Basic French Reference and Information Services Librarian

This job popped up in my TweetDeck search for librarian and jobs.

Basic French Reference and Information Services Librarian

• LN3 Librarian 3
• Term/full-time
• Renegotiated yearly

Manitoba Education, Bureau de l'éducation française Division
Winnipeg MB

Advertisement Number: 22898

Salary(s):  LN3 $49,287.00 - $60,427.00

Closing Date: September 6, 2010


An eligibility list may be created for similar positions and will remain in effect for 12 months.


The successful candidate will be working within the Direction des ressources éducatives françaises branch located in Collège St. Boniface , 200 avenue de la Cathédrale, under the supervision of the Director.

Qualifications:


The successful candidate will have excellent oral and written communication skills in French and in English. The incumbent will hold a valid teaching certificate. Experience teaching French as a second language is desirable. Experience in the use of information and communication technologies (word processing, electronic mail, automated library system) is essential. The successful candidate must possess school library experience which includes answering information requests, selecting new resources, organizing book displays, meeting and speaking to groups of students/teachers regarding their search for information, and promoting resources/services. The ability to support other personnel  in the delivery of workshops is desirable.  Ability to work both as a  team member and independently is essential. Excellent organizational skills are essential.

Duties:
The incumbent will be responsible for:

• answering information requests;
• performing circulation functions and other related services for the clients;
• researching appropriate new resources;
• promoting resources and services;
• supporting other personnel (i.e. in the delivery of workshops);
• provide consultation related to services and resources.

Apply to:
Advertisement #22898

July's Labour Force Survey

Statistics Canada has released the Labour Force Survey for July 2010, and though there are job losses, there is some good news for students in the 15-24 year age bracket, with increases that meant it was at least better than this time last year. The analysis also indicated that college/university age students did better finding employment than roughly high school age job seekers.

If you go to the bottom of the release, you can review the information by province.

CBC has also prepared a comparison between the US and Canadian data for July.

Upcoming Courses on Economic Gardening

WebJunction is offering a series of three seminars on "economic gardening": helping entrepreneurs, using business databases and library outreach. These seminars will probably be very useful to reference librarians, since they will sometimes get the question, How do I start my own business? especially if the person has given up looking for work.

Do identity theft prevention services really work?

After reading Googlebomb and Wild West 2.0, I've been a bit more interested in this topic, including identity theft. And PC World has written an article about protecting your identity which asks if the services work.

Now there are no reviews of individual services, but the article does have links and advice on how to protect your physical records, which thieves can steal (for Canadians, there is advice on the CBC website). People worry a bit too much about high tech methods of stealing data and don't worry enough about low tech methods (stealing mail, finessing you on the phone, someone unscrupulous takes your file from a cabinet and sells the info).

And this curious mix of low and high tech thievery that was profiled on Marketplace, Who's Minding the Store?

I don't want to be a fatalist and suggest that if thieves want your data, they will get it. Though this is possible, there are steps you can take to make it harder for them to get it. Especially when you are putting your data out online in a job search.

And before you think, whoa, I'm a penniless college student/consultant/professional, what are they going to get from me? here are some examples:

• Get more credit cards
• Get a job
• Get health care services
• Get insurance
• Buy property
• Get arrested while using your identity

So, not to get all John Walsh, but do your best to protect your own identity and show others how to batten the hatches.

Democracy Now: Google Teams up with CIA to invest in start-up Recorded Future

Excelle releases The 10 Top-Ranked Cities for Women

Excelle, a career and networking site for women, has released a list of The 10 Top-Ranked Cities for Women. There isn't much info as to how they devised their ranking, but these lists can be fun for a person who decides they can really go anywhere once they graduate.

Try searching for opportunities in these cities by combining your keywords and the locale on the SimplyHired Special Searches.

Book review: Google Bomb: The Untold Story of the $11.3 M Verdict that Changed the Way We Use the Internet

I have been trying to get a copy of this book since I finished Wild West 2.0 because I was interested in the real life "google bombing" enacted against Sue Scheff. Sue Scheff is the founder of PURE, described as a "parenting advocacy association", and she responded via email to a request from a parent who needed to get her children from a facility in a foreign country. Scheff had a brief electronic advising relationship with this person, but when Scheff had to respond negatively to a request for information, the correspondent began a negative campaign against her, conducted online and using the "google bomb".

In a google bombing, the Google search results affiliated with that person or organization's name are hijacked by results that redirect to sites that are not flattering to the person or organization you just searched for. For example, in Scheff's case, a search for her name led to unflattering and sexually explicit comments about her, which drew users away from her own website and made it look as though she was no longer the upright and impartial advocate that she had portrayed. She lost clients. She lost referrals. She lost esteem in her community of counselors and parents. She also lost her privacy when another  legal deposition, which included private information of clients and her own personal information, such as her Social Security Number, was posted to the Internet. It was at this point that she decided to fight back and launch her court case that ultimately led to the enormous civil decision.

Throughout Scheff's recounting of her struggles, the co-author and lawyer John W. Dozier Jr explains some of the legal issues and decisions about online defamation and trademark law. He explains how online smear campaigns are run and uses personal examples from his own law firm to discuss how campaigns can affect businesses. He describes how there are current legal remedies for these issues if a person or organization comes under attack and how the courts can have real teeth when dealing with a person who attempts to google bomb another person or organization.

I found this book to be highly informative, though I wish there was more information about the steps you can take or how to gather evidence of the attack to take to a lawyer, the ISP that hosts the site or the police should you feel that the harassment may become RL violent.

The book is also part of the "cult of amateurs" camp, in the sense that the educated "grown-ups"--journalists, lawyers, business leaders--should be elevated to Internet authorities and regular people should follow the recommendations of the elite. I would have laughed out loud at Dozier's paternalistic assertion, "if you cannot use and understand that technology your kids are using, then don't allow them to use it" if most of the book had not been written in such a calm and authoritative manner, so that this seemed like a reasonable assertion. However, no more chemistry sets and wrenches, junior, because I just don't know a Philips head from a hammer, so you can't play with one either, is not a reasonable assertion.

The harassers that this book described are not the same as everyday people who have expertise in a field. I am also not advocating surgery by non-surgeons, but I think a mechanic can offer better opinions than a marketer on a automaker's blog, and a person who receives customer service can offer a different side to the story of the interaction than the person who gives customer service. It is also rather ridiculous to suggest that all college educated experts are non-biased. Some "citizen journalists" are civil, honest and knowledgeable--and they are not as obsessed and hostile as Scheff's tireless attackers. We can't make the Internet a better place by shutting it down or shutting people out. They will just find another back channel, just as this book describes.


I don't know what the solution is to this dilemma--make people nicer?--but having some knowledge of attacks and how to document them is a good first step.

Google Bomb: The Untold Story of the $11.3M Verdict That Changed the Way We Use the Internet

Business Beat, Episode 8: Friendly Competition

Streamlining the Federal (US) Hiring Process

The US President has mandated hiring reforms for the federal public service and all of the reforms must by in effect by November 1, 2010. This release from NACE explains some of the changes to the process and provides several links for people looking for work with the federal government or for people who assist in researching these career opportunities

TMZ of the recruitment industry?

This article from Workforce looks at some of the bloggers and blogging trends in the HR community. The post includes the obligatory, is the blog dead? questioning, while at the same time revealing how blogs can have a big impact on big industry within recruitment.

Recruitment blogs and HR blogs can be useful for librarians, 1) if they are engaged in HR in their library or 2) if they are teaching others how to search within databases or place their information within databases used by HR.

I have to admit, I loved that description of Cheezhead as the TMZ of the recruitment industry.

More job satisfaction in the private sector?

This 2010 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey examines government employees in relation to public sector employees and found that in several areas, private sector employees experienced more satisfaction than their public sector counterparts, though the race was very close and tied in some cases.

• Both sectors tied at 86% with I like the work that I do.
• For How satisfied are you with your involvement in decisions that affect your work?, 55% positive responses for Team Gov and 58% positive responses for Team Private
• And for Considering everything, how satisfied are you with your job? 72% of government respondents offered a positive response while 75% of private sector respondents replied positively.

Spotted on Government Executive.

Fallacies about promotions

HBR Magazine has an article about career development fallacies. The author looked at the CVs of approximately 1000 executives to determine how executives get ahead. She found there were four fallacies about career advancement:

• Job hoppers can hop their way into a promotion; instead stability with a company and internal promotion seem to lead up the ladder;
• Move up the ladder; instead lateral moves can offer more exposure to senior management and then into a promotion;
• A big company will lead to big moves. We have this problem in the career center: students are convinced they need to work for the Big 4 or the Big Ten or the Ivies, instead of thinking about how they will stand out better amongst a smaller pool;
• Switching industries will hold back your career; instead think how you can bring a fresh perspective. The example about salary is a little fishy, since it means some industries are bargain shopping for managers in other industries.

I have one quibble with this article: I do not know one career counsellor who advises flagrant job hopping, or even tentative bunny hopping, as a way to get ahead in a career. Most counsellors are talking risk takers away from frequent jumps based on brief infatuations with other companies or perceived slights that the job seeker takes as a sign to jump ship, instead of a sign to learn to work problems out.

However, the advice is good for career planners: stay steady, make your choices based on what you want to do and know that sometimes small can become big.