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Purpose – As the role of technology in libraries has broadened and expanded, tech-savvy librarians and non-librarian technologists are increasingly working side by side in complex digital environments. Little research has explored the key differences between these roles and the implications for the future of the Master of Library Science (MLS) and its variant degrees, particularly as technologists from various backgrounds increasingly enter the information field. This chapter contrasts the technological responsibilities of the two groups to build an understanding of the necessity of the MLS in library-oriented technology work.

Design/Methodology/Approach – Qualitative coding and text mining techniques were used to analyze technology-oriented librarian and non-librarian job advertisements, technology curriculum changes, and surveyed technology interests of current information professionals.

Findings – Findings indicate a clear distinction between librarian and non-librarian technology responsibilities. Librarian positions emphasize web design, data and metadata, technology troubleshooting, and usage of library-oriented software. Non-librarian technologists require programming, database development, and systems administration, with deeper software and systems knowledge. Overlap was noted in the areas of user experience, linked data, and metadata. Several newer trends that information professionals expressed a desire to learn – such as makerspace technologies – were observed to be poorly covered in the technology curriculum, though the MLS curriculum generally covered the tech-savvy librarians’ responsibilities.

Originality/Value – This chapter builds understanding of the current necessity of the MLS in library-oriented technology work, as contrasted against the role of non-librarian technologists, through analysis of a triangulated set of data sources covering employment opportunities, technology curriculum, and librarians’ technology interests.

The purpose of this paper is to identify and explore curriculum related to makerspaces and making within library and information science graduate programs and continuing education opportunities available to librarians. These findings are compared against prior assessments of makerspace-related educational offerings, as well as contrasted with recent practitioner survey results indicating the number of library practitioners involved in makerspace work and their needs.

This paper employs content analysis to assess makerspace topics within American Library Association (ALA)-accredited library and information science Masters programs’ course catalogs and in continuing education opportunities for librarians.

This work identified a total of eight courses from seven ALA-accredited Masters of Library Science programs relating to makerspace and making topics. A series of past and current makerspace-related continuing education opportunities were noted, with a variety of durations and structures, all offered in online format. As compared to prior research, these findings describe a notable increase in training and curriculum relating to library makerspaces.

A limitation of this work is the difficulty in assessing frequency of course offerings, details regarding special topics courses and the potential continuing education materials that may have been removed from the internet since their offering.

Although significant research efforts have focused on makerspaces, little work has directly assessed the ongoing impact of the makerspace trend on library and information science graduate programs and continuing education opportunities.

Cultural heritage archives rely on environmental monitoring devices, such as dataloggers or more complex networked systems, to ensure collection preservation through collecting temperature, humidity, light and/or air quality measures. Existing systems are often costly, inflexible and do not use a modern, internet of things (IoT) approach. This paper aims to determine the suitability of currently popular general-purpose IoT devices, standards and technologies to the environmental monitoring needs of archivists, as well as identify any challenges.

This paper describes an exploratory study detailing the design, construction and usability testing of a do-it-yourself datalogger and data dashboard system, which seeks to manage previously identified trade-offs in cost, required technical skill and maintainability.

The environmental monitoring system presented met archivists’ needs well and was generally noted to be easy-to-use, efficient and an improvement on existing systems. This suggests that an IoT approach can support archivists’ needs in this area.

Potential limitations of this study include lack of archival staff with sufficient technical training to maintain such a system and the rapid pace of IoT evolution yielding unstable and constantly changing technologies.

The system design presented in this work provides a blueprint for cultural heritage organizations desiring a fuller-featured, lower cost environmental monitoring system for archival collections.

This research takes a novel user-centered, open-source, IoT approach to construct an environmental monitoring system that is designed directly from archivists’ requirements and is extensible for future needs.

This research seeks to better understand the potential uses of maker technologies, such as single-board computers and microcontrollers, more broadly within libraries and not simply confined to the makerspace. Through interviews with librarians creating such projects, this study illustrates their successes, challenges, means of acquiring the necessary skills and knowledge, as well as their perceptions of the broader benefits and challenges to other library and information science practitioners.

This research study employed semistructured interviews with 12 librarians who have created projects with maker technologies for broader library use. Inductive qualitative analysis of the interview transcripts was conducted to identify themes of interest to the stated research questions.

Librarians' projects included: displaying digital signage, hosting online public access catalog stations, tallying reference desk interactions, counting patrons at the gate and monitoring 3-D printing statistics, among others. Participants appreciated the low-cost, flexible and creative nature of such technologies, and though they also encountered technical and organizational challenges in their use, relayed a potential series of benefits to librarians and library staff were these technologies to be more widely used.

Although significant research efforts have focused on aspects of makerspaces across all types of libraries, little work has formally collected and assessed library practitioners' work with maker technologies outside of the makerspace. Participants help detail the potential benefits of having a deeper understanding of this work, and the successes it could bring to librarians' work.