Communicating competencies and collaboration: putting theory into practice

摘要

Professionalism lends itself to teaching. The consummate information professional realizes he/she is part of a process, and endeavors to contribute to the cycle, not merely take from it. In librarianship, mentoring is highly regarded as a way to contribute and is encouraged by professional organizations such as the Special Libraries Association (SLA). Teaching can even be viewed as an extended mentoring situation, and one that provides rich benefits for both the students and the mentor. More library and information science graduate schools are realizing the value of practitioners as a model for praxis-putting theory into practice. Information professionals are succeeding as adjunct faculty in these schools, bringing their dairy "frontline" experience to the classroom as an illustration of the theories behind organizing information for access. Practitioner adjuncts can complement full-time faculty who are more skilled in pedagogy, but who may not have recently worked as information professionals in other organizations. In addition to expanding the offerings at a university for a professional program, adjunct teaching responsibilities allow for a unique type of continuing education for the actual practitioner. Teaching allows practitioners to articulate what they know, while affording them the opportunity to improve upon their communication competencies. Add to this the experience of working with fresh minds, and practitioners can discover new directions and energies from those who represent thefuture of the information profession. Many librarians are kept busy with their job responsibilities alone. Those who wish to expand into new venues of professional development may often discard opportunities due to time constraints. This article illustrates how a team from the Illinois Chapter of SLA--looking for an opportunity to creatively embrace several projects--coalesced into a group that shared its expertise through the venue of adjunct instructorship. This example provides evidence that the individual information practitioner can successfully further the profession through collaboration with others.