Whitepaper: The Value of American Library Association-Accredited Master’s Programs

The Value of American Library Association-Accredited Master’s Programs in Library & Information Studies:

Serving Our Communities Through a Professional Workforce

Presented to the: American Library Association

By: John Carlo Bertot, Lindsay C. Sarin

John Bertot Consulting

September 1, 2016

Download the whitepaper: The Value of a ALA Accredited Master's Programs in Library & Information Studies: Serving Our Communities Through a Professional Workforce (PDF, 187.38 KB, 25 pages)

 

In June 2016, the American Library Association commissioned John Bertot Consulting to prepare a white paper on the value of the ALA-accredited Master of Library and Information Studies (MLIS) degree. Bertot Consulting was invited to prepare the white paper because of Bertot’s work on the 2015 study Re-Envisioning the MLS: Findings, Issues and Considerations (University of Maryland, College of Information Studies).



For the ALA white paper, Bertot and co-author Lindsay C. Sarin were asked to explore and answer the following questions based on their extensive research which included interviews with librarians and educators:


•    What is the value of an ALA-accredited Master of Library and Information Studies (MLIS) degree?
•    What aptitudes, competencies, and abilities do MLIS degree-holding professionals possess that are unique to those degree holders?
•    What set of values do ALA-accredited MLIS-holding professionals hold that enable them to serve their respective communities in ways that other professional degree holders cannot?



Their white paper, delivered on September 1, 2016, responds to these questions.