Library technician programs: skills-oriented paraprofessional education - includes appendix outlining a course of study

Without the framework of the profession, the graduate would merely be a clerical worker with skills. With this framework, the graduate becomes a paraprofessional.

General Education

The amount of time allocated to general education electives has decreased as a result of budget cutbacks. Seneca College policy currently requires successful completion of a college-level English course as well as three other general education electives.

Curriculum Design

There are a number of mechanisms by which the education of library technicians is achieved. Learning outcomes for various courses have been mentioned previously. Each learning outcome begins with an action verb whenever possible which denotes skills such as "search" or "catalog." More importantly, these terms reflect activities in the day-to-day operations of libraries. To further illustrate this distinction, when students learn to search various library catalogs, the learning outcome of this training is that students will be able to use diverse library catalog software. Consequently, one of the things that students are taught is what the various terms in the catalog mean. When learning to use a particular package, such as DRA's catalog software, they are taught the difference between selecting "subject" versus "subject keyword." The intention is that graduates working in a library will not need to be trained to search library catalogs. In a best case scenario, they will actually have been trained with the specific software used by that library. At worst, they will have learned enough various library catalog software packages to be able to use a specific library's catalog. There are no learning outcomes that state that students should be able to select the best software to use in a library or that they should be able to design screens for library catalogs. Such outcomes would reflect higher-level activities than intended in the technicians' training.

When knowledge acquisition rather than skill acquisition is required, the learning outcomes use verbs reflecting less complex levels of learning. Verbs such as "describe" and "explain" are used rather than verbs such as "discuss," "compare," and "analyze." For example, in the course "Introducing Libraries," students are required to describe the various types of libraries: school, public, academic (college and university), and special and distinguish among these types of libraries according to background, roles, staff, clientele, collections, services, and relevant government relationships. There are no outcomes that require them to discuss the appropriateness of specific roles for particular libraries, such as the role that information should play in public libraries. Library technicians must know what public libraries do in order to work in them, but they are not taught to plan the future direction of public libraries.

There are also learning outcomes that apply to the entire program rather than to the individual courses. One of these is the ability to follow instructions; another is to be accurate. These are outcomes that are considered necessary in technicians' work regardless of the course.