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April 07, 2008
Coffee Talk: Diversifying the Profession
An interesting topic that came up at last Friday's coffee break was the issue of diversity in the library profession. At the last Senior Managers' meeting there was a presentation from a UM committee called STRIDE, Strategies and Tactics for Recruiting to Improve Diversity and Excellence, on faculty recruiting. Somebody asked about the presentation, which prompted a discussion about whether there were things we could do differently to improve diversity within the Library.
Are we doing all we can to recruit librarians of color?
Where do we advertise, do we send recruiters to relevant conferences, are we actively inviting candidates to apply for positions?
It was mentioned that one of the difficulties in hiring librarians of color is the relatively small number there are and, if we want a more diverse profession, library schools need to do a better job of recruiting diverse candidates.
Is librarianship as a profession appealing to people of color? Why or why not?
ALA has some statistics on credentialed librarians by race and ethnicity on its website.
88.3% of librarians are white, 4.8% are African-American, 3.3% are Asian/Pacific Islanders, 0.2% are Native American, 0.7% are two or more races, and 2.7% are Latino.
I don't remember what the percentages are at UM, I'll check with HR to get the numbers, but I do remember that Paul mentioned at the last Library Update that are numbers have been going down over the last few years.
What could we be doing differently to attract and retain more librarians of color, any suggestions?
Posted by kfolger at April 7, 2008 11:23 PM
Comments
I'd be very interested to hear the results of any discussion you smart people up at UM have! :)
I work in a department that is 100% white (well, I'm half Latino, but my skin color makes me appear white, so to students, I'm white) - and my school, UT Arlington, the student body is 50% non-white. Texas is one of just a few minority-majority states. If there should be a glut of librarians of color anywhere, it *should* be here.
What gives?
Posted by: efrierso at April 8, 2008 08:12 AM
I think a couple of things need to happen. One, Library Schools in general and UM in particular need to make and effort to seek out minority students. One easy way is to send recruiters to HBCU's to talk to undergrad students and more importantly talk to staff at the HBCU's library. There are also colleges and universities with large hispanic student bodies.It would seem thisis one quick and easy way to contact prospective students. In terms of recruiting more staff UM has and has had many minorities insupport staff roles that have obtained a MLS yet the powers that be continue to allow these staff members to leave for other positions. Even if the staff member does not fit the open position can't the administation set up some kind of internship program to train these staff members for other positions. Off the top of my head I can name at least 5 former minority staff members that obtained a MLS and could not even get interviewed for a position here at UM.
Posted by ransomcg at April
Posted by: ransomcg at April 9, 2008 10:50 AM
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