ALA Recruitment Assembly Notes Monday, January 23, 2006 ALA Midwinter Meeting – San Antonio

Attendees

 Julie Brewer, Chair, ALA Recruitment Assembly
 Beatrice Calvin, Program Officer, ALA HRDR Office
 Deborah Costa, RUSA Representative
 Denise Davis, Simmons College
 Kathleen Delong, University of Alberta (attending for ACRL Representative)
 Tracie Hall, Director, ALA Diversity Office
 Irene Hoffman, Georgetown University (attending for ACRL Representative)
 Chrystal Carr Jeter, ALSC Representative
 Megan Kinney, Mellon Librarian Recruitment Program
 Robert Labaree, University of Southern California
 Monique Le Conge, PLA Representative
 Larry Neal, PLA Recruitment Committee
 Connie Paul, ASCLA-ICAN
 Claudia Sumler, Past Chair, ALA Recruitment Assembly
 Lorelle Swader, Director, HRDR Office
 Manuel Urrizola, ALCTS Representative          

Reports on Recruitment Initiatives

 Librarians Association of the University of California Irvine – Manuel Urrizola

 ALCTS/SAGE Support Staff Travel Grant - Manuel Urrizola

 MassBlast (IMLS) – Denise Davis

 Becomealibrarian.com – Connie Paul

 Recruiting Urban Librarians (IMLS) – Connie Paul

 Mellon Librarian Recruitment Program – Megan Kinney

 PLA Recruitment Committee – Larry Neal

 UCLA Diversity Recruitment and Mentoring Committee – Deborah Costa

 USC tuition assistance program – Robert Laboree

 Georgetown University internal recruitment program – Irene Hoffman

 CIRLA Fellows Program (IMLS) – Irene Hoffman

 The 8Rs Canadian Library Human Resource Study – Kathleen Delong

 Knowledgeseekers.org – Tracie Hall

  Black Collegiate and Careers and Colleges magazine ads – Lorelle Swader

 National Career Development Association Conference program – Lorelle Swader

Demonstration of LibraryCareers.org

 Larry Neal provided a live demonstration of the new ALA library career recruitment website which very recently went live at LibraryCareers.org.   It looks great!   Megan offered to share photos that may be added to the website.   Feedback and suggestions regarding the website may be directed to Beatrice Calvin at bcalvin@ala.org.   She will confer with Larry on substantial changes and additions.   See attached marketing plan for ideas the Assembly proposed for “rolling out” the new website to the library community.

Concerns of new MLS graduates

 Tracie Hall led a discussion related to employment opportunities and challenges facing new MLS graduates.    Messages on library blogs and listservs and articles in library publications indicate that the number of entry-level jobs may have declined in recent years.   These reports conflict with data and predictions about the impending mass retirements of librarians.   The Recruitment Assembly affirmed that ALA needs a continuing recruitment initiative regardless of the economy or job market.   Messages about the availability of future employment need to be responsible.   The Recruitment Assembly expressed interest in including newer librarians and finding ways to respond to the concerns that have been raised.

Future Initiatives

 ALA recruitment video – The ALA Recruitment Assembly continues to look for opportunities to produce a recruitment video which may streamed and distributed via the web.

 Poster session at 2006 Annual Conference – The ALA Recruitment Assembly will submit a poster session application to promote various recruitment resources, including the new website, and

 Vocational tests – Questions came up about how library careers and personality characteristics are profiled in standard vocational tests.    Attendees were encouraged to review Discovering Librarians: Profiles of a Profession / edited by Mary Jane Scherdin. Chicago: ACRL, 1994.

 Participation in ALA Recruitment Assembly – Lorelle confirmed that membership on the Assembly is inclusive and not limited to those appointed by ALA divisions.    Julie will invite additional IMLS grant recipients, NMRT, and others to attend next meeting.  

 Learning communities – Lorelle reported that she has created an ALA learning community for the Recruitment Assembly.    This new technology forum supported by ALA should enable the Assembly to communicate and work more efficiently between conferences.   She will send more information soon.

 ALA Recruitment Clearinghouse – The meeting concluded before there was time to talk about the clearinghouse which currently is located at http://www2.lib.udel.edu/personnel/clearinghouse/home.htm.   Please send additions and updates to Julie at jbrewer@udel.edu.  

draft by Julie Brewer

1/26/2006