Ruth Ketchum, 45
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Years on job: 21
Title: Librarian IV Unit Manager, Business/Science/Technology Unit, Sulzer Regional Library, Chicago
Salary range: $47,328-$65,352/year
Q. So what does a “librarian IV unit manager” do? You’re a reference librarian, right?
A. Yes, mostly. I also manage the unit here. That involves a lot of different things. I probably spend three to four hours on reference every day.
In addition to that, I order all the books in the business section for this library, and I supervise two people who order all the books and materials in science and technology, which is a large section. It includes cooking and electronics and mathematics and animals and all sorts of other things.
Q. So at each individual branch or regional library, there’s a librarian making decisions about what titles to put on those shelves?
A. Yes! That’s what’s really great about the Chicago Public Library, and I think a lot of people don’t realize it. It’s really valuable. It’s exciting for us as employees, but for patrons it’s really important. There are about 75 branches all over the city, and librarians at each one of those places order the books for that community. They’re aware of what people need, so you get a really broad, interesting collection that you wouldn’t have if all the books were ordered centrally. I feel really proud about that, and I think most of my colleagues do.
Of course, there’s a downside to [this system] too. It takes a little while longer to get the books, because the process is cumbersome. But bureaucracies and institutions are built that way.
Q. What’s your educational background?
A. I have a bachelor’s in English and educational literature, and I went to graduate library school at the University of Chicago.
Q. What’s a typical day in the library?
A. The thing I like is, there’s no typical day. We get a lot of people at Sulzer who really value our services and who understand libraries and use us a lot. We also get a lot of patrons who don’t really know what’s up. We get people asking, “Can I buy books here?”
Many times they’re from other countries that don’t have public libraries–“libreria” in Spanish is “bookstore.” People don’t expect that they can read books for free, supported by the government. That’s an outrageous concept.
We get every kind of question at the reference desk, and they’re pretty much in-depth … so that’s really interesting. The rest of my time is spent ordering books and managing what my people are doing. We also provide a lot of programs–for example, we are going to be starting career workshops again in the fall, and science-fair workshops–so we have to get ready for that, with the paperwork and the publicity. We do it all.
Q. What’s the best part about your job?
A. It’s really interesting. I’m one of those people who just can’t stand working if I’m not interested. The two things that have kept me here for 21 years is that it’s interesting and it’s worth doing–even on a really hard day, when somebody screamed at me and there’s too much to do and I can’t find a book and the lights went out. I may get angry, but I never get bored. I really believe in what I’m doing; I think people have a right to this information.
Q. What’s the worst part?
A. Because it’s a large bureaucracy, a lack of money sometimes prevents me from doing what I want to do for a patron. And we can have the most fantastic resources, but if the photocopier doesn’t work, you know–there are those frustrations. We don’t have a lot of control over that, because we’re a city institution. There’s politics and budget considerations, and we can’t change things immediately because it’s government and it doesn’t work that way.
Q. Identify three attributes essential to doing this job well.
A. I think you have to be pretty smart and well-educated. You have to get joy out of working with all kinds of different people. If that doesn’t energize you, you’re not going to be able to do this for long. And it helps to have an interest in a lot of different things. This is a great job for a Renaissance person.
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Q. What advice would you give to someone interested in this field of work?
A. You have to get a library science graduate degree to be a librarian, especially at the Chicago Public Library. It doesn’t matter what undergraduate degree you do. It’s great to do anything you want, what’s interesting to you. We encourage that; we want people in science and art and business and whatever.
I would definitely recommend first working in a library to see if you like it. The Chicago Public Library has what’s called an associate’s job, which is how a lot of us started; it’s for a person with a bachelor’s degree and not a graduate degree. The pay is fairly low, but you get to be a part of the institution and see if you like it–and then the city pays for your tuition in library school while you’re working.