The Age Demographics of Academic Librarians: A Profession Apart / Edition 1

by Stanley Wilder

Overview

The Age Demographics of Academic Librarians: A Profession Apart discusses the current demographics of librarianship in North America and examines how a huge retiree rate will affect the profession. With the average age of librarians increasing dramatically since 1990, this book examines the changes that will have to take place in your library, such as recruiting, training, and working with a smaller staff. The Age Demographics of Academic Librarians provides you with insights on how to make your library’s transition easier when several of your colleagues leave your library.

Valuable and intelligent, The Age Demographics of Academic Librarians discusses trends through easy-to-read charts, tables, and comprehensive data analysis. Exploring possible reasons for the anomalies of this trend, this book explores several surprising facts, such as:

• 16 percent of the 1995 American Research Libraries population of librarians will retire by the year 2000, another 16 percent between 2000 and 2005, 24 percent between 2005 and 2010, and 27 percent between 2010 and 2030, leaving the ARL lacking seasoned librarians
• the number of ARL cataloging librarians are decreasing, but the number of reference librarians seems to be increasing
• 54 percent of all ARL librarians who have twenty or more years of professional experience have worked at only one library in the course of their careers
• Canadian ARL librarians are older than their United States counterparts
• in 1990, 48 percent of ARL librarians were 45 years old or older; in 1994, the number increased to 58 percent
  
  The Age Demographics of Academic Librarians provides you with valuable insight into the unusual shape and movement of the academic librarian age profile as well as some speculation on its possible effects so you can predict how it will affect your library in the future and help you prepare to take preventative actions.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780789008404
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	01/10/2000
Series:	Journal of Library Administration Series
Pages:	98
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

Table of Contents

Contents Preface

• Introduction
• Acknowledgments
• List of Figures and Tables
• Executive Summary
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: The Age Profile of Librarianship
• Librarians in the Context of Aging Populations
• Age Profile of Librarianship
• Chapter 2: Shape and Movement of the Age Curve
• New Entry, Mobility, and the Shape of the ARL Curve
• Age at Entry and Mobility
• Movement of the Curve
• Chapter 3: Projections for the U.S. ARL Population
• Projections and Potential Consequences
• Chapter 4: Age Within the ARL Population
• Age Distribution by Category
• Conclusion: A Profession Apart
• Appendices
• Data Sources
• Projections and Methodology
• Salary Survey Form and Instructions
• ARL Member Libraries
• References Cited

Editorial Reviews

Reviewer: Faye Powell, MLS, MA (Portland State University Library)
Description: Research of the employment patterns of primarily Association of Research (ARL) librarians from the 1960s through 1994 reveals that, as a profession, they are aging at a faster rate than professionals in comparable fields. The author suggests explanations for this variance and projects what it may mean for the profession in the next decade and beyond.
Purpose: The author's purpose is three-fold: to examine the age profile of ARL librarians; to project changes through 2020; and to consider variation among subgroups of librarians.
Audience: This study should be of particular interest to library school faculty and administrators of academic libraries, and to a lesser degree, to other university administrators and individuals considering entering the profession.
Features: The author uses ARL data, the U.S. Current Population Survey (CPS), and the U. S. Census to analyze demographics of ARL librarians. He displays results in tables and charts in readily understandable formats. Appendixes include descriptions of the data sets and the projection methodology, the ARL Salary Survey of 1994, and a list of ARL libraries. A list of cited references, most of which were current at the time of the study, is also included. There is no index.
Assessment: Valuable data, if not surprising conclusions, are provided for planning academic libraries in the coming decades. Caution, however, should be used in extrapolating the results of this study to non-ARL librarians as certain characteristics may not apply. A comparable study of the demographics of non-ARL academic librarians would be useful to provide a more complete age profile of academic librarianship. I recommend this book for academic libraries that do not subscribe to the Journal of Library Administration.

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