Strategic Directions for Library,Information Science,

and Archives CurriculumDr. Robin Peek

Simmons College

The GraduateSchool of

Library and Information

Science

Leading Changes in the United States

• Librarians as Publishers: • Digital Publishing• Digital Libraries• Digital Archives• Institutional Repositories

Leading Changes in the United States

• The Librarian as Managerial Leader• Must be have to evaluate services and

performance.• Must understand the role of marketing

services and achieving strong customer service.

Leading Changes in the United States

• Distant Education-A Mixed Success

• American Library Association has recently raised standards for schools offering distant education

• The optimal number of students in distance education is 15 students of less through course

Leading Changes in the United States

• Undergraduate Programs in LIS Schools but more interdisciplinary in nature.

• Dropping enrollments in Computer Science (some estimated as high as 50 percent) has also affected enrollment in these new undergraduate programs.

• New programs such as the University of New York at Buffalo have recently announced closure.

Leading Changes in the United States

• Rising interest in the social consequences of the deployment of these new technologies and applications (social informatics)

• In the US we have seen a significant generational divide between the Millenials (refers to young people who have grown up with computers (up to 21 years of age)

Challenges Facing the United States

• And graying and retiring faculty who teach in “traditional” areas and in insufficient number of doctoral students interested and prepared to teach in these areas.

• A great reliance on adjuncts to teach in the traditional areas while the new faculty teach contemporary topics.

A Younger Student Body

• Over the past ten years our median age at Simmons has dropped from 37 to 29-with an increasing number of students coming directly from undergraduate college.

• Surprisingly they are not as technologically prepared as we expected.

Changes We Made

• 3 to 5 required courses• Reference• Information Organization• Technology for Information

Professionals• Management for Information Services• Evaluation of Information Programs and

Services

Contact Information

• Robin Peek

• 300 The Fenway

• Boston, MA 02115

• 617 (521) 2807

• robin.peek@simmons.edu