Lifelong Learning at 9 Years

Today, I mark 9 years since my MLIS graduation.  Although I finished my schooling for my degree that day, I knew that I was going to continue the pursuit of lifelong learning.  This anniversary is a great occasion to reflect on what I've been learning.

Last summer, my supervisor trained me to catalog music CDs, a step away from my overall focus on book cataloging. There are different aspects of the records for items in the audio format, and it's been a good opportunity to work my brain in a different way.

My role focuses on getting the books ready for the shelves once they've arrived.  In my department is a group of staff who focus on collection development and the ordering of books.  In the past few months, I've had the chance to acquaint myself more with their work.

During our recent Staff Development Day, the collection development staff led us in exercises simulating what they do.  I could think about what they consider when they look at suggestions from the vendors and decide what to buy.

It's interesting to get the inside look at what happens in various roles at work, just as I like sharing about my work as a way to give people an inside look of what happens behind the scenes in the library.  In fact, I remember having dinner with my Grandma and her friend a few months ago.  I mentioned that my work involves metadata, and it's a concept that can be confusing to define.  Usually, I find it easy to give an example of metadata.  So picture standing at an intersection and you see street signs positioned above the street, sometimes on traffic signals.  Those signs are not actually the streets, because those streets are the pavement below.  Yet those signs function as metadata because they tell us the names of the pavement on the surface.  Similarly, if you look at a map, you might see names on or along the streets.  If you went to the street, you wouldn't likely see the name written on the street, but the names are on the map as metadata to help us know which lines represent which streets and their relative location to one another.

Bibliographic records have metadata about books and other library items so people can find then when searching in a library catalog.

Libraries have so many materials that can help us learn about subjects for our enrichment and enjoyment, with so much available to learn.  I usually seek to encourage my students in Religious Education to keep learning because there's so much to know about faith and it helps us grow in relationship with God.  I thought about this reality when I attended teh National Eucharistic Congress last summer:  During that time, I learned much about faith even as I opened myself to encounters with God.

As I mark this anniversary today, I realize that lifelong learning is a great pursuit that helps us encounter Truth so that we may live with purpose.