2013

SHIFT

[ ROLE OF MENTORING IN LIBRARIANSHIP ]

1. The author in the article has tried to highlight a few major points, which can be summarized as:

Hes claimed that having a strong mentor in the initial years of a librarian is too essential for early professionals, as it provides them a safety net of advice to depend on, caution to be aware of and encouragement to learn. True mentoring for him is not just a piece of advice delving in questions like Which classes to take, (Stephens) rather true mentoring is more to do with involvement, psychological encouragement, and thereby improvement of the overall Educational experience.

Hes believed that a formalized process wherein both Practice and LIS can be balanced is the best way forward for Librarianship. Most US Profs are out of touch with true Practice, so its practically impossible for them to impart knowledge which would stand testified in the current phase of Times. To minimize this rift, Michael believes it should be ensured that Practice, Admin roles and Teaching should go hand in hand.

Further hes also validated that with so much of Technological interference in daily lives and Social Networking becoming the order of the day, one must be aware of what to learn and what not to learn from such networking platforms. (Bartlett, 2013)

In all, he wants to check if a formalized process of Mentoring in Librarianship could be a possibility or is it just an organic bud that grows with time through like-mindedness.

2. Yes, the article supports the mentoring concepts as presented in the text.

The article talks about a formalized mentoring concept where Beginners would not have to fight for knowledge, rather anyone and everyone would be assisted by a strong mentor. It talks about a system wherein Institutions would not just garner formal learnings, but would provide practical applications to its students. (Bartlett, 2013) Furthermore, the text also speaks about mentoring as a process, which is more encompassing and holistic, and throughout examples is cited where a Formal Learning seems to be a much better form of institution as compared to the currently existing looseness in the system.

Thus in this way it can be seen that the claims made is thoroughly validated by the facts and discussions taken up in the article.

3. The author has failed to establish properly if Social media could be the next big revolution in Librarian Mentorship.

On one hand where he has stated that Social sites could be used by institutions to benefit the formal program of mentoring, he has also claimed that with so much of opinion on net, mostly dealing with frivolities, the veracity of the learning cant be verified. (Stephens)

Furthermore the claims made by the author, that mentoring is the most essential part of Librarianship simply defies the very basic reason of the jobs existence.

4. Yes, I agree with the authors conclusion.

The author concludes by saying that librarianship has more to do with informality and like mindedness till date, but things can change for better, and this could right there be initiated by building connections and formalizing the institution. I indeed believe formalization would make things more systematic, where everyone would gain from the association and LIS would look far more practical, (ow.ly/6i5vU) logical and reasonable. Thus, Formalization should indeed be the next big leap in this field.

5. Yes, Mentoring via social sites can be effective but with certain caveats.

Social Sites are the next big revolution in this technological world, and people even if not an extrovert tends to be social in such platforms. Given such considerations, a social site can indeed help students to learn from each other and formalize things using Socialization tools. But again all of this convenience comes at a cost. With so many sites in place, and plethora of writers available with their frivolities, one need to be aware of the source of information and the foundation of learning that one builds from such sites.

REFERENCES: http://uknowledge.uky.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1076&context=libraries_facpub https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/bitstream/handle/2142/8435/librarytrendsv50i4_opt.pdf?s equence=3