It’s been a while since I did a “Librarian Day in the Life.” It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything, but today of all days seemed like a good day to share.
6:30a-8:45a: Wake up. Get kids ready for school. Get ready for work. The usual morning routine. Drop kids off at school.
9:00a-9:30a: Arrive at work and fire up all the devices. Review email to see if anything can be quickly completed (i.e. can be done in under 2 minutes). Including:
- Sent a survey to all library staff assessing internal communication methods
- Invited two faculty members to serve on a November panel discussion event
- Received and uploaded two graphics for the library’s digital displays to help promote athletic events on campus
- Gave instructions for student worker to create first drafts of social media content
9:30a-10:30a: On Mondays I set aside the first hour of the day to plan my social media content for the entire week. This week, I’ll be promoting our Faculty Pub Night and Archives Opening Reception, looking at a few titles from our Popular Reading collection (on Instagram), and highlighting historic anniversaries with resources from our collections (on Facebook and Twitter).
10:30a-12:00p: Library management meeting. All the unit heads and deans get together weekly to discuss current projects, issues, and library initiatives.
12:00p-3:00p:
- Worked on the table of contents for the library’s annual Year in Review publication (which will consume most of my attention for the next few months).
- Took photos of staff members for an article on their new publication
- Edited blog post about current archives exhibition written by student intern (and took photo of human hair)
- Updated library homepage slider to highlight our staff statement on DACA
- Posted to library social media about upcoming events. Retweeted a few useful links
- Grabbed a smoothie for lunch.
3:00p-4:00p: Had my weekly meeting with the dean. Among many topics, we discussed updates on library orientation for transfer and honor students, the Year in Review (see above), and new methods for assessing the success of library programming.
4:00p-5:00p: Led my bi-weekly Outreach Department meeting. We discussed upcoming Fall events (Haunting of Hannon; Human Library), the file organization of our shared department folder, and a new role for our student workers: “event correspondent” (where we are asking students to attend library events, talk with attendees about their experience, and draft up brief summaries of what they learn).
5:00p-5:15p: Quickly address a few open loops via email.
5:30p-8:30p: Pick up kids. Get kids dinner. Watch an episode of Octonauts. Get kids ready for bed.
8:30p-9:30p: Watch a few YouTube videos I saved earlier in the day. Meditate.
9:30p-11:30p: Read an article on library outreach. Create a flyer for an LMU Common Book event in November. Finish drafting the blog post from earlier. Clean out inbox (I maintain Inbox Zero daily).