Re: Library Appreciation by President of Johns Hopkins University

[Jeffry Larson <jeffry.larson@YALE.EDU>]

Ann-
It seems to me the president of Johns Hopkins was singling out his "highly 
skilled" professional librarians.
Since Brody became JHU president in 1996, their library has increased its 
professional staff by a whopping 44% while reducing its support staff by 8%*.
In the same period of time Yale increased its professional staff by 17% and 
its support staff by 9%.
Clearly Johns Hopkins has been putting its money where its mouth is.
-Jeffry Larson, SML RS&C
* All figures from arl.org.

At 14:02 2004-12-08 -0500, Ann Okerson wrote:
> >From yesterday's front page piece in the JHU gazette -- charming and worth
> a look. Of course he meant ALL library staff!  Cheers, Ann Okerson
> ____________________________________________________________________
>
> A Billion-Dollar IPO for Johns Hopkins - by William R. Brody, President of
> Johns Hopkins Univ.
>
> http://www.jhu.edu/gazette/2004/06dec04/06brody.html
>
> [SNIP]
>
> What is this great technology, you ask? Well, JHUSL stands for the Johns
> Hopkins University Sheridan Libraries. You see, our library has the most
> effective search engines yet invented -- librarians who are highly skilled
> at ferreting out the uniquely useful references that you need. Rather than
> commercializing the library collections, why not export to the public
> market the most meaningful core of Hopkins' intellectual property the
> ability to turn raw information into useful knowledge.
>
> I hope by now you realize that any talk of taking our library public is
> simply to emphasize the point missing in all this Google mania: Massive
> information overload is placing librarians in an ever more important role
> as human search engines. They are trained and gifted at ferreting out and
> vetting the key resource material when you need it. Today's technology is
> spectacular but it can't always trump a skilled human.
>
> Have you hugged your librarian today?
>
> ###