Inspiring stuff to read, Take 2instruction, librarianship, libraries, library school, our digital future, tech trends

by Meredith Farkas on 9/7/2010 with 11 comments

I was thinking about writing a post reflecting on recent posts about the myth of the graying of the profession (and the coming librarian shortage) and Peter Brantley’s post about involving young’uns in discussing the future of libraries, but Colleen Harris beat me to the punch. And because she really knows how to tell-it-like-it-is, I …

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Numbers vs. meaningassessment, instruction, librarianship, libraries, management, reference

by Meredith Farkas on 7/21/2010 with 19 comments

Forgive this less-than-well-thought-out post. I’ve been thinking a lot about assessment lately and the librarianly love of numbers in assessment, and I’m a troubled by the way that some academic libraries tend to measure how well they are supporting the academic mission of the institution. Librarians keep a lot of statistics and measure a lot …

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Technology education and the “real world”american libraries, instruction, librarianship, libraries, library school, open source, our digital future, social software

by Meredith Farkas on 12/15/2008 with 20 comments

I just love that feeling of serendipity when I find that people are thinking about the same things I am at the same time. Karin Dalziel made an impassioned case for every librarian to learn how to program. Dorothea Salo responded to it and described how she thinks technology should be taught in library school. …

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Validation of my crackpot teaching ideasblogging, free the information!, instruction, library school, online education, social software

by Meredith Farkas on 12/11/2008 with 5 comments

Last week, my students in the Web 2.0 and Social Networking class I teach (at San Jose State) presented their fantastic proposals (via web conference) for implementing a specific social tool at a specific type of library. I was so impressed with their creativity and professionalism. Each of them made a very good case for …

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Loex 2008 goes online!free the information!, instruction, online education

by Meredith Farkas on 4/28/2008 with Comments Off on Loex 2008 goes online!

I got this email about LOEX 2008 Encore from Catherine Pellegrino at Saint Mary’s College and wanted to spread the word: The annual LOEX conference is trying something new as an experiment this year: three of their breakout sessions will be presented as live, interactive webcasts a few weeks after the conference: http://www.loexconference.org/2008/virtualsessions.htm I think …

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Building 21st century librarians AND librariesinstruction, librarianship, library school, management, our digital future, reference, social software, tech trends

by Meredith Farkas on 3/9/2008 with 20 comments

There were three recent posts that got me thinking a lot about the growing necessity to have tech-savvy people in public services positions. The first was Dorothea Salo’s post about how many librarians outside of Systems see learning about (or doing anything with) technology as being something outside of their sphere of responsibility. The second …

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