Everyone has been to SOME library at least once in their lives. Everybody knows that the librarians check books out, put books back, inventory, etc. But librarians are also here to help the visitors with any questions/help needed. They are the secretaries of the library.
It would be really useful if librarians would be able to tutor students. Not full time, but part time. When students go to the library to study and no one is able to help, it would be up to the librarians to save the day. They would have to be a big brain of knowledge, but that's never a bad thing. Knowledge is very valuable and that would be the coolest thing for them to have, unlimited knowledge.
I imagine that librarians in the future will be robots, robots that will look like humans and have that unlimited knowledge I said earlier. They will have so much willingness to help others and be kind to the libraries visitors J The library might not even look like it does today, maybe it will be designed like a vending machine where you select the desired book and it will be given to you, no more searching! So the librarians will really be more helpers than the people behind the desk. They’re already helpful so many new devices and inventions will be installed into them. What if the computers became realistic and could talk to the students? It would provide advice for their searches, papers, or things to explore. With endless possibilities on how to “upgrade” a library, it will become the ultimate student resource!
Hello Diana!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your blog about what you think will be the future of libraries and librarians. In the past they have been the "secretaries" of the library, but their roles are changing. They still check books in and out, shelve, and work on inventory; but they do many other jobs also. Some of their jobs have already been replaced by machines such as self checkouts and machines that check books in.
The role of librarians probably never will be to tutor students, but to help them learn to use libraries and technology to obtain the information they need. I think the computers are what you refer to as "a big brain of knowledge" and they are already here. Do you know about Watson, the computer who won on Jeopardy? We can fill a computer with facts that it can spit out, but we cannot make a computer who can understand the complexities of questions the students might need answers for.
I like your imagination in your last paragraph. The public libraries are already getting vending machines to spit out DVDs. It could come to the point that we would have vending machines for books. It is fun to think of robots and what all they might do for us in the future. I hope, however, that we will always have a human being behind that desk or on the floor to offer help to the people who come to the library.
Helen White
Health Sciences Library