UC Berkeley Students Protest Saturday Closing of Campus Libraries

Today I came across an article from SFGate.com about 300 UC Berkeley students holding a sit in to protest the closing of the smaller campus libraries on campus. It's wonderful having students show such support for the library and hopefully this will show administrators how important libraries are to students, especially during a time when some believe that "brick and motor" libraries are obsolete in the age of Google. While most of the comments have been positive, one struck me:

"5 shifts a day
4 hours per shift
2 students per shift
7 days a week
20 per hour
52 weeks

=291200

Toss in 1 UCB full time employee spending 4 hours per week for administration

15000

insurance

4000

=310000

How many students use that library? Say 3000.

That's $100 per student assuming no capital expenditures or money for janitorial maintence."

Student workers to open shop and check out books, with one "administrator" coming in four hours a week? I know of no libraries, or any other institution really, that could run on that sort of model.

It's no surprise to librarians that the general public has very little idea about what we do. When one thinks about it, this isn't actually that surprising. Much of what we do, program planning, collection development, cataloging, goes on behind the scenes and most patron only interact with the library staff person behind the circulation desk. So what can librarians do about this? I don't pretend that there are easy answers, but things like this remind me that we need to speak up and set the record straight about what we do. Libraries can also publicize library programs and services to people outside of the library, do outreach to different parts of the community we serve, and make the library more accessable. We are a profession built on providing access, but instead of using everyday words that actually tell people what we do, we use "library speak". We don't need a "reference desk", we need a "research help and information desk". Librarians work hard to provide services and programs to the community we serve, sometimes it helps to remember that many don't know what we do, and that has and effect on public support for libraries.