Libraries aren’t usually the subject of multimillion dollar exchanges, but a nationwide crisis has changed all that.

A severe librarian shortage is brewing, according to Eileen Maxwell, public affairs specialist with the federal agency Institute of Museum and Library Services, and has prompted the federal government to pour millions into organizations to develop training for librarians and library-related technology.

‘The reason why it is so important to care is that librarians are the providers of information,’ Maxwell said. ‘The way that information is navigated and delivered is all important to the American people.’

With this in mind, the IMLS, backed by President George W. Bush, created a grant called the Recruiting and Educating Librarians for the 21st Century, which is designed to fund the schooling of new librarians and professors of library science.

So far this year the IMLS has doled out $14.7 million, Maxwell said, and the Syracuse University School of Information Studies is one of the top recipients, receiving $1.2 million of the total.

Bruce Kingma, associate dean and professor of the School of Information Studies, is heading up the larger of the two grants, using a $713,492 donation to create the Web-based Information Science Education program, a distance education program with the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the University of Wisconsin that will focus on library sciences and other forms of information science.

Online classes in some cases can be more beneficial than regular classes, Kingma said, because they can create a more broad and diverse atmosphere, bringing perspectives from across the nation and even across the world, which will then distribute knowledge back into local communities.

Online learning can also provide students with more obscure, specialized classes and subject matters, as the one or two students interested in a specific field of study can pool together with students across the nation and the world to create a large class.

This is what Kingma hopes will come of the WISE program as it grows into comprehensive center and schools for librarian and others in the information management fields.

The key to ensure the success of WISE, Kingma said, is to ensure class quality with consistent interactive contact with professors and smaller limited class sizes, among other requirements.

‘We know that in some ways online education can be a richer experience,’ Kingma said. ‘We’re going to see how this scales up and open it up to universities whose meet these standards and qualities.’

Kingma said he is already getting offers from many American universities, such as Rutgers and Pittsburgh, to join WISE, and he eventually hopes to get universities from all over the world involved with the program.

The IST school also received a second grant totaling $499,727, which will be used to set up a curriculum and provide funding to lure library professionals and post-graduate students into becoming Ph.D. students in the library science field.

The grant money will allow students to focus solely on their studies, said Kevin Crowston, associate professor at the School of Information Studies, speeding up their graduation and, he hopes, producing more professors in the field of library sciences. This will then lead to more librarian training and help stem the tide of retiring professors in the library sciences field.

‘The goal of the fellowship program is to turn out professors in library programs,’ Crowston said. ‘Basically, in a year from now we hope to have five students identified and new in Syracuse. So it’s sort of one level removed: We need more librarians so we need more professors; and we need more professors so we need more Ph.D. students.’

In all, SU received these grants because of the excellence of the School of Information Studies, Maxwell said.

‘Grants are chosen by (a program’s) national leadership ability, their ability to be replicated at other institutions across the country,’ Maxwell said. ‘That’s why Syracuse University was chosen.’

Published on September 1, 2004 at 12:00 pm