On ACRLog, Stephanie Willen Brown has come out of the closet to report that she has spent a semester in the closet. The University of Connecticut librarian says she was holding office hours.
Ms. Brown says she wondered what would happen if a librarian held office hours outside of the library. Would she be more visible? So she got a converted janitor’s closet in an academic building near the library, hung a sign with her name on the door, and spent one hour a week there. During that time, she says, she saw eight people. But “unofficially, the stats are much higher: I ran into people in the hallway, bathroom, and going in & out of the building,” she reports. And she was able to hand out reference advice.
It was a success, she says, if one considers the “PR value” of being seen in the building on a regular basis. Next semester, if she holds office hours again, she expects more business, closeted with students and faculty. And she wonders: do other librarians hold office hours? —Josh Fischman
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