Reference

There are several areas in which my knowledge of reference has served me well. This skill demands not only fairly extensive knowledge on the part of the librarian but also a creativity and a tenacity that prompts one to look in unusual places for the golden nugget of information. I like to think of reference skills as one of those 'baseline' skills that every librarian has in his or her toolkit and I was therefore grateful that there were several classes offered by the Information School that not only would enhance those skills, but also give the students the chance to have actual practice working for a reference service for real people.

On the Virtual Desk - Volunteering for the Internet Public Library

Without a doubt, one of my favorite experiences was working as a volunteer for the Internet Public Library (IPL) through a reference class. Not only did I personally discover a valuable resource in IPL, but I also got to answer a wide variety of reference questions while also evaluating and experimenting with resources that I had never used before. I answered reference questions for many types of people, including public school students and people for whom English was a second language. By far one of the most interesting questions was helping a student find similarities between Spider-Man and Odysseus. You can see my answer to their query here.

On the Physical Desk - Working for Libraries

In addition to serving as a volunteer for IPL, I also have worked solo on the reference desk for both public libraries (Bellingham Public Library and King County Library System) and an academic library (Physics-Astronomy Library at the University of Washington). While I did love my IPL experience, I have enjoyed answering reference questions in a variety of venues, including e-mail, phone, face-to-face, instant messaging (IM) and even on Facebook.