Given the conversations in the U.S. since fall 2016 and some of the
actions that have occurred, it is not surprising that there were many
sessions related to bias, microaggressions, diversity and inclusion.
I was able to attend only two. I'm giving you the descriptions
because these capture important information.
New Destinations in the Recruitment, Retention,
and Advancement of People of Color to the Library Profession
Description
In spite of ongoing diversity initiatives and programs by
organizations such as ARL, ACRL and other groups, recruitment,
retention and promotion among library and information studies (LIS)
students and library workers is lagging. Two recent projects, the
REFORMA Telling Our Stories: Community Building to Recruit and Retain
Latinx to the Library Profession grant and the Hampton University
Forum on Minority Recruitment and Retention in the LIS Field grant,
both awarded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS),
address the need to set new goals and create profession-wide efforts
to look at the recruitment and retention efforts if we really want to
diversify the profession. Libraries that succeed in recruiting must
simultaneously focus on retention and promotion of new hires.
Mentoring programs have proven to be effective in supporting new
professionals and aiding them to remain in the field. There is a need
to develop a climate in the workplace that supports and encourages
advancement. The Hampton LIS Forum, held August 1-2, 2018 at Hampton
University provided a safe space for the discussion of diversity
initiatives and the concerns of people of color within the LIS
profession. The forum also created a think-tank to create actionable
strategies to address diversity in recruitment and retention. This
presentation will discuss both grant-funded projects and the need for
continued efforts and research to address the lack of diversity of
people of color within the library and information studies field.
Speakers: Miguel Juarez, Tina Rollins, and Tess Tobin
Notes
The speakers wanted to spent more of the time having a discussion
with the audience, but unfortunately, they spent too much time
providing background in this one-hour session. What is clear,
though, from their presentation is that there are areas where we can
focus, in order to improvement recruitment, retention, and
advancement. Those areas include two which drew my attention:
Mentoring
- Leadership training
We often have a specific idea of what mentoring is. However,
I like the varied list of what was mentoring can be in the Tomorrow's
Professor post entitled "
Mentoring
and Productivity." Our staff of color may benefit from
mentoring that provides one (or more) of the following:
Library staff of color need to find and connect with mentors, who
can provide the type of mentoring they need. While a library
might provide a mentor, staff should be willing to look elsewhere for
additional mentors, who can provide a different point of view and
perhaps a different mentoring relationship.
In terms of leadership training, current and future leaders need
to be trained on working with diverse staff members, no matter what
that diversity might be. We cannot assume that someone already
has those skills. This training could occur in a number of
different ways and might need to occur more than once, since we
really don't leave everything about working in a diverse and
inclusive environment in one sitting.
Our staff of color should also receive leadership training,
because they will be leaders. Some will become team leaders,
managers or directors, while others might lead a project. They
should get into that leadership role with an understand of what it
entails and how to succeed as a leader. They should see
leadership as a natural progression in their careers. Having
people of color in leadership roles puts them in the position of
being role models for other staff as well as our communities, so we
need to help them succeed, rather than setting them up for failure.
An Introduction to Implicit Bias and
Microaggressions
Description
The American Library Association commits to ameliorating
marginalization and underrepresentation within the Association and
the communities served by libraries through increased understanding
of the effects of historical exclusion. This introductory training
will explore implicit bias and microaggressions. Participants will be
able to identify how these concepts create barriers and begin to
explore ways to disrupt our biases and respond to microaggressions.
This training will be presented three times throughout Annual
Conference and is open to all conference attendees.
Speakers: Mee Moua and Michael Wenger
Notes
They noted the history of bias in the U.S., noting that it was
used to justify enslavement and conquest. Some bias has been
based on pseudo science. Some have been quite intentional
through federal government actions.
Bias is a preference for - or against - a group of people and it
occurs on a subconscious level. We all are biased. We all can learn
what our biases are and then be more mindful of how we consciously
react in various situation.
One of the exercise we did was to discuss how we would handle the
following scenario.
Two groups of students - one predominately white and one
predominately black- are sitting at separate tables in the library,
and both groups are speaking loudly to each other. Your
colleague walks over to the table that has mostly black students and
tells them to be quiet or they will be kicked out of the library.
What message do you think the students at either table
received from the interaction?
What would you do or say to the students, if you were the
one responding?
What would you do or say to your colleague?
That was a fascinating discussion! Wow. Did we all read the
scenario the same way? And then what did we decide to do?
You might discuss that scenario with your staff and see what
happens. I guarantee it will be educational.
This session was both informative and fun. The speakers
created good interaction with the participants and assured that we
interacted with each other at our tables.
Resources
Thoughts
It is likely that every sessions at ALA related to diversity,
bias, etc., began with some sort of an overview of the basics.
While I know having an understanding of the basics is necessary, I
wish there could have been a different way of doing it, so that each
session could have spent more time one what was unique about that
session. This might have meant creating an introductory session
each day, which was marked and promoted as such. Then the other
sessions could have had in their descriptions that people were
expected to attend one of the introductory sessions first. Yes,
I know this would be a hassle, but I think participants at these
sessions would have appreciated it.
Finally, I want to say that I appreciate ALA having so many
sessions on these topics. Now more than ever, we need to be trained
and retrained on them. And then we need to be willing to use
what we have learned to make our libraries more welcoming for
everyone.