Janis Hashe: Preserving the full truth of the #Black Panthers
#BlackPanthers #Libraries #Stanford #archive #Oakland #California #history
https://eastbayexpress.com/beyond-the-berets-and-rifles/
Janis Hashe: Preserving the full truth of the #Black Panthers
#BlackPanthers #Libraries #Stanford #archive #Oakland #California #history
https://eastbayexpress.com/beyond-the-berets-and-rifles/
What’s everyone #reading right now?
I just cannot stomach any nonfiction in this moment (though lots of great stuff is out) so I’m currently making my through a two-part #scifi anthology. I’ve been wanting to read this for a long time and finally checked it out through interlibrary loan at my local public #library. By the way, #libraries rule. Support yours!
Biblioteca civica Gambalunga, public library in Italy.
Guildhall Library, public library in London, UK.
How many #libraries are (accidentally) paying a premium for this feature? Is that how this scam works? Librarians, make sure your institution doesn't waste money!
RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:qvhevmxqofcydffyajz2ghea/post/3lu3qc5rq7s2l
Investigating the “Feeling Rules” of Generative AI and Imagining Alternative Futures by Andrea Baer
"rather than rushing to adopt and promote new technologies whose ethical implications raise major questions, we might slow down and claim more time and space for considering the present and potential implications of GenAI adoption and use"
#libraries
https://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2025/ai-feeling-rules/
Opinion | Texas gutted free speech on college campuses. Is your state next? – The Washington Post
Attendees pass a political “free-speech zone” at Cochise College in Douglas, Arizona, on Sept. 27, 2024. (Melina Mara / The Washington Post)Texas just gutted free speech on college campuses. Is your state next?
New laws in the Lone Star State will silence dissent and undermine faculty authority.
July 14, 2025, 5 mins
By Laura Benitez and Jonathan Friedman
Laura Benitez is state policy manager and Jonathan Friedman is Sy Syms managing director for PEN America’s U.S. free expression programs.
As thousands of students return to college campuses this fall, they will find themselves stepping into an environment reshaped by political and ideological mandates. Across the country, state legislators have been racing to exert new influence over free expression in higher education. Now, Texas has surged to the forefront, closing its 2025 legislative session by passing two alarming laws that take effect Sept. 1.
Get first-person illustrated stories about how work is changing
Signed by Gov. Greg Abbott (R) in June, the new laws amount to a stunningly aggressive legislative crackdown on campus protest (S.B. 2972) and academic shared governance (S.B. 37) at public colleges and universities. The laws will not just silence dissent and undermine faculty authority in Texas; they provide a blueprint for how to dismantle academic freedom and chill speech on campus state by state.
Only a few years ago, conservative lawmakers railed against college “free-speech zones,” arguing that liberal administrators were muzzling students on the rest of campus. In 2019, Texas legislators joined other states in taking action by declaring all outdoor spaces on public campuses open for protest and speech by students, employees and the general public.
Now, some ofthe same legislators have done an about-face. The campus protest law actually directs public colleges and universities to implement a version of free-speech zones and adopt sweeping limitations on protests. Encampments? Banned. Megaphones or speakers during “class hours”? Forbidden — if anyone claims your “expressive activity” is one that “intimidates others” or “interferes” with an employee’s duties. Even wearing a mask during a protest — something many do for safety — could land a student or employee a disciplinary hearing resulting in “sanctions.” And any expressive activity between 10 p.m. and 8 a.m. is off-limits altogether.
Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.
Continue/Read Original Article Here: Opinion | Texas gutted free speech on college campuses. Is your state next? – The Washington Post
#2025 #America #Books #CollegeCampuses #Colleges #DonaldTrump #FreeSpeech #Health #History #Libraries #LibraryOfCongress #Politics #Resistance #Science #Texas #TheWashingtonPost #Trump #TrumpAdministration #UnitedStates #Universities
Letters from an American – July 15, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson
By Heather Cox Richardson, July 15, 2025
Heather Cox RichardsonWithout any explanation, the right-wing majority on the Supreme Court yesterday granted a stay on a lower court’s order that the Trump administration could not gut the Department of Education while the issue is in the courts. The majority thus throws the weight of the Supreme Court behind the ability of the Trump administration to get rid of departments established by Congress—a power the Supreme Court denied when President Richard M. Nixon tried it in 1973.
This is a major expansion of presidential power, permitting the president to disregard laws Congress has passed, despite the Constitution’s clear assignment of lawmaking power to Congress alone.
President Donald J. Trump has vowed to eliminate the Department of Education because he claims it pushes “woke” ideology on America’s schoolchildren and that its employees “hate our children.” Running for office, he promised to “return” education to the states. In fact, the Education Department has never set curriculum; it disburses funds for high-poverty schools and educating students with disabilities. It’s also in charge of prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race and sex in schools that get federal funding.
Trump’s secretary of education, professional wrestling promoter Linda McMahon, supports Trump’s plan to dismantle the department. In March the department announced it would lay off 1,378 employees—about half the department. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia sued to stop the layoffs, and Massachusetts federal judge Myong Joun ordered the department to reinstate the fired workers. The Supreme Court has now put that order on hold, permitting the layoffs to go forward.
Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan concurred in a dissent written by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, noting that Trump has claimed power to destroy the congressionally established department “by executive fiat” and chastising the right-wing majority for enabling him. “When the Executive publicly announces its intent to break the law, and then executes on that promise, it is the Judiciary’s duty to check that lawlessness, not expedite it,” they say.
“The President must take care that the laws are faithfully executed, not set out to dismantle them. That basic rule undergirds our Constitution’s separation of powers. Yet today, the majority rewards clear defiance of that core principle with emergency relief.”
Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.
Continue/Read Original Article Here: July 15, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson
#1973 #2025 #America #Children #DepartmentOfEducation #DonaldTrump #Education #History #Libraries #LibraryOfCongress #Nixon #Politics #PresidentialPower #PublicSchools #Resistance #Science #SCOTUS #SupremeCourtOfTheUnitedStates #Trump #TrumpAdministration #UnitedStates
Wolves at the Door
The Myth of the EdTech Ecosystem
We who work in the education sector often encounter the metaphor of “the edtech ecosystem.” This metaphor is used to suggest that such ecosystems are self-regulating, and the edtech ecosystem is specifically framed as an innovative domain that exists to “disrupt” traditional education. But this framing serves vendors and venture capitalists (and learning technologists) who cast themselves as “forces of nature”, and want to bring about change for education’s sake, when in actual fact they are commercial actors driven by profit, or institutional actors trying to “gain seats at the table” (and the assumed power and influence that said table represents).
In late June of this year, we were invited to give a talk at the M25 Consortium of Libraries conference, the first one that had been convened face to face since 2019. We wanted to confront the underlying assumptions of the EdTech Ecosystem metaphor, by way of telling a story about Yellowstone National Park, in the US.
Trophic Cascade(s) in Yellowstone
Photo by Mike Goad https://pixabay.com/photos/bull-elk-next-to-madison-river-elk-3855610/Following the eradication of grey wolves from Yellowstone in the early 20th Century, the population of elk (large herbivores) grew unchecked. These herbivores grazed the park’s vegetation beyond what was sustainable, causing riverbank erosion, loss of habitat, and causing the reduction of other species such as beaver. In addition, without strong tree roots to stabilise the soil, rivers meandered unpredictably. Essentially, biodiversity collapsed and the park as a whole suffered.
This ecological disaster was brought about by the removal of a key species – the wolf – causing a trophic cascade – that is, the indirect effects across an ecosystem, caused by impacting one species, a domino effect that alters the ecosystem throughout. For example, when the farmers and ranchers (at the advice and encouragement of the US Government) shot all the wolves they didn’t expect to lose all the beavers and all the trees.
Photo by NPS/Neal HerbertIn 1995 the park authorities, acting on the advice of ecologists, began a programme of reintroduction of the grey wolf. The wolves preyed on the elk numbers, controlling their population, and it changed their grazing behaviour. The vegetation recovered, it supported the return of beavers, waterways became stable, and the ecosystem became more diverse, more balanced.
Photo by NPS / Jacob W. FrankEdTech “Ecosystems”
This figure is from a 2019 article, by Regan, P. M., & Khwaja, E. T. It shows the ecosystem of tech companies in the education sector, and their relationship to each other. The red nodes are Venture Capitalist investors. The blue nodes are the edtech companies funded by the VCs.
This is a system that has no balance. The individual companies and the VCs are doing so much of the same thing, competing with each other to exploit the same food source, that is, Higher Education. This diagram represents a network of actors exerting gravity over the sector in a disproportionate way.
This entire diagram is a herd of elk, uncontained by wolves. We might say the red nodes are the ranchers and farmers and government officials, determined to get rid of the wolves.
What is missing from this figure? The answer lies not in another technological solution or stream of funding from venture capital, but in fundamental human elements: pedagogical wisdom, ethical frameworks, and holistic educational philosophy. That would look, possibly, more like a network of the people doing educational work from within universities and other institutions.
Like this one. This shows a Network generated in Socioviz, a social network representation of people, connected by practice and priorities on a social media platform. This is Lawrie’s social network , mapped according to his interests in education and digital (blue), birds and wildlife (pink), canals (green), and the athletics world championships (red), (plus a few outliers). The smaller nodes are people he engaged with about those topics, over the entire month of August in 2017 (A LIFETIME AGO). This is a representation of relationships, of connections, of ties weak and strong, of people in webs of meaning.
This is a personal network filled with humans and human interests, even if it was visualized with data from a specific tech platform. The humans, and the varied interests, they are the point. This network is not just about edtech, or education, but about all the other things Lawrie (and other people) engage with. The flows in Lawrie’s network are multi-directional, not going in a single path. This isn’t a cascade of information or money in one direction, but an engagement, a feedback loop that enriches.
The previous network is a financial network, filled with products. It is an edtech monoculture, extracting resources from the Education sector, leaving it devastated.
Once the wolves were removed from Yellowstone, elk populations exploded, overgrazing the land and stripping vegetation from riverbanks. Many educational institutions buy technology and (increasingly) subscribe to tech services without a clear pedagogical or research purpose—whether it’s AI-driven grading, data analytics, or virtual learning platforms. While these tools promise efficiency, their unchecked dominance can lead to:
Like the elk of Yellowstone, unchecked EdTech overconsumes resources (such as institutional funding and staff time) and creates a monoculture that crowds out more diverse, nuanced approaches to teaching and learning and research. Like eroded riverbanks and dying willow trees, learning environments filled with standardised, tech-driven instruction often lack intellectual depth. Students may complete assignments quickly but miss out on the reflective, discussion-based, and inquiry-driven aspects of true education.
So while EdTech has often been described as an ecosystem, one that regulates itself, as a necessary disruptor of education, we see very little evidence of regulation, or of the benefits of disruption. The reality is that edtech is an unbalanced force, growing unchecked in ways that sometimes harm rather than help learning–we can point to the growth of GenAI tools within the sector as the latest example of that.. And just as Yellowstone suffered without wolves, and the explosion in Elk numbers, the educational ecosystem is suffering from a lack of humanity, where GenAI tools are becoming ubiquitous.
Libraries
In a library context, this can look like collection development funneled through one particular company’s vision of what resources individual libraries “should” need (based on generalities), ignoring the specifics of what an organization needs to support the particular people in their specific place. It can look like discovery layers that prioritize holdings across a network (hello OCLC WorldCat), rather than what is available locally. It can look like replacing physical holdings with digital collections that are subscribed to, rather than held in perpetuity by an institution. It can look like swipe card surveillance technology used to inform about library use, rather than engagement at a human level with the community within (and outside of) your library building.
It can look like replacing human library workers with chatbots.
The lens of library technology can obscure the importance of human expertise in the library, the network of people who should be required to facilitate and communicate the complex work of scholarship. When the largest part of our budgets is going to subscriptions and systems, not people, we lose so much.
Call for a Trophic Cascade
The ecosystem we are concerned about is the whole of education, the entire sector. The unchecked actors (the elk) are indeed the vendors and products, and the market logics that mean that universities and libraries are encouraged to literally buy into the priorities of the sellers of edtech and library tech, not the people who have to use that tech while they are engaging in and supporting learning, teaching, and researching. The variety of approaches to academic practices that was possible before the slick layer of VC driven technology was applied is being homogenized, and in some cases suffocated, leaving us with a monoculture, fragile and sterile, and increasingly written by a machine.
This is accelerating through the race to adopt “AI” and this will lead to algorithmic conformity, a monoculture at best, and more likely a degraded ecosystem overall, less rich and less sustainable than we need it to be.
Before wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone, overgrazing destroyed key plant life, depleting the ecosystem. In education, deep learning and meaningful engagement, like the vegetation of Yellowstone, are at risk of being stripped away when technology is prioritised for its efficiency rather than its effectiveness. And if we are really honest, it is not about efficiency, it is about expediency, finding a fast solution even if it’s not a particularly good one.
For the education ecosystem to heal, something must regulate the overuse of technology and restore the conditions for diversity.
Druid wolf pack chasing bull elk;Human-Centred Futures
We need the wolves that can restore balance to the Education landscape. But who are they?
It’s certainly not an algorithm, software update, or digital tool. It is the intentional, human-centred application of pedagogy, ethics, and critical reflection, acting as the “wolves” that bring stability to the ecosystem. We need workers in the sector to be the wolves.
We also need regulatory wolves–something we are unlikely to have in the US, and maybe not in the UK, but perhaps the EU can get started so that we someday might follow.
Just as wolves in Yellowstone reshaped elk behaviour, the introduction of regulatory, pedagogical, and humanitarian concerns could force technology to slow down, adapt, and serve an educational purpose rather than merely expanding unchecked to increase vendor profits.
NPS / Jacob W. FrankWe are advocating, as we usually do, for human-centred approaches to technology (and, everything). The presence of human-centred values ensures that:
Without the reintroduction of wolves, everything struggles to survive. When technology dictates academic practices and priorities, rather than the other way around, library and other education workers become implementers of software rather than architects of learning. If education is to be dynamic, adaptable, and human-centred, then educators must have the space and authority to engineer the learning experiences that best suit their students.
In the education ecosystem, institutions that embrace thoughtful, human-centred approaches over technology integration will see a similar effect. Instead of letting technology dictate educational structures, they will reshape their policies, practices, and cultures to ensure that human learning remains the central focus. To have the agency to adhere to humanistic priorities, institutions additionally need government support, both financial and regulatory, to be robust.
This means:
For the education ecosystem to return to a rich, diverse and sustainable system we need a trophic cascade, one in which the “wolves” of critical pedagogy, ethical considerations, and holistic learning reshape its behaviour, restore balance, and allow deep learning to flourish once again.
At the end here we want to point to the need for maintenance and sustainability. Just because there was a restoration of the ecosystem does not mean that the current political situation will allow that to continue. At the time we gave this talk there was a push to privatize the US National Parks, sell the public lands, and extract the resources. Ecosystems have never existed in a vacuum, and that continues to be the case. We are advocating for individual responses here, and also collective action, both practical and political.
We must be the wolves at the door, not to destroy, but to restore the balance.
8 mile pack wolf pups;#19659d #ecosystems #edtech #GAI #GenAI #humanCentredEducation #libraries #TrophicCascade #ventureCapital #Yellowstone
“I found my multiple p/t jobs through cold-calling and a temp-hiring firm”
Please note: this is an anonymous response to an online survey; I do not have any way of contacting the respondent or verifying responses. Their answers may reflect good, bad, or middling job searching practices. I invite you to take what’s useful and leave the rest.
Your Demographics and Search Parameters
How long have you been job hunting?
√ Other: I’ve been job-hunting throughout my library career, always underemployed, and not finding a really good job.
Why are you job hunting?
√ I’m underemployed (not enough hours or overqualified for current position),
√ My current job is awful/toxic,
√ Other: I live in a radically-gentrified area.
Where do you look for open positions?
ArchivesGig
What position level are you looking for?
√ Requiring at least two years of experience,
√ Supervisory,
√ Department Head
What type(s) of organization are you looking in?
√ Academic library,
√ Archives,
√ Public library,
√ Special library
What part of the world are you in?
√ Northeastern US
What’s your region like?
√ Urban area,
√ Suburban area
Are you willing/able to move for employment?
√ Yes, to a specific list of places
What are the top three things you’re looking for in a job?
Healthy workplace culture, Room for creativity, Better pay
How many jobs have you applied to during your current search? (Please indicate if it’s an estimate or exact)
dozens and dozens
What steps, actions, or attributes are most important for employers to take to sell you on the job?
√ Pay well,
√ Having (and describing) excellent benefits,
√ Prioritizing work-life balance
Do you expect to see the salary range listed in a job ad?
√ Yes, and it’s a red flag when it’s not
Other than not listing a salary range, are there other “red flags” that would prevent you from applying to a job?
Location
The Process
How much time do you spend preparing an application packet?
between an hour and 2 hours
What are the steps you follow to prepare an application packet?
deep-reading of the ad and job-description, adjust resume, write targeted cover-letter, create any supporting documents (including Dropbox portfolios)
How do you prefer to communicate with potential employers?
√ No preference
When would you like potential employers to contact you?
√ To acknowledge my application,
√ Other: To tell me if the search is at the interview stage, even if I have not been selected, when they have more questions; it’s unfortunately never a 2-way street, and they’d rather ghost-and-reject than make queries
How long do you expect an organization’s application process to take, from the point you submit your documents to the point of either an offer or rejection?
60 days
How do you prepare for interviews?
by rereading job descriptions and visiting their web sites
What are your most hated interview questions, and why?
“why do you want this job?” -it goes without saying that as an applicant, I want the job; let’s talk about the job and what they need!
During your current search, have you had any of the following experiences:
If you’ve turned down an offer (or offers), why?
In 25 years, this has happened 3 or 4 times, always due to finding out more about the institution or the fine-details about the job. A couple of times, I visited places that were embroiled in financial duress. On one occasion, the library was amidst administrative turmoil.
If you want to share a great, inspirational, funny, horrific or other story about an experience you have had at any stage in the hiring process, please do so here:
I gave my finalist lecture at a college library, and at the end of a productive day, the library director warned me about the financial uncertainty of the institution, explaining how they had special fund to cover a year’s salary when the place closes.
What should employers do to make the hiring process better for job hunters?
Be candid. Tell us what is needed, and be as open as the applicant is, considering how relational our field is. Perfection does NOT exist; imperfection can be quite wonderful, and these search committee members should look for teachable/amenable employees.
You and Your Well-Being
How are you doing, generally?
√ I’m despondent,
√ I’m frustrated,
√ I feel alone in my search,
√ Other: I went to Simmons, which has a lot of potential influence- but will not lift a finger to help an alum.
What are your job search self-care strategies?
Journaling and spiritual life
Do you have any advice or words of support you’d like to share with other job hunters, is there anything you’d like to say to employers, or is there anything else you’d like to say about job hunting?
We’re librarians/archivists, and we know how to network! Why not help one another? “Good luck” does nothing. We should be pulling strings and really supporting one another.
Do you have any comments for Emily (the survey author) or are there any other questions you think we should add to this survey?
It might be a totally different survey, but asking participants about what’s wrong in their workplaces.
Job Hunting Post Graduate School
If you have an MLIS or other graduate level degree in a LIS field, what year did you graduate? (Or what year do you anticipate graduating?)
MLIS in both Archives Administration and Library Science – 1998
When did you start your first job search for a “professional” position (or other position that utilized your degree)?
√ After graduating with my MLIS/other LIS degree
In relation to your graduation, when did you find your first “professional” position?
√ Other: Just a few months out of the gate, juggling 3 (sometimes 4) simultaneous MLS-level p/t positions
What kind of work was your first post-graduation professional position?
√ Part Time
Did you get support from your library school for your first job hunt (and/or any subsequent ones)?
None at all; a real, persistent, and inexcusable disappointment, which served to hold back my career.
Is there anything else you’d like to tell us about searching for or finding your first post-graduation position?
I found my multiple p/t jobs through cold-calling and a temp-hiring firm
#GLAMJobs #librarians #libraries #libraryHiring #libraryInterview #libraryJobs #libraryWork #LISCareers #lisJobs
"I've been job-hunting throughout my library career, always underemployed, and not finding a really good job." #LIS #GLAM #Libraries #LibraryJobs
#SaveYouAClick: If you put money on it, yea, this could work. Duh. What'd be better? Expanding actual mental health services and funding them properly instead of dumping another burden on #libraries.
> Libraries Can Be Hubs for Mental Health Supports; Approach Could Aid Care in Rural Communities https://www.rand.org/news/press/2025/07/libraries-can-be-hubs-for-mental-health-supports-approach.html
New Hampshire Governor Vetoes Book Ban Legislation https://www.infodocket.com/2025/07/16/new-hampshire-governor-vetoes-book-ban-legislation/ #books #bookbans #libraries
Seville Public Library, library in Spain.
Stewart Library, former public library in Grinnel Iowa.
Silver Spring Library, public library in Silver Spring, Maryland, United States.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brigadier_General_Charles_E._McGee_Library
From RAND: #Libraries Can Be Hubs For Mental Health Supports; Approach Could Aid Care in Rural Communities https://www.rand.org/news/press/2025/07/libraries-can-be-hubs-for-mental-health-supports-approach.html #mentalhealth
Two-thirds of the DOJ unit defending Trump policies in court have quit | Reuters
A member of the media records U.S. President Donald Trump speaking during a press conference, after the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a blow to the power of federal judges by restricting their ability to grant broad legal relief in cases as the justices acted in a legal fight over President Donald…By Andrew Goudsward, July 14, 20256:29 AM PDT, Updated July 14, 2025
WASHINGTON, July 14 (Reuters) – The U.S. Justice Department unit charged with defending against legal challenges to signature Trump administration policies – such as restricting birthright citizenship and slashing funding to Harvard University – has lost nearly two-thirds of its staff, according to a list seen by Reuters.
Sixty-nine of the roughly 110 lawyers in the Federal Programs Branch have voluntarily left the unit since President Donald Trump’s election in November or have announced plans to leave, according to the list compiled by former Justice Department lawyers and reviewed by Reuters.
The tally has not been previously reported. Using court records and LinkedIn accounts, Reuters was able to verify the departure of all but four names on the list.
Reuters spoke to four former lawyers in the unit and three other people familiar with the departures who said some staffers had grown demoralized and exhausted defending an onslaught of lawsuits against Trump’s administration.
“Many of these people came to work at Federal Programs to defend aspects of our constitutional system,” said one lawyer who left the unit during Trump’s second term. “How could they participate in the project of tearing it down?”
Continue/Read Original Article Here: Two-thirds of the DOJ unit defending Trump policies in court have quit | Reuters
#2025 #America #DonaldTrump #Health #History #LawyersLeavingTrump #Legal #Libraries #LibraryOfCongress #Politics #ResigningDOJ #Resistance #Reuters #Science #Trump #TrumpAdministration #TrumpLawsuits #TrumpLawyers #TrumpPolicies #UnitedStates
NEW Journal Article: "Prompt Engineering For #Bibliographic Web-Scraping” https://www.infodocket.com/2025/07/15/journal-article-prompt-engineering-for-bibliographic-web-scraping/ #AI #LLMs #prompts #libraries