Assignment: Personal Philosophy Paper LIS204: Foundations of Library and Information Science
Assignment rationale: A primary objective of this course is to help you develop a personal professional philosophy based on the LIS profession's ethics, standards, processes, environments, and principles. This paper is an opportunity to articulate your emerging philosophy. It will also be an important artifact for the final capstone/e-portfolio that you will submit at the end of your MSLIS degree program.
Instructions:
1. As you read materials, engage in discussions, and experience other courses in the MSLIS program, pay attention to expressions of the values, ethics, standards, processes, principles, etc., of our field.
2. Write an 8-10 page paper describing what you personally believe our profession is all about (i.e., your personal philosophy of librarianship/information practice.
NOTE: This paper is not to be based solely on how you “feel”. Instead, you should describe what you think. And this thinking should be informed by both your own personal, educational, and workplace experiences as well as the documents and other sources with which you engage. Certainly subjectivity has a place in our profession. But you must be able to describe thought processes and articulate arguments for both this paper, and in the information workplace as well.
3. Some questions that you may consider when formulating your papers: ? What are the professional values that motivate you?
- Are there any values, ethics, standards, etc., that you will personally emphasize in your LIS practice?
- As you work to uphold professional values, do you foresee personal, environmental, or organizational challenges? How will you overcome or deal with these challenges? ?
- Upon receiving the MSLIS degree, what mindset will guide you so that you are a “practicing professional” rather than “a person with a job”?
- How will your emergent philosophy guide your professional growth and development? ? This is not an exhaustive list. Feel free to explore other “big picture” questions.
4. You must include a reference section using APA style. 5. You must follow the writing guidelines posted on the course Bb site.
Daniel Dobroff 5/2/2016
LIS 204 Prof. Rioux
As a Liberian we all have a responsibility, mandate and obligation to show honor, respect and integrity for the profession. Honor, respect and integrity are the values, ethics and standards which I will use. I foresee personal, environmental, and organizational challenges. I will work to overcome those challenge by having honor, respect and integrity for the profession. I will do that by ensuring that all the work that I will do is fact checked, accurate and helps all members of the community that I represent. The mind set of I have an obligation to serve my community will guide me so that I am a “practicing professional” as opposed to “a person with a job.” My philosophy of serving my community will guide my professional growth and development since that will be what keeps me grounded in doing great work as a Liberian. I will have an interest in learning about where I will work as well as helping that community to learn about where they live. That is the role of a Liberian in today’s world. The internet is no substitute for learning about one’s community. I know that first hand. I learned a lot about my community Plainview-Old Bethpage from resources at the POB Library most of which I was never able to find online in an era where almost everything can be found online. From elementary to grad school libraries have had several different tools and resources that I have used to help with several assignments that I never would have found using the internet at home. In a workplace I have used the library to find facts about the kind of work I have done including historical aspects which the internet alone did not have enough resources. about. The main goals of a Liberian are to represent the community they work at, fair and unbiased research and have a good knowledge of facts that are objective and not subjective. For example if someone comes to the library and wants to do research on the candidates running for president I would have an obligation to help them do research that is positive, neutral and negative for all the candidates running for president. I cannot let a bias get in the way. I would be obligated to give all the facts and truthful information on Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton as well as Bernie Sanders be it good, bad or indifferent. The same goes for issues. Say I am pro-choice I would have an obligation to help someone with research on making a pro-life argument cause not doing so would be objective instead of subjective. I must also not let religious views get in the way of my job as a Liberian. I must help anyone of any religious group with research they may want to do as well as any atheist with any research that they choose to do. I also have an obligation to treat all patrons fairly regardless of their background be it they are a Women, Gay, African-American, Transgender, Immigrant, Atheist, Disabled, Mentally Ill or a Muslim. Not doing so would show a bias that must never exist in a library.