#thing 10

Thing 10 is on Networking Tools. For this Thing I chose task one and I picked Twitter as it was the more straightforward site to use (I have a Facebook account but it is a personal account and not one I feel would be suitable for using for this task).

I have only just set up a twitter account I am currently on work experience in a library and it was recommended to me that twitter was the best way to keep up with library related news. I have since followed several pages (including Rudai 23!), e.g. @CILIPinfo, @LAIonline, @libfocus and @SLIPIreland.

As I am new to both Rudai 23 and Twitter I have not tweeted a lot but I have found that even over this short period of time that I have been able to get a lot of library news and about different conferences that have been held. Twitter is an straightforward and fluid method of communication and is easy to access for someone like me who is not yet working in the field.

Oops!I jumped the gun on thing 10 in my post for thing 9. I use both Snapchat and Instagram. Snapchat is pretty silly, but I use it a bit socially. The temporary nature of the photos is a myth, so I try to be careful. I'm not sure my students truly understand the implications of using Snapchat, especially for provocative content.

Librarianship training options: Graduate traineeships, Masters degrees, Chartership, Accreditation Graduate Traineeships

I fell into my career kind of by accident. I had been travelling after I graduated my PGCE course in May 2006 and I didn't really know what to do next. I happened to look on the Prospects website for things to do with an English degree and lo and behold **LIBRARIAN** appeared. I followed the links and ended up looking at the CILIP graduate list. There was an advert for a traineeship in a school in Bristol (the post was being re-advertised as the previous applicant had pulled out), but the deadline was only a few days away. It seemed like the perfect job, I had the school experience and I needed to apply for something so I thought "why not". And the rest is history...

I cannot believe how luck I was to get my placement at John Cabot CTC (now Academy). I had a fantastic year and learnt everything there was to learn in a school library environment. I was considering starting a Masters and I was lucky enough to have the support of my employer through the university application process as well as my application for a grant from the Arts Council. I was amazed and delighted to discover that I had received the (very rare) full grant from the Arts Council which allowed me to study for a year without having to work. This is still one of my proudest achievements to date!

Masters Degree

I studied for my Masters in 2007-08 at UWE in Bristol. As I mentioned above, I was extremely lucky that I did not have to work to pay my way through my Masters course. I ended up going part-time to complete my dissertation while I worked in my first professional post. My dissertation was on book selection strategies of young people in school libraries. I think I knew from the moment that I started my course that School Librarianship was the correct route for me, although I never completely shut the door on the idea of working in public libraries or corporate libraries.

Chartership

So Chartership is my next step. I have been thinking about Chartering for a while, but this year is the first time I can honestly say I have felt "ready" for it. A friend from my Masters course recently contacted me to ask if I was interested in meeting up with a few people who were at various stages of the process and that was finally the kick I needed to get started.

I have found the 23Things really useful for getting in the habit of recording training or visits and reflecting back on things. I am finding it quite hard to write reflectively and evaluating at the moment and I am realising that I need to be much more organised and get a more effective filing system of handouts and flyers. I have already started a "CPD notebook" in which I record all my professional reading or any meetings or training that I attend. When I finally get myself organised and registered I will start using the CILIP audit sheets.

I think I am quite good at list writing and targeted to-do lists (things I need to do before I can go home and things I can delegate). I have discovered a brilliant online service to record what I do every day which was recommended by Nicola McNee at the SLA conference earlier in June. https://idonethis.com/ sends you an email every day at the allotted time and all you need to do is reply with a list of things you have done that day. Mine emails me at 3pm every weekday and it takes 30 seconds to reel off everything I have done that day. The service then records everything in a calender and emails you back to remind you what you were up to this time last year or yesterday in fact! I think this will be useful as it shows me that I do work hard and stuff does get done occasionally.

I work in two sectors: public and academic. I've been a Saturday Library Assistant in a public library for 4 years and I'm also on the casual list - I've done 500% more work as a casual library assistant than as a Saturday library assistant. I mostly work at my "home" branch but do get called out to around 4 others on a regular basis. My experience therefore tallies up to about one year's full time. Since November 2010, I have worked in an academic library as a Senior Library Assistant on Sundays. I've also spent two Easter holidays working for a School Library Service affiliated with my Saturday employer and began volunteering in the library of a charity foundation. I also used to work as a bookseller at Borders. The job made me a much better library assistant as I became more confident and knowledgeable about authors, genres and publishing. If you can't get any entry level library work or volunteering experience, I definitely think the next best thing is a spell in the book trade. It is my library experience (I was already a Saturday Library Assistant when I applied to Borders just after graduating) is what got me the job. I hate all the usual annoying things about retail and the low pay but I do miss bookselling.