Hillsborough Community College (HCC), Ybor City Campus, 2112 North 15th Street, Tampa, FL 33605-3648, (813) 253-7731
http://libguides.hccfl.edu/hcclibraries
Alicia B. Ellison is one of two degreed librarians at the Ybor campus of Hillsborough Community College (HCC). As others before her have done, she's taken the 'long road' to librarianship. Where to begin telling about her is another story. I would have to say that meeting her and Elizabeth Barron of the University of Tampa Library (next blog) introduced me to what I'd term the 'ADHD' of librarians! (Come to find out from my interviews, they already knew one another and had worked together at one point!) Anything I asked about, they found on a website and printed it out for me faster than a Western gun slinger. They put me to shame! Quite impressive resumes and lives for both ladies. But first...Ms. Ellison.
Ms. Ellison was born in Cuba and attended a bilingual public elementary school, the first elementary school in the country to be a part of a K-12 bilingual program. Subjects were taught in English in the mornings and in Spanish in the afternoons. She is a product of the community colleges, something she is proud of and she says gives special meaning to where she works today. She graduated from Miami-Dade Community College and went on to the University of Miami, receiving a Bachelor's, majoring in Journalism, specifically Broadcast Journalism and Broadcasting. She also minored in Political Science and History. She worked three years at a Miami TV station, where she was an assistant producer, writing and staffing news assignments, but never appearing before the cameras. From there she worked three more years at a state agency and five years with a non-profit agency.
In the '90s, she attended a USF extension program held at the Broward County Library at Fort Lauderdale. Interest began when in high school and college she worked in a private law firm's library as a clerk. Her boss was a librarian with an MLIS who'd been a lawyer in Cuba, and his wife was a high school librarian. Ms. Ellison had always enjoyed the library, using it as one of her 'favorite hangouts'. Working at this law firm only reinforced her love of the library. By her early thirties, she decided she wanted a more 'sane' lifestyle. She was tired of living by a beeper in the broadcasting business. She'd always been interested in information and 'how it was packaged'. So at the age of 32, she applied to grad school at USF-Broward (January 1993). This was just before the explosion of the World Wide Web (WWW). When she moved to Tampa, she continued her studies at USF, graduating in 1995. She was working as a paraprofessional/clerk at the University of Tampa. She took a position at the Tampa Hillsborough Public Library with Suncoast Freenet, administered by the library IT department. This was where she learned all about DOS and Eunich. She created and posted menus and uploaded them for community organizations and partners. Then she became a public librarian for four years, including a position with the St. Petersburg Public Library. She didn't care for it and decided to take a break that lasted for four months. Around 2001, Ms. Ellison decided to 'put out feelers,' considering academic libraries. She found a temporary full-time position at HCC, which in 2002 turned out to be a tenured full-time position that was a 'perfect fit' since she lives close by to the Ybor campus and is fluent in Spanish. (This is where I first found out that I have about 6 or 7 librarians of various positions all living around me in Seminole Heights, including the FMHI librarian I interviewed last.)
Ms. Ellison has been a board member of Suncoast Information Specialists (SIS) since 2003. Activities there have included newletter, presenting and/or planning programs, and list administrator since 2006. She is on the committee board of the FLA. She started out as a board intern there in the late '90s, and began the leadership committee. She has never been to ALA, but is a dues member of both SIS and FLA. Currently she is chairing a statewide committee for automation with Community Colleges Library Automation (CCLA). She is also proud to be a member of the 2010-2011 Sunshine State Library Leadership Institute, where she was honored to be asked to mentor Carla Clark of Miami-Dade College. In 2007 and 2009 she received the Exemplary Chat Reference Award - "Detailed Chat" Category, and has done numerous presentations for both college students and professors, as well as professional organizations, and publications.
The Ybor campus library is currently split into two rooms. This is supposed to be solved soon with construction. The rooms won't be moved, but the entrances will be combined into one area. Books available for circulation are in one room and all others are located in the second section of the library. There were two beautiful displays, one in each main room of the library, highlighting the multicultural events that were going on at the campus at the time of this interview. All of the library areas are carpeted and include a computer lab and several small study and seating areas. There was also a small section near some tables where a screen could be pulled down for presentations. The collection involves about 25,000 books on the shelves and 'hundreds of thousands' of e-books. They've been building their e-book collection for about ten years now. (We...Hillsborough County Schools...are sooo behind!...I couldn't help but think this.) They have a special collection that is 'kind of a repository' for realia of Tampa Hispanic Heritage Incorporated and the PanAmerican Union of Women. About one hundred databases are available CCLA, or are brokered by CCLA for them and other institutions. Some are subscription based.
Programs and services are decentralized since each campus is individualized. For example, the Ybor campus library staff took great pride in their involvement in the International Cultural Festival that was mentioned above. They participated by dressing up, creating the displays, including a 'green countries' display built according to the international standards. They choose to make things very artistic, informative and involved to add library value to events. Another example would be their author receptions they hold for faculty members anytime they publish. B.I. sessions are held, which is when library orientations are set up with professors, creating customized websites for their classes and introducing their classes to them. Library service is open, of course, to students, teachers, and staff, but it is also open to the public. Anyone can get a community borrower card. This allows them to check out up to three books, but does not give them remote access to databases or e-books. Ask-a-Librarian is available on their website.
The library is run under a campus-based management model. Ms. Ellison reports to the Academic Affairs Dean on campus. There is not an HCC library director. They collegically and collaboratively work together in cluster systems, not departments. Each cluster has an administrative contact. The tech services coordinator and automation coordinator directly report to administration and connects to the library. There is only one other librarian, who is also the program manager and receives a stipend as "boss of the staff". Four full-time Learning Resource Technicians (LRTs) are employed due to the previously mentioned split library rooms. Everyone I encountered seemed helpful, friendly, and professional in manners and appearance.
As for social media, LibGuides is the platform used. There is no blog or Facebook. Just webpages to HCC. I did note, however, that Ms. Ellison does use links from the information online about herself to links in Delicious. She has a vast amount of resources available to anyone at the drop of a keystroke. To see more, go to http://hccfl.edu/faculty-info/aellison.aspx and then click on 'service' and 'publications'. You will find links to Delicious here, as well.
As stated earlier, Ms. Ellison is hard to keep up with, considering what all she has accomplished and will continue to do. I find myself in awe and wonder if I will ever be able to achieve such accomplishments in my remaining lifetime. When I take all of this into account, I'm not so sure I'd be a great academic librarian. It could be fun, but it sure is daunting!
No comments:
Post a Comment