarians will go a long way to earn you the respect of your users however, in the light of what is being discussed at the Conference, Top Management and Library Management will have to go back to the drawing board – if they every left it, and re-look at how the Library will support research in a more personal way.

Releasing Librarians for personal use to me should form part of a Faculty Budget – I am not sure this should fall on the shoulders of Library Heads and Executive Committees to scuttle around with the re-engineering and further deplete the dwindling Librarian posts.

While I understand the urgency of research and the bigger urgency for the Librarians to reinvent themselves to meet the needs of researchers, I am very aware of the forty thousand or so undergraduates that have to be serviced. If we leave them to their own devices we may sit with a larger headache a few years down the line when they turn into researchers without the necessary skills, without being able to identify and evaluate information, without being able to produce a unique assignment based not only on their findings but on their own logical assumptions and new ideas based on sound research foundations.

The other issue I have is, if the Librarian is a PhD in Engineering and is just about doing the research for the researcher – are we really producing researchers or just people who ‘plagiarize the Librarians brains’ and could not do their own unique research even if it was expected of them. Where is the cut-off point? Or is there none? Does the researcher write on his thesis –his name and next to it the Research Librarians name seeing as they did most of the work anyway?

‘Nice to have’ these specialised Librarians - if you have the budget or if government comes to the table and provides additional funding for Research Librarians and Personal Librarians as it should; if it is really serious about Research as it says it is.

However it worries me that the powers that be seemed to have declared null and void the guidance that the General Librarian can still provide to the majority of the under graduate student body at the University and Institutions albeit via Chat lines, Social Networks etc and not face to face as was the traditional role played. It worries me that the mention of under-graduate programs and support hardly made the headlines in the discussions or papers that were presented but for a few.

Honestly?  Has the role of the Librarian and the library as a whole, really changed that much, that quickly? Are we going to shut the doors already and lie down and die while our users plagiarize the world of online information with their skills on an ever downward spiral and no Librarians to guide the way forward? Librarians may no longer be the keepers of information but they certainly are still the tour guides to it.

In stark contrast to the established post matric educational institutions with their government sponsored infrastructure - I attended a few sessions with school, public and special interest libraries because, what is happening there, has a ripple effect when those children become students and walk through our physical or virtual doors. What I heard there turned my blood to ice especially in the light of what I discussed above. Some public librarians even felt that Information literacy skill training was not applicable to them. Oi veh!!

The infrastructure in most provinces of fully stocked libraries with trained librarians and access to digital information is, as one speaker from Limpopo tactfully put it, ‘deteriorating by the day’.  The person for Education and a few government officials were delegates. The lady for Gauteng Education was quick to brag about the literacy programs they had in place and how they supported school and public libraries. What she said was in stark contrast to what was actually happening on the ground if you took note of what speaker after speaker laid before the Conference and came to light during open discussions. I can attest to the lack of resources at school and public library level as I work mainly with information illiterate first years, the majority of which have never seen the inside of a library. I was very tempted to challenge her and the honourable government member but I kept my pose as we may need them in future and taking her on in open debate was not a good idea. Let her have her day, history will prove her mistaken in the difference her efforts where making in the global scheme of things. We need a nationwide effort when it comes to support for educators and scholars.

Telling industry to provide the funding is just as chilling. When the king abdicated his throne for the love of his life it was to a equal who could take his place. When Education abdicates its position of the leader in education to industry its on dangerous ground. Industry in any case wants to welcome well trained researchers into its family, they do not want to have to make the bottles of milk. No wonder less and less corporates are investing in South Africa.

If municipalities do not have the expertise or passion or vision to do it, then Government needs to spend some of the tax money to send experts to get the ball rolling at a much faster rate than it is rolling at present; if it is rolling at all.

In Limpopo the school and public libraries for the number of people living there and the mainly rural environment they find themselves in, is a horrific tragedy, to say the least. The sentiment was not –‘we need to build infrastructure and uplift the people better preparing them for their future academic studies’. The basic sentiment was, ‘well it’s largely rural so there is very little we can do” and everyone had their moment-of-silence for the lost-cause, but moved on – no way!! 

If I swore I could think of some choice words to say here. For goodness sake – if you as government and municipalities have identified what is a growing crisis for a nation; surly you find solutions and provide the funding to make it a reality, not just sweep it under the carpet and hope it will disappear. I lost count of how many people attested to no funding for new books and resources on the shelves of rudimentary libraries that did not meet the curriculum needs. 

Education and support for those who are going through studying or teaching – are the only solutions to poverty and to uplift our people into the new world and from them, we birth the researchers of tomorrow. Are you trying to tell me no researchers will come from rural Limpopo except from the one or two universities in the area– what a waste of a countries talent! 

No one is born information literate, no one is born being able to use Internet, online databases or do research correctly but everyone can be taught and learn, and the younger they learn the better for themselves and for the institutions that will absorb them after school.

Research Librarians, Personal Librarians – awesome thought and it needs perusing; but getting back to the millions and millions that are not there yet, what about placing more resources in the hands of the humble General Librarian. How about skilling them to be able to cope with the new demands and expectations of the upcoming students – those who are from rural backgrounds and those who are from the cities.

Closing thoughts - Come on –do we need a PhD to assist a ‘fresh out of matric’ with how to locate, evaluate and use accredited information –man I don’t think so. Is the role of the General Librarian really so mundane and unimportant that it hardly took centre stage and left most of the delegates desiring the more lucrative and highly esteemed senior posts of Research and Personal Librarians.  

My thoughts are, that in the rush to be the most important Research Institution in Africa, I think the library has lost the vision of its vital role with undergraduate students. Simply providing Information Literacy courses like some do, is not enough. 

How as Librarians and Libraries we support users in future - may be on the transformational landscape – but we cannot just cross it out as no longer relevant to, what remains in many aspects, a very third world population in South Africa and Africa. 

Schools, Public Libraries, Specialised Libraries and Academic Libraries need to take hands, share resources and skills and form a unified approach – taking each others needs into consideration, to combat what may be the biggest man-made disaster in the twentieth century happening right under our noses.  Your Training Librarian. 2013

Man's Inhumanity to man?? reflected in two movies

District 9

Ok I have a love hate relationship with this movie. The first 45 minutes irritated me out of my skin.

It was reminiscent of the ‘old – first try’ South African movies. Felt like really bad acting. One of the reasons I stopped going to watch them years ago. Even if you are acting like you can’t act – you should be able to act. Then again maybe I just have a thing about making South Africans – especially an Afrikaner with an English accent sound dumb.

Then as I got into the story I began to wonder if this was just a spoof on the political situation in South Africa hidden behind a sci-fi saucer and a few prawn-look-alike characters, that at first glance looked like their costumes were made from papier-mâché.

Later when it converted to something from a ‘transformer’ comic book, I began to think this guy has just mixed and matched everything he has been exposed to and come up with a rather poorly acted movie.

But give it some credit – it highlighted in a few places  man’s inhumanity to anyone who does not fit their profile of what they expect.  How easily we attack something we do not understand and how easily we ‘shoot first and ask questions later’. Maybe it was just too close to the truth that formed part of my life in the apartheid era to be enjoyable and just to sit back and relax and watch the movie. I felt sickened by what is happening in our country at the moment and other places worldwide as well - after all not all aliens are extraterrestrial. Overall not a bad movie - for the night out. I would give it a 4 out of 6.

Conversations with God [DVD shop Golden Oldie]

Ok this one I will have to rewatch. Set in the past, present and future of a mans life, with these three timezones intertwining each other, left me rather exhausted trying to work out if this was something happening to him now, if it was a backflash, or something in his future, or if it just worked on the platform of reincarnation. 

One thing that really got to me, was when he digs in the dustbins looking for tins and eventually food. This hit a raw nerve as we have people like this in our streets everyday, and in South Africa its getting worse as the economic crises oozes down to the grass-roots of humanity. This movie and District 9 had similarities when it comes to how man treats others of his own kind or those who he perceives to be 'different'.

As I watched, I just wished none of it were true, I enjoy fantasy but in both movies this was reality disguised as fantasy. Both District 9 and Conversations with God - made me feel uncomfortable for those portraying these 'street people' and the slums that are part and parcel of my day to day living. Both made me revisit my own thoughts and how I treat others that are 'different to me'. Both had a strong message to reach out -  so from now on I feed all the 'aliens' and 'beggars' at my gate, and just hope that what ever is buried in my cellar, stays buried. LOL