I was rather impressed recently, when the Australian Library and Information Association announced last week that they were going to develop a National Framework for Public Libraries, which would coincide with a new initiative from ALIA in developing National Standards for the provision of public libraries in Australia.
Now, I love public libraries, as you will already know. And one thing I'm very passionate about is setting consistent standards of quality and professionalism in public libraries. There is an unfortunate attitude amongst many in the community that you don't get a professional service from a public library, and that it's basically a 2nd-rate public service that you wouldn't expect to get anything of quality from. For many young / professional people in the community, they wouldn't even THINK about going to the public library for anything.
There is also an all-too-unfortunate attitude amongst many library and information professionals in the academic and research industries that public librarians aren't "real" librarians, in terms of professional practices of library and information sciences. It's also unfortunate that these attitudes are often reinforced by the growing trend in public libraries of doing away of the "Eligible for Associate Membership of ALIA" when it comes to librarian roles.
And I will happily concede that the completion of an accredited course in librarianship shouldn't be mandatory in public libraries (or many libraries) in order for the librarian to provide a professional service. Professional accreditation, after all, has always been more about being accountable with an assessed evidence of professional knowledge, but there are other ways in which this can also be achieved, such as transferable skills and industry experience, combined with on-the-job training.
However, this is certainly a bone of contention across many a public library service, and it will be interesting to see how it is addressed by ALIA in establishing national workforce standards in the public library sector.
I also love how some public libraries are extremely pro-active in innovation and social inclusion, and incorporating these elements into national standards would be a fine move in raising the bar for other libraries who may, perhaps, miss the mark in terms of customer service, community building, and online engagement. I realise that resources can be tight, and you can be worked off one's feet just in managing library circulation and acquisition workflow, let alone doing all that other "extra" stuff. But it could be the justification that some library services need to point out to their directors where their services are falling short of the bar.
I also really look forward to seeing which other bodies are consulted in developing these guidelines, such as PLA, PLVN, PLNT, as well as the statewide public library projects that are run by the State Libraries.
I'm really excited at the prospect of all this, and that such a positive direction has come out of the ALIA Public Libraries Summit. I can't wait to see where this leads...
