ERIC EJ1074681: Creating Tomorrow's Technologists: Contrasting Information Technology Curriculum in North American Library and Information Science Graduate Programs against Code4lib Job Listings

2015·1.6 MB·English

by  ERIC

Creating Tomorrow’s Technologists:
Contrasting Information Technology Curriculum in
North American Library and Information Science
Graduate Programs against Code4lib Job Listings
Monica Maceli
School of Information & Library Science, Pratt Institute, Email: [email protected]
This research study explores technology-related course offerings in ALA-accredited li-
brary and information science (LIS) graduate programs in North America. These data are
juxtaposed against a text analysis of several thousand LIS-specific technology job list-
ings from the Code4lib jobs website. Starting in 2003, as a popular library technology
mailing list, Code4lib has since expanded to an annual conference in the United States
and a job-posting website. The study found that database and web design/development
topics continued to dominate course offerings with diverse sub-topics covered. Strong
growth was noted in the area of user experience but a lack of related jobs for librar-
ians was identified. Analysis of the job listings revealed common technology-centric
librarian and non-librarian job titles, as well as frequently correlated requirements for
technology skillsets relating to the popular foci of web design/development and meta-
data. Finally, this study presents a series of suggestions for LIS educators in order that
they continue to keep curriculum aligned with current technology employment require-
ments.
Introduction standards. These standards broadly state
that curriculum must integrate “the the-
Technology has become a common ory, application, and use of technology”
tool supporting nearly all aspects of (ALA, 2008). However, despite common
the library profession. Many researchers perceptions that the younger populations
and practitioners in the field have called currently entering graduate schools are
on information professionals to become more tech-savvy, research has shown that
technology leaders and innovators instead current library and information science
of being simply users of technology (e.g. (LIS) students of all ages do not necessar-
Carson, 2014; Farkas, 2007). As technol- ily have extensive technology experience.
ogy use expands outside (and within) the A 2013 study of “digital native” librarians
library, an increasing number of library revealed the Millennial generation (born
functions and roles deal directly with between 1982 and 2001) that are increas-
information technology. These include ingly populating library schools tend to
working with integrated library systems, lack more advanced technology skills. The
expanding to new search or discovery sys- majority of their technology experience is
tems, website creation, extending to mo- as the role of user of technology (Emanu-
bile app development and the construction al, 2013).
and operation of maker spaces (Breeding, Given the intensely and increasingly
2013). A longstanding emphasis on tech- technological nature of the information
nology has been included in the American professions, much attention has been paid
Library Association’s (ALA) accreditation to the state of information technology cur-
J. of Education for Library and Information Science, Vol. 56, No. 3—(Summer) July 2015
198 ISSN: 0748-5786 © 2015 Association for Library and Information Science Education
doi:10.12783/issn.2328-2967/56/3/3
Creating Tomorrow’s Technologists: Contrasting Information Technology Curriculum 199
riculum in library and information science curriculum, what general technology
graduate programs. This includes consid- topic areas dominate current course of-
eration of the ability of such programs to ferings and what specific concepts and
meet employers’ needs. This study intends skills are covered?
to extend and build on the current dialog • What technology skills are employers
about these issues, while providing a nov- seeking in technology-related job list-
el view into the current state of the field ings?
though unique datasets. While many pre- • How do these findings compare to
vious studies analyzed information tech- earlier research and what can this tell
nology curriculum offered by LIS pro- us about the evolution of technology
grams (e.g. Riley-Huff & Rholes, 2011; within the field of library and informa-
Hu, 2013; Singh & Mehra, 2013), this tion science?
study takes both a broad look into curricu-
lum across all ALA-accredited programs. Literature Review
This work complements the data with text
analysis of several years of technology- The subject of information technology
focused job listings in the information in library and information science cur-
professions provided by the Code4lib jobs riculum has received much attention in
website. research literature over the recent years.
Code4lib began as a mailing list for Nearly a decade ago, several influential
library programmers in 2003 and is de- publications (e.g. Markey, 2004; Gor-
scribed as “a volunteer-driven collective man, 2004; Dillon & Norris, 2005) criti-
of hackers, designers, architects, cura- cally evaluated and assessed the state of
tors, catalogers, artists and instigators technology education in LIS, with diverse
from around the world, who largely work perspectives put forward regarding the
for, and with, libraries, archives and mu- future relationship between the informa-
seums” (Code4lib, 2014). The organiza- tion professions, information science, and
tion now runs an annual conference while information technologies. Relevant to the
continuing to maintain an active mailing current study, in the following years these
list. It also serves as a venue for adver- voices sparked a dramatic increase in re-
tising technology-related job listings. In search studies exploring the technology
keeping with this diverse member base, skills taught in LIS education.
the associated jobs website of Code4lib No doubt highlighting the increasingly
(accessible at http://jobs.code4lib.org/) essential nature of technology skills in
captures a broad collection of job list- information professionals, previous stud-
ings, both from the Code4lib mailing list ies have approached this issue in varying
and gathered from relevant online sources. ways. Singh (2012) assessed a diverse
The positions listed are targeted towards set of stakeholder perspectives relating
the intersection between technology and to technology curriculum in library and
information organizations. In the interest information science. These findings indi-
of this study, this Code4lib jobs dataset cated that professional organizations, em-
facilitates a view into today’s job require- ployers, students, and educators all found
ments, the ability to compare curriculum technology skills to be of upmost impor-
and employment opportunities, and to un- tance, yet they expressed concerns about
derstand changes over time. the current state of technology coverage
The goals of this study are to build on in LIS educational practice. By attempting
previous research efforts in this area and to to understand coverage of technology top-
address the following questions: ics in LIS curriculum, prior research has
yielded different findings in the number
• Within library and information science and specialty of technology courses of-
200 JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE
fered. This is due to different methodolog- line educational materials could assist
ical approaches. But it is clear that several librarians in building technology skills
technology topics have consistently domi- once on the job.
nated curriculum in recent years. These Finally, in addition to applied technol-
popular technology offerings include data- ogy skills, Farkas (2007) stated that future
base design and development, web design information professionals must also be
and development, digital libraries, broad skilled in managing and evaluating tech-
introductory technology courses, systems nologies. And just as importantly previ-
analysis, and metadata (e.g. Riley-Huff, & ous literature has suggested that the LIS
Rholes, 2011; Hu, 2013; Singh & Mehra, demographic may need particular support
2013). in overcoming pre-existing negative at-
Complementary research work target- titudes or fears towards technology (e.g.
ed the competencies required by employ- West, 2007). This includes building in-
ers in the LIS domain. Mathews & Pur- terest and confidence about information
due (2009) found the following desirable technology both in education and in the
technology competencies, listed from workplace.
most to least popular, in their analysis of
librarian job listings: web development, Research Study Design
project management, systems develop-
ment, systems applications, network- In order to develop understanding of
ing, and programming languages. Two the topic under review and answer the
years later, in a 2011 study, Riley-Huff research questions presented earlier, this
and Rholes found the most commonly two-pronged research study design in-
sought job titles were systems/automa- cluded collection and analysis of two data
tion librarian, digital librarian, emerging sets. These were the ALA-accredited pro-
& instructional technology librarian, web grams’ technology course descriptions and
services/development librarian, and elec- job listings derived from the Code4lib jobs
tronic resources librarian. In pursuit of website.
understanding the relationship between
technology curriculum and job require- Library and Information Studies
ments, several studies identified gaps in Program Analysis
LIS technology education or suggested
future direction. Prior research identified The American Library Association
a need for consistency across programs (ALA) accredits master’s programs in li-
and more advanced course offerings brary and information studies in North
(Riley-Huff & Rholes, 2011). Enhancing America. An accredited degree is a com-
coverage of key topics was suggested by mon requirement for employment in the
several related studies, with varying find- field of library and information science.
ings. Singh & Mehra (2013) suggested a For this reason, all ALA-accredited pro-
need for courses in core web tools, tech- grams were the focus of the curriculum-re-
nology policy, public access computing, lated aspects of this study. Data were gath-
and hardware. Hu (2013) advocates for ered for the current list of ALA-accredited
a strong technology set of core courses schools (ALA, 2014) as of fall 2014. Each
covering database and systems manage- program’s website was assessed in order to
ment and information organization and compile a list of all courses and course de-
services. Alternatively, other researchers scriptions that indicated a significant tech-
have focused on how these skills might nology component. Coding schemes from
be gained within the workplace. Carson prior research (e.g. Singh & Mehra, 2013)
(2013) suggested that problem-based and the author’s technical knowledge pro-
learning combined with high-quality on- vided an initial list of terminology to use
Creating Tomorrow’s Technologists: Contrasting Information Technology Curriculum 201
in identifying technology-specific cours- all purpose and instructional topic of the
es. To ensure consistency and accuracy, course (e.g. “Database Design and Devel-
each website was assessed by multiple re- opment) then more detailed codes were as-
searchers. These were the author and one signed as suggested by the course descrip-
or more graduate assistants familiar with tion (e.g. “MySQL”, “HTML5”). A total
the technical terminology. Special topics of 822 course descriptions were coded,
courses with a technology focus were in- yielding a coding scheme of 441 technol-
cluded in the dataset and, where possible, ogy-related codes, representing both the
each distinct special topics course title was parent theme of the course and detailed
counted as a unique course. Two non-Eng- sub-topics.
lish speaking programs were ultimately
excluded (University of Puerto Rico and Code4lib Job Listings Analysis
University of Montreal) due to translation
difficulties. Data for the Code4lib job website is
Courses directly offered by the pro- collected both from the popular mailing
gram’s home department were the pri- listserv and through scraping tools to gath-
mary focus of data collection. Courses er potentially relevant listings from out-
outside of the program were only included side sources. The Code4lib jobs website
if they were directly suggested as elec- provides an interface for volunteers to cu-
tives or required for the LIS program or rate job listing text (e.g. format or tag the
concentration(s) within the degree. Sever- job listing appropriately and correct any
al of the ALA-accredited schools studied errors). This also allows a human curator
offer additional graduate programs with to be the final determinant of whether the
a technology focus, e.g. in areas such as job truly entails the application of technol-
information systems. As detailed above, ogy in the LIS world. Curators must view
courses associated with non-LIS gradu- and edit the position before it is published,
ate degree programs were not included thus ensuring high-quality and relevant
in the dataset unless there was clear evi- job postings. The resulting dataset consists
dence that such courses were commonly of a large collection of job titles, text de-
included in the LIS curriculum. This de- scribing the position, and the various as-
termination was made by reviewing and sociated tags, representing approximately
assessing the information presented on 4,200 job listings from 2011 to the pres-
both the LIS program’s website and any ent. Simple reporting functions, such as
potentially associated additional graduate the most popular tags, are available on
degrees. the public website and provide naviga-
A qualitative analysis on the course tion for users of the website to traverse
data was then undertaken to explore the the open positions.
technology-related themes and skills An analysis of the complete set of job
emerging from the course descriptions. A listings was conducted, including calcu-
process of inductive qualitative analysis lating frequency of the various technol-
was used to code course description text ogy tags associated with each position, as
and identify themes from the data (e.g. well as text mining with R (R Core Team,
Miles & Huberman, 1994). Inductive 2014) to assess the co-occurrence of de-
coding was used to allow the most current sired technology skills. The text mining
technologies and techniques to emerge. framework provided by the tm package
To ensure inter-rater reliability in coding, (Feinerer & Hornik, 2014) in R was used
data were first independently coded and to create a term-document matrix, allow-
then compared for agreement by a team ing for exploration of the frequency and
of three raters. Courses were assigned to a co-occurrence of technology-related terms
general parent theme to indicate the over- within job listings.
202 JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE
Results technology courses offered per program
was 14.6 (STD = 8.8), with a maximum
Results—Library and Information of 45 courses and a minimum of 4 courses
Studies Program Analysis per program observed (Table 1).
A total of 93 general topic areas were
A total of 822 technology-related identified and coded; the top five most com-
courses were identified across the 56 LIS mon general topic areas observed within the
programs studied. The mean number of collection of courses were: user experience,
Table 1. List of ALA-accredited MLS/MLIS Programs Studied and Total Number of
Technology-related Courses Offered. Bolded Text Indicates Program is a
Top 25 Graduate Program in Library and Information Studies
per U.S. News and World Report (2013) Rankings.
Library and Information Studies Total # of Library and Information Studies Total # of
Program Courses Program Courses
Michigan, University of 45 Pratt Institute 12
Illinois, University of 42 Kent State University 12
Syracuse University 33 Kentucky, University of 12
North Carolina—Chapel Hill, 31 Long Island University 12
University of
Drexel University 30 St. Catherine University 12
Simmons College 28 Arizona, University of 11
Maryland, University of 26 Wisconsin—Milwaukee, University of 11
Texas—Austin, University of 24 Western Ontario, University of 10
Missouri—Columbia, University of 22 South Carolina, University of 10
North Texas, University of 21 San Jose State University 9
Toronto, University of 20 Wisconsin—Madison, University of 9
Florida State University 19 Louisiana State University 9
Wayne State University 18 Denver, University of 9
North Carolina Central University 18 Oklahoma, University of 9
Queens College, City University of 17 Buffalo, State University of New York 8
New York
Washington, University of 17 St. John's University 8
Catholic University of America 17 Ottawa, University of 7
Hawaii, University of 17 Texas Woman's University 7
McGill University 16 Alabama, University of 7
Rutgers University 15 Alberta, University of 7
Tennessee, University of 15 Rhode Island, University of 7
British Columbia, University of 14 Dalhousie University 7
Pittsburgh, University of 13 Southern Mississippi, University of 7
Indiana University 13 Valdosta State University 6
California—Los Angeles, University of 13 Iowa, University of 6
Dominican University 13 Clarion University of Pennsylvania 6
Emporia State University 13 North Carolina—Greensboro, 6
University of
Albany, State University of New York 12 South Florida, University of 4
Creating Tomorrow’s Technologists: Contrasting Information Technology Curriculum 203
web design and development, database de- es within a particular topic area, present-
sign and development, introduction to in- ing complementary aspects of the topic
formation technology, digital libraries, and and/or as a series of courses contributing
information retrieval (tied for fifth). Table 2 to a concentration or program specialty.
lists the top 25 topic areas and the number The topic areas commonly supported by
of courses observed in this area. multiple courses were loosely similar to
The analysis of general topic areas the overall topic frequency findings, with
found the data to demonstrate a long tail, user experience and web design and devel-
with the top 25 topic areas (Table 2) ac- opment again leading the list (Table 4).
counting for 82% of the total technology- A more detailed analysis of the most
related courses identified. The many more
infrequent topic areas (Table 3).
Many programs offered multiple cours- Table 3. Most Infrequent Course
Topic Areas Observed.
Data Warehouses
Table 2. Top 25 general Course Digital Media
Topic Areas Observed across
Digital Publishing
Programs.
Document Modeling
Document Processing
Number
Topic Area of Courses Electronic Health Records
Electronic Resource Management
User Experience 77
Electronic Resources
Web Design And Development 72
Feminist Technologies
Database Design And Development 56
Informatics
Introduction To Information 54
Information Processing
Technology
Information Science
Digital Libraries 52
Informetrics
Information Retrieval 52
Linked Data
Metadata 43
Medical Knowledge Representation
Digital Collections 34
Microcomputer Applications
Systems Analysis And Design 31
Museum Informatics
Networking 25
Network Security
Information Visualization 17
Open Access
Technology In Schools 16
Open Data
Data Mining 15
Open Source Software
Programming 14
Personal Informatics Design
Digital Preservation 14
Persuasive Technology
Digital Curation 13
RDA
Multimedia 13
Recommender Systems
Electronic Records 13
Reputation Systems
Instructional Technology 13
Resource Identifiers
Library Management Systems 12
Scientific Informatics
Geographic Information Systems 8
(GIS) Systems Administration
Data Analytics 8 Technology and Older Adults
Library Technologies 7 Virtual Environments
Emerging Technology 7 Visual Information Science
Health Informatics 7 Wireless Networking
204 JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE
Table 4. Number of Programs Offering Multiple Courses
in a Particular Topic Area.
% of Programs
Number of Programs Offering Offering Multiple
Topic Area Multiple Courses in Area Courses in Area
User Experience 18 Programs (min 2, max 8 courses) 32%
Web Design and Development 17 Programs (min 2, max 4 courses) 30%
Digital Collections & Curation 11 Programs (min 2, max 5 courses) 19%
Digital Libraries 9 Programs (min/max 2 courses) 16%
Information Retrieval 9 Programs (min 2, max 3 courses) 16%
Introduction to Information Technology 9 Programs (min 2, max 3 courses) 16%
Database Design And Development 8 Programs (min 2, max 4 courses) 14%
Networking 5 Programs (min 2, max 4 courses) 8%
Metadata 5 Programs (min 2, max 4 courses) 8%
Data Mining 4 Programs (min 2, max 3 courses) 7%
Technology in Schools 3 Programs (min/max 2 courses) 5%
popular general topic areas was conduct- ceding years, 2012 to the present, were
ed, using the child tags to identify specific tallied (Figure 2). The analysis of job titles
concepts or skills taught within the courses revealed 30% of jobs (345 listings) were
in each topic area. Table 5 details the most titled as librarian positions, with the re-
common child tags associated with skills maining non-librarian positions broadly
and concepts taught in courses within the covering various technology-related roles
four most popular categories. (Table 6, below). Across the entire set of
A particularly diverse set of tags was job titles, the most common title terms
identified in the courses serving as an in- used were: librarian, digital, developer, li-
troduction to information technology, as brary, systems, services, web, technology,
to be expected from courses attempting manager, and specialist.
to broadly highlight the use of technology As detailed above, in addition to the job
in information organizations. The word listing’s text, the Code4lib jobs website
cloud (Figure 1) illustrates the frequency stores user-generated tags that represent
of the full set of 82 tags representing skills/ skills or concepts required for the position.
concepts taught in introductory informa- An analysis of the most popular tags over
tion technology courses. As illustrated in the preceding years (Figure 2), revealed
Table 4, several programs offered mul- XML to be the most common tagged re-
tiple courses covering technology basics, quirement, followed by Javascript, PHP,
perhaps motivated by the broad range of metadata, HTML and cascading style
necessary material to cover. sheets (CSS). Taggers have become less
active over time, accounting for the overall
Results – Job Listings Analysis drop in number of tags assigned in 2014.
A further analysis of the job description
The jobs listings analysis focused on text explored what technology skills and
the 2014 job listings in the Code4lib da- knowledge are often required as combina-
taset (N = 1,136), assessing common job tions within the listings, focusing on the
titles and terms, as well as popular and most common areas of expertise sought
co-occurring skillsets. Additionally, the across all year’s job listings. Figures 3, 4,
popular user-generated tags for the pre- and 5 display term correlations for several
Creating Tomorrow’s Technologists: Contrasting Information Technology Curriculum 205
of the common competency areas identi- Discussion
fied (web and metadata-centered skill-
sets), by first identifying the correlated Current Trends in Technology Course
terms and then displaying the strength of Offerings
their interconnectedness. The analysis was
conducted using the full set of job descrip- As the breadth of the introduction to
tions, including both librarian and non- technology courses illustrates (Figure 1),
librarian technology focused positions. the field of LIS currently encompasses use
Graph edges are labeled with the correla- of a broad and diverse set of technologies.
tion coefficient representing the strength Popular topics remained generally consis-
of the correlation between the two terms. tent across findings from previous years,
These collections of required skills and with databases and web design/develop-
competencies will be explored further in ment continuing to dominate course of-
the following discussion section. ferings. The findings show clear growth
Table 5. Top 20 Tags Representing Skills/concepts Covered in Courses Falling
into the Four Most Common Categories.
Web Design and Database Design and
Rank User Experience Development Development Introduction to IT
1 Usability Usability Databases Databases
2 HCI HTML Database Design Information Retrieval
3 Information Architecture Programming Database Management Information Systems
Systems
4 User Experience CSS Relational Database Web Design
Management Systems
5 User-Centered Design Information SQL Programming
Architecture
6 Web Design WWW Data Normalization Operating Systems
7 Usability Testing JavaScript Microsoft Access Information
Technologies
8 User Interface Design Content Management Query Languages Networks
Systems
9 Interaction Design XHTML XML Database Design
10 Heuristic Evaluation Databases Data Modeling HTML
11 Information Systems XML Indexing XML
12 Human Information PHP Database Programming Web Development
Behavior
13 Digital Libraries Networks Programming CSS
14 Web Development User-Interface Design Schema Design WWW
15 Information Behavior User-Centered Design Data Analysis Integrated Library
Systems
16 Interactive Design Semantic Web Information Retrieval Information
Systems Architecture
17 Cognitive Walkthrough Web Applications Data Warehouses XHTML
18 Information Retrieval Website Management Relational Databases JavaScript
19 Metadata API Query Construction HCI
20 HTML Web 2.0 MySQL Systems Design
206 JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE
Figure 1. Word cloud of sub-topic frequencies observed in courses falling into the broad “introduc-
tion to information technology” category.
Table 6. Most Common Librarian and Non-librarian Job Titles Listed in 2014.
Top Librarian Job Titles Top Non-Librarian Job Titles
Systems Librarian Web Developer
Metadata Librarian Digital Archivist
Emerging Technologies Librarian Digital Library Software Engineer
Digital Scholarship Librarian Archivist
Web Services Librarian Data Curator
Digital Initiatives Librarian Software Developer
Electronic Resources Librarian Library Applications Developer
Digital Projects Librarian Web Application Developer
Digital Services Librarian Systems Administrator
Cataloging and Metadata Librarian Software Engineer
Creating Tomorrow’s Technologists: Contrasting Information Technology Curriculum 207
in the sheer number of technology-related tiple course offerings helps illustrate ex-
courses offered. Compared to studies even isting or growing program specialties or
a few years ago, most programs demon- concentrations (Table 4). The area of user
strated an increase in technology courses experience, which broadly covers a user-
and topics covered; e.g. the top listed Uni- focused approach to the design of technol-
versity of Michigan offered 25 courses in ogy, showed significant growth over prior
2012 (Singh & Mehra, 2013), which has years, both in sheer number of courses of-
increased to 45 courses today. In 2011, fered and the number of programs offering
Riley-Huff & Rholes found a total of 439 multiple courses in the area. In the context
technology-related courses across ALA- of this study, the category of user experi-
accredited programs whereas this study ence was used to identify a wide range of
found 822 courses in total. This may also user-centered approaches and perspectives
reflect a shift towards a greater use of on the design of information technology.
technology in longstanding topics (e.g. 43 As the child tags illustrate (Table 5), the
metadata-focused courses were identified terminology used as well as the particular
as technology-intensive in this study). concepts or approaches taken varied, illus-
The data identifying areas with mul- trating the evolution in topics and concepts
Figure 2. Top 25 tags associated with job listings from 2012–2014.