Associate Librarian California State University, East Bay, California, United States
While much has been written about the changing role of academic librarians and their evolving responsibilities in liaison activities, the issue of whether or not science subject specialization continues to be a necessary component of the librarian workload has not been adequately addressed. There is added value in learning both science liaison librarians’ perspectives as well as library leaders’. Two similar surveys were sent out: one to Library leaders at the level of University Librarians, Library Directors, and Library Deans (emails were derived from ACRL) and the other to science liaison librarians on the STS (Science & Technology Section of ACRL) Listserv. Both were surveyed about their predictions for the future of science liaison librarianship and the importance of science subject specialization. This poster analyzes the responses from 71 library leaders and 230 science liaison librarians at institutions ranging from community colleges through large, research intensive universities and provides insight into evolving roles for academic science librarians. A few key findings include that both groups of library leaders and science liaison librarians perceive functional roles such as data management and scholarly communication growing in importance, yet these roles are rarely seen as replacing traditional subject-based ones. Subject specialization is still seen by many of the respondents as a desirable qualification for science librarians, even though smaller institutional size and budget constraints may necessitate a more generalist approach
