James Sweetland, Library Link Convenor, North America

As mentioned in an earlier article see Library Link archives, Library Financing in the United States of America: A General Overview the US library situation is somewhat complex. However, keeping this fact in mind, it is possible to generally summarize who staffs the libraries, in terms of overall qualifications, training, and job descriptions. Since there is no national licensing of library staff at any level, terminology and exact duties may vary a bit in different parts of the US, but the following should provide a generally accurate guide.

TYPES OF LIBRARY STAFF:

The American Library Association has a policy defining the basic types of staff in libraries. While not compulsory, many libraries use these grades or something quite similar, so they are of value. They are also about the only general such listing available. The following is a brief summary of the document, "Library Education and Personnel Utilization: A Statement of Policy Adopted by the Council of the American Library Association, June 30, 1976." The full document is available from the ALA Office for Library Personnel Resources.

Librarian
Holds a master's degree in librarianship, information science, information studies or the like. This degree is ideally from an accredited school in library and information studies, but there is no general requirement that this be so. Similarly, not all libraries require either the master's degree, or that it be in librarianship. Typically, the smaller the library, the less the likelihood that even its director will hold a master's degree, or that it will be accredited. Some states, however, do require some formal post-graduate training, at least for the Director.

Duties involve some form of management, in the words of the ALA, "which require independent judgment, interpretation of rules and procedures, analysis of library problems, an formulation of original and creative solutions for them (normally utilizing knowledge of the subject field represented by the field of the academic degree)."

In larger libraries, and in many special libraries, the title "librarian" may also be used for specialists in such things as archives, preservation, and specialize subject fields, even if the person in question does not hold a library degree. There is an enormous body of literature on the issue both of the use of the term, "librarian", and of what, if any, qualifications are implied by that term. Many special libraries, in fact, prefer terms such as "information specialist" or "researcher", among many others.

Library Associate:
Ideally, holds a bachelor's degree with some library science coursework. Provides various sorts of support services, involving a degree of judgment and subject knowledge such as is usually obtained by completing a bachelor's degree. The ALA recommendations, it should be noted, do not suggest that any librarianship coursework is a requirement.

In many libraries, notably elementary and secondary school library media centers in the U.S., the "library media specialist" is often a person who holds a bachelor's degree in Education, with some coursework in librarianship. Their title is usually something along the lines of "school librarian". In practice, the term "library associate" is rarely used.

Library Technical Assistant:
Holds a two-year college degree (such as Associate Arts degree), or has at least two years of college study, or has some other formal training in the relevant library skills beyond the secondary level. In theory, LTAs perform support to Library Associates, in fact they usually support Librarians directly. The tasks generally involve work that follows established rules and procedures, but may also include supervising such work.

Clerk:
Business school, or similar training in relevant skills, which may often taken place in secondary schools, supplement by on-the-job training and experience. Duties involve all kinds of clerical support within a library.

These terms are often modified in actual use. One example of this may be seen in the classification for library staff used by the State of Wisconsin. Each of these categories has multiple salary grades, depending on the needs for experience, training, and education in the specific job assignment:

• Librarian Supervisor: A person with the qualifications of a librarian, but whose job primarily involves management duties.
  
• Librarian: A person who performs a multiplicity of professional librarian tasks.
  
• Library Associate: In effect, a librarian who only performs one librarian task, such as original cataloging.
  
• Library Assistant: A paraprofessional or clerk, ranging in requirements as listed above for Clerk, LTA and Library Associate. The lowest grade includes such duties as shelving books, checking out library materials; the highest grade includes management of a small library, and performance of all necessary technical duties related to that.
  
• The state also has classifications for such positions as "Clerk" and "Secretary" and "Word Processing Operator", who may work in a library setting, but do not formally perform any duties specific to a library. For example, a person who checks out, checks in and reshelves books would be a "library assistant"; a person who provided data entry and simple bookkeeping services would be called a "clerk".
  

And, although there has been considerable discussion, with considerable heat, over the past century, many people routinely use the word, "librarian" to apply to any employee of a library, or to any person who has some responsibility for a collection of documents. So, the musician or clerk who oversees the collection of parts and scores for an orchestra or opera company is often called the "music librarian", even though they have no training or experience or qualifications in library work as such. For example, few of the Librarians of Congress have had any formal library training.

The state of Wisconsin, like most other states, also has its own classification scheme, but only for public library directors. While this is not directly a "librarian" grade scheme, it is roughly in the same category as the above. In essence, the requirements for the director/head librarian are based on the size of the population served by the library, and begin with very minimal educational qualifications (including a specialized, but brief, training program). Only the directors of the largest libraries are required to have a college degree plus some additional, formal, post-graduate library training. Of course, these requirements are only for the chief management officer-there are no specific state-wide requirements for any other library employee.

Many academic and public libraries in the U. S. however, regardless of the minimum requirements of their governing body, tend to require, or at least "strongly prefer" as a "librarian" a person who holds a master's degree from a school accredited by the American Library Association.

EDUCATION FOR LIBRARIANSHIP

The general qualifications are listed above. Obviously, it is assumed that the typical "librarian" will have a master's degree, probably from an accredited library school (regardless of its exact title). Since accreditation is not common in all parts of the world, a few words on this would be relevant:

In brief, while a "license" or a "certificate" applies to an individual, "accreditation" applies to the school itself. Thus, in effect, once the school is formally approved by the accrediting body, it is assumed that the school will confirm that its graduates have the basic qualifications to practice what it teaches, and the individual graduate does not need any further license. Thus, once one graduates from an ALA accredited program, one is considered capable of performing as a professional librarian.

In addition, there are some licensing requirements applied in some situations. Notably, most elementary and secondary school systems require all their teachers to hold a certificate, the nature of which is set by the school district, or, of ten, the state. However, in the case of school library media specialists, as for most teachers, this takes the form of a requirement for specific types of coursework as part of a degree, and often a further requirement for relevant coursework every few years, in order to retain the certificate. On a complete different plane, some professional library organizations have set up their own certificate program, the most cited example being that of the Medical Library Association. In these cases, and similar, a librarian possessing a degree is expected to take further training, and demonstrate a basic level of expertise, as well as have some professional experience. When these requirements are satisfied, the person then receives the MLA Certificate. Many medical libraries require their staff to hold such a certificate.

CURRENT STATISTICS:

According to the ALA's Website, the following represent the number of persons employed, generally in the early 1990's. Please see the site for further details, and for more discussion of the meaning of "librarian" in the context of these numbers. SEE http://www.ala.org/library/fact2.html

*Not collected by ALA. Based on a 1982 study, which ALA still finds "reasonable"