For over a century librarians and others in academe have debated the issue of faculty status for librarians. Do librarians play the same role as teaching or research faculty members? Is academic freedom a problem for librarians? Do librarians have real faculty status if they do not earn tenure the way other faculty members do? Although some librarians now have faculty status, the pros and cons continue to be argued passionately.
In 1971 the Association of College and Research Libraries, a division of the American Library Association, approved standards for faculty status for college and university librarians. Revised standards, approved in 2001, set out nine conditions for faculty status, grouped into three areas: fulfilling professional responsibilities, to be determined by regular, rigorous review; being eligible for the same personal benefits -- tenure, promotion, compensation, leaves, money for research and development, academic freedom -- as other faculty members; and participating in library and institutional governance. In effect, librarians with true faculty status have the same rights and responsibilities, including tenure, as other faculty members. Any other arrangement, according to the ACRL, is merely “academic status.”
In a joint 1972 statement on faculty status, the ACRL, the Association of American Colleges (now the Association of American Colleges and Universities), and the American Association of University Professors agreed that librarians contribute significantly to teaching and learning, shape and provide access to materials required for research and teaching, and therefore meet the “essential criterion for faculty status.” Based on studies conducted in the 1980s and 1990s, about half the academic librarians in the United States have faculty status, although a 1999 survey by the ACRL showed that colleges and universities vary considerably in how they define that status. Probably about 40 percent of academic librarians today -- including me -- have true faculty status with tenure.
Research about the costs and benefits of faculty status for librarians is contradictory and mostly out of date. But to many of us it seems clear that librarians who have earned tenure through the same process of evaluation as other faculty members are in a better position to enhance the quality of research, teaching, and service in academe. Academic freedom is important to librarians as we help other faculty members and students by acquiring materials that do justice to many points of view, including some that are very unpopular. In addition, making librarians true peers of the faculty has never mattered more than it does now.
At a time when higher education is under attack, and libraries make the national news as partners with Google, the role of the library in academe is anything but certain. The comforting metaphor of the library as the heart of the university no longer resonates. Libraries compete openly for resources with other campus units and are expected to deliver increasingly expensive and sophisticated information services to ensure the university’s success in research and teaching.
Librarians can no longer afford to stay within the walls of the library and the confines of their profession. To ensure that libraries have a say in the future and help shape their institutions’ activities in important areas like digital scholarship and information literacy, librarians need to be at the table, in on the deals, and in the classroom. They need to lobby for new visions of library services and collections. They need to become astute politicians and fund raisers.
Research that my colleagues and I have conducted illustrates that presidents and provosts have radically changed their views on what they value in the academic library. A decade ago, they cared little about whether the library collaborated in instruction and research, acquired outside funds, was innovative, or was considered important to others on campus; today they care a great deal about those matters.
The inescapable conclusion is that the performance of libraries and librarians is being evaluated in new ways, strongly influenced by the development of new technologies for teaching and learning, radical changes in scholarly communication, and increasing demand for resources.
The best way to increase the odds that librarians will be visible on the campus and play a vital role in the changing world of higher education is to give them faculty status. When they participate in university governance, they provide a unique viewpoint -- and develop political and negotiating skills. And when they collaborate with other faculty members, they have a better understanding of the academic enterprise, including conducting research.
With faculty status, librarians find it easier to earn the respect of their faculty peers and administrators. They become credible academics who are capable partners in the shaping of teaching and research. As faculty members, librarians are more likely to have a say in establishing the criteria on which academe will judge libraries in the 21st century.
Catherine Murray-Rust is dean of libraries at Colorado State University’s main campus.
http://chronicle.com Section: Libraries Volume 52, Issue 6, Page B10