Generally speaking I am in agreement with Susan on most issues here. We'll
address the LIS/InfoSci split at another time and venue.

Most of the reasoning here can be summed up in a phrase used by a former
colleague of mine:

"The LIS schools are in charge of education. Practice (broadly defined) is in
charge of training." That's not exact, but you get the idea.

No library director should expect a newly minted librarian to know all the ins
and outs of practice at a particular institution. When I started as a 
librarian
back in the dark ages somebody on staff was intensely annoyed that I did not
know what a "P slip" was. In the Air Force they were known as "snowflakes," a
term totally unknown to the person complaining about my lack of knowledge.

Charley Seavey
Ranganathan said it all!


Quoting Sue Myburgh <[log in to unmask]>:

> Dear all
> I agree with Mr Sloan: this is a perennial topic of debate.  And it 
> is ultimately completely irrelevant.  If there isn't a chasm between 
> LIS education and practice, there jolly well should be.  It is the 
> task of educators (and I refer here to academics or faculty whose 
> goal is to 'educate' - please look up this word if you do not know 
> what is means) to introduce neophyte information professionals to the 
> DISCIPLINE of 'LIS' (or whatever else you want to call it.  I believe 
> the split between 'Librarianship' and 'Information Science' 
> constitutes another hoary debate, largely promulgated by our US 
> cousins, and which should be knocked on the head or shot at dawn, 
> whichever is quicker).
> In such a program, the learners can learn the history and development 
> of how information is created and communicated, and with what effect, 
> which will take in the development of language as a representative 
> system, the development of writing, of printing and the consequent 
> development of libraries.  It will deal with the necessity of 
> describing and physically (even if digital) organising documents or 
> information artefacts; the principles of categorisation and 
> classification.  It will examine how people look for information, and 
> what they do on the rare occasions that they actually come to a 
> 'library' to find it.  It will furthermore consider the processes and 
> purposes of reading.  It will be based on the premise that 
> information is alchemic, and transformative, and this provides our 
> professional raison d'etre - that being able to understand 
> information and make use of it might help people live their lives on 
> this earth.
>
> The details of HOW these places of physical storage and access work, 
> what should be stocked in them, who should be allowed to access them, 
> and when, what should be avoided or discarded, what the visitors to 
> such information stores should know and what we should know to help 
> them, how to look after the information artefacts and describe them 
> and store them for specific purposes: ALL OF THESE TECHNIQUES should 
> be taught by the employer concerned.  There are too many tasks in 
> every library for ANY LIS program to make even the slightest attempt 
> to train their learners in them - and this is NOT important either, 
> as these techniques change not only from institution to instutituion, 
> but over time as well.
>
> Employers should get over this - unless they want clerks and 
> administrators, and not professionals who serve a social purpose and 
> assume (quite serious) social responsibilties (which can even involve 
> life and death).  It is quite ridiculous for university-based 
> educational programs to attempt to focus on work-related 
> 'competencies', which they cannot do very well anyway without being 
> in a real-life setting.  This is something that employers must assume 
> - as all for-profit businesses assume as well (just look at how new 
> accountants, doctors, lawyers, architects, nurses and so forth are 
> treated and trained in the first year or two on the job, after 
> university.
> But this brings me to a wider discussion about how universities 
> should stop thinking they are money-making training enterprises, and 
> should rather be phrontisteries that encourage creativity and 
> innovation in society.  So I'll stop here.
> Love to all for a Happy New Year from a VERY HOT (43 celsius - over 
> 100 fahrenheit?) Adelaide.
> Susan
>
> Dr S Myburgh
> School of Communication, Languages and International Studies
> University of South Australia
> Adelaide
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Open Lib/Info Sci Education Forum [[log in to unmask]] On 
> Behalf Of Muriel Wells [[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Saturday, 9 January 2010 11:15 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: 2010 Forum on Library Education
>
> Won't our work address the issue Mr. SLoan is talking about here?
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: B.G. Sloan <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Fri, January 8, 2010 3:10:37 PM
> Subject: Re: 2010 Forum on Library Education
>
>
> This announcement asks: "Is there a chasm between LIS education and 
> professional practice?"
>
> As Yogi Berra once said, "It's like deja-vu, all over again." Isn't 
> this question asked just about every year? And don't we wind up with 
> one group saying "Yes, there is a chasm", and another group saying 
> "No, there isn't a chasm"? Then there's some heated debate, and maybe 
> a report. Then people get tired of talking about the question and it 
> gets put on a back burner until the next round.
>
> It sure would be nice to put this question to rest once and for all 
> by actually answering it.  I remember John Unsworth's suggestion last 
> summer in the iSchool/iCaucus response to the ALA Library Education 
> Task Force report:
>
> "As deans of the iSchools, we suggest that the most efficient means 
> of achieving the outcomes that you desire would be to conduct 
> empirical research leading to a genuine understanding of the needs of 
> the profession and to consider how those needs are, or are not, being 
> met by programs such as ours. We envision this work being conducted 
> in an atmosphere of mutual respect between those who teach and those 
> who practice, and would willingly engage the expertise and resources 
> of the iSchools in the achievement of such an outcome."
>
> To the best of my knowedge, no one (on either "side") ever took John 
> up on his suggestion.
> I, for one, am really tired of the "chasm" debate. It always seems to 
> end with both sides each convincing themselves that their position is 
> correct.
>
> Bernie Sloan
>
> --- On Thu, 1/7/10, Patricia Antrim <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> From: Patricia Antrim <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: 2010 Forum on Library Education
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Date: Thursday, January 7, 2010, 2:55 PM
>
> The following announcement is sent on behalf of the ALA Committee on 
> Education.
>
> 2010 Forum on Library Education
>
> The American Library Association (ALA) Committee on Education and the
> Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE) will
> present a forum on Library Education. The forum will be hosted by ALISE
> and held during the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Boston, (MA) at the Boston
> Park Plaza Hotel & Towers, 3:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 15,
> 2010.
> This year's theme will be: "Learning Outcomes: Methodologies for
> Connecting Communities"
>
> Representatives from Library & Information Studies (LIS) education and
> ALA divisions will discuss the following issues of learning outcomes in
> LIS education and how the professional community views LIS graduates:
> What is a Learning Outcome? How might the new competences impact LIS
> education? What relationship do the new competences have to established
> division competences? Is there a chasm between LIS education and
> professional practice?
> The forums on library education are annual events and are venues for an
> open exchange of ideas and ongoing dialogue between LIS educators and
> library practitioners on current topics related to library education
> matters.
> Speakers:  Rachel A. Applegate, Indiana University - Indianapolis;  Lynn
> S. Connaway, OCLC; Sara Kelly Johns, Lake Placid Middle/High School
> (NY); Dan O'Connor, Rutgers University and Scott Walter, University of
> Illinois - Urbana.
> For updates and additional information about the Forum, please visit the
> website:
> http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/hrdr/abouthrdr/hrdrliaisoncomm/c
> ommitteeoned/libraryeducationforum.cfm
>
> Lorelle Swader
>
>
>
> **Please include the history of email correspondence in your reply**
>
> Dr. Patricia Antrim
> Chair, Educational Leadership & Human Development
> Lovinger 4102
> University of Central Missouri
> Warrensburg, MO  64093
> Phone: 660-543-8633
> Fax: 660-543-4164