8:00 am – Checked my email. Checked reference email accounts. Answered a few reference questions, forwarded a database error on to our Head of Digital Initiatives and a Norwich history question to our Archives.
8:30 am – Director called me into her office to let me know that she’d heard back from the office that created the orientation schedule for the cadets. Apparently, we now have 35 minutes and 40 students to split between the library and the museum (last year we had 1 hour and 15 minutes and 20-25 students) since they are giving the Academic Achievement Center a period and a half. Given space constraints, there is no way that 40 students will fit, and given the time constraints, there’s almost nothing we can do. My Director and I agreed that under these circumstances, we’d rather just not do it and would rather just get the students when they come to the library for EN101. Ironically, the civilian tours, which were a disaster last year (every civilian student coming to the library over the course of an hour and a half on no set schedule), are now going to be great, with 8 groups of 20 coming for 40 minutes each. Nice!
8:50 am – Work on clues for the scavenger hunt for the civilians. Walk around the library thinking of tasks for them to do and wrote up new clues.
9:30 am – Worked on instructional goals for FY10. I met with most of the librarians who take part in instruction a few weeks ago and we decided that the two things we’d like to focus most on this year are increasing faculty awareness of library resources and services and improving our own instructional effectiveness through assessment/analysis and peer review. Last year I did so many instruction sessions that I didn’t have time to really focus on instructional program administration, so I am promising myself that I will delegate more to our other instruction librarians.
10:15 am – finally took some psychology books that I’d weeded a few weeks ago down to the cataloger to delete and ordered a new version of a neuropsychology book for which we had the 1976 edition (ouch!).
10:35 am – Looked over new employee orientation since my new employee will be starting in a couple of weeks.
10:50 am – filled out reimbursement paperwork for ALA Annual, which I keep forgetting to do.
11:10 am – pumped and caught up on feeds
11:35 am – started cleaning off my desk. Since I’ve been working so few hours this summer, I’ve been just letting things pile up on my desk and now it looks like a disaster area. Made some headway, but got distracted by pile of LIS journals.
12:30 pm – ate lunch and put many, many journals into my colleagues’ boxes.
1:00 pm – received an email asking for the key to the office I’ve been using to pump breastmilk in (since my office is actually the most fishbowl-iest in the building). Someone in the Academic Achievement Center is taking over that office on Monday and wants to move in tomorrow. That was the final straw for me. Yesterday, my boss had told me that someone was taking over that office on Monday (!) and asked if I’d be ok with going to his office and pumping while he went somewhere else during that time. She also said that they put in an order with facilities to have blinds put on the windows of my office. I said yes, because I didn’t really see another option, but honestly, I wasn’t really ok with it. How uncomfortable to have to ask a stranger to leave his office so that I can pump breastmilk in it. Yuck! The email asking for my key was the final straw that made me realize that no, I can’t do this. It’s been one thing after another since I came back to work. First, no one had a key for the office where I’d be pumping and the glass door had not been covered (though our Office Manager had asked Facilities to do it 2 or 3 months before). Then, I got a guilt trip from someone (not library staff) that I was taking up an office to do this and was asked “well how long are you planning on doing this for?” I can see why so many working women stop breastfeeding when they go to work, because even in a pretty supportive environment like mine, there can be so many barriers, inconveniences, and uncomfortable situations. I had a few moments where I actually felt guilty for inconveniencing people… but then I got over it.
1:45 pm – decided to ask Director if I could just use paper and cover all the windows in my office. She didn’t seem crazy about the idea from an aesthetic sense, but she understands what a difficult situation this has been for me, so she said yes. Good thing too, since apparently, facilities hasn’t even ORDERED the blinds for my office!!! Sigh…
2:00 pm – Cut craft paper and taped up the windows. Finished product is ugly, but it is private.
3:00 pm – Answered some emails.
3:30 pm – Pumped in my office for the first time and caught up on RSS feeds.
4:00 pm – Worked some more on clues for scavenger hunt.
4:30 pm – Headed home. Not coming back to work until next Thursday, so this will be it for now!
Hi,meredith. You are a super woman. Your work day is so busy. I need to learn from you. I think this will imporve my efficiency if I can do like you.
Feel lucky I live in civilised country where maternity leave from work is longer than in the US and PAID. Honestly don’t know how y’all do it.
If only you also had an older child too who could colour on the craft paper to make it less ugly. It’s a shame that new mothers who work are often made to feel ashamed or guilty by one party or another.
I agree with Julie though, it really is great for those of us who live in places where parents are able to take longer leaves (not that I’m a mother, or plan to be).