In Brief: On average, it takes approximately five months for LIS graduates to find a library job, according to Library Journal’s 2012 Placements and Salaries Survey (Matta 2012). This time frame represents the experience of 34% of 2011 graduates, but stories of months- or year-long job searches are common (Weak 2012). While some can afford [...]

This week, In the Library with Lead Pipe fields professional development and career questions from library school students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The questions they asked ranged from committee work to composing cover letters to conference attendance. Here is the complete list (so you can jump around if you like): [...]

This is the first in a two-part series on librarian collaboration with faculty. Part 1 presents a five-step program for building collaborative relationships, while Part 2, published on July 13, 2011, addresses specific examples and strategies for collaboration.   Introduction Collaboration has become something of a buzzword of late, which puts us in danger of [...]

As library travel budgets are increasingly slashed around the country, it’s a tough time for conference-going. In this group post, we compare notes about the conferences we’ve attended, which have been our favorites, and why. We hope this will generate creative ideas on good conferences (online or in-person) to look forward to, and maybe offer [...]

Social networking may have started out as a way for students to keep track of their friends, but it has expanded in just about every direction. These days, you can find at least one related social networking site on just about any general topic, including music, photography, television, books, shopping, and bookmarking. But it isn’t [...]