Professional Development Programs on a Limited (or Non-Existent) Budget

Christian MillerSusan Kendrick

Mentorship Program

• Under the umbrella of the Committee on Professional Development (CPD)

• 3 types of mentees:

– Junior librarians

– Non-academic staff going to library school

– Librarians new to Cornell

• Career mentoring

• Local-level mentoring

Cornell University Library

• ~20 libraries across the Ithaca campus

• 126 librarians

• 335 non-academic staff

• Serve a population of about 34,935 students, faculty and staff

Source: 2008 CUL Annual Report

How Mentoring Program Works

• Coordinator receives applications and makes pairs

• Pairs are made in the fall and disbanded in June

• Budget through CPD

• Occasional programming for mentorship pairs

In Fantasyland the program would have…

• Support from an AUL as an official sponsor

• Group offer suggestions mentorship pairs to coordinators

• Create a broader network of mentors

• Have a support system for the mentors

• Use campus resources to promote the program

PD Categories

• Technology

• New Librarians

• Networking

• Local Projects

• Personal Improvement

• Professional Improvement

Technology

• Hands-on Series (Cornell)

• Emerging Technology/Lunch’n’Learn Tech Talks (Wake Forest examples: Google Wave, Net Neutrality)

• 23 Things (SLA, UK’s ‘Blue 2.0’)

• Danger! Internet Ahead (Cornell)

New Librarians

• New to the locale or to the profession

• Lunch/Coffee with CPD

• New Librarians Cohort (tours, time with upper level admin, departmental intros, mentorship)

• New Librarians Wiki page (Yale)

http://www.library.yale.edu/scopa/newlibrarian/

Networking

• Happy hours

• Speed networking

• Bake-off

• Ask- a-Colleague Wiki https://wikis.uit.tufts.edu/confluence/display/ULCStaffDevelopmentWiki/Tufts+Libraries+Ask-a-Colleague

• Baseball games/picnics

Local Projects

• Professional Development Week– https://confluence.cornell.edu/display/prodev/

Professional+Development+Week+2009

• Brown bags– Degree in Creativity– Research trip to Iceland– Hip Hop Collection Overview

Personal Improvement

• Photography (Effective, Copyright, For the Web)

• Geneaology

• Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

• “StrengthsFinder” Top 5 Strengths (Video?)– Developer– Includer– Positivity– Ideation– Empathy

Professional Improvement

• Survey Series – “How to do effective surveys”– Brown Bag– Survey Research Institute presentation– Panel Session

• Writing/publishing/speaking group(s)

• Journal Reading Club

How much does programming cost?

Event Attendance Cost Cost per Attendee

Brown Bags 2007-08

55 $120 $2.18

Hands-on! 2007-08 119 $0 $0

Happy Hours 15-30 each $0 $0

Survey Series 2009 51 $0 $0

PD Week 2007 316 $919 $2.91

PD Week 2008* 510 $2295 $4.50

PD Week 2009 439 $237.27 $0.54

* Unusual expenditures for non-food items raised the budget for the 2008 PD Week. Excluding those costs brings the cost per attendee to $3.18.

Future Considerations

• Evolving committee – need for inclusivity, CPD basis for change

• Budget will be ever-present, rather than something we had to react to

• As tech improves, what is the possibility of creating a clearinghouse of talks/programs/ideas? What is needed?

(See Darryl Coleman’s PDC message in May SUNYLA newsletter)

Contact us!

Curious about any of these programs?

Chris Millercjm267@cornell.edu

Susan Kendricksfk23@cornell.edu

Thank you!