Wade Kotter is Social Sciences and Music Librarian at Weber State University in Ogden, UT. Wade has been an ACRL member since 1994 and is your ACRL member of the week for May 11, 2015.
1. Describe yourself in three words: Dedicated, detail-oriented, and questioning.
2. What are you reading (or listening to on your mobile device(s)? My reading is currently focused on biographies of various American religious figures of the early 19th century, most recently Barton W. Stone, one of the founders of the Stone-Campbell movement. I will, however, be reading the latest Stephen King novel, Finders Keepers, when it’s released in June. As far as music goes, I listen to recordings of Sacred Harp singing at every opportunity. Sacred Harp singing is a community-based, participatory, a cappella singing tradition that dates back to the early 19th century. Honestly, I simply can’t get enough of it.
3. Describe ACRL in three words: Networking, collegiality, and service.
4. What do you value about ACRL? What I value most about ACRL are the opportunities it provides for networking and service. I would not have retained my membership for all these years were in not for these opportunities. I also value the role ACRL plays in promoting the value of academic libraries and the importance of information literacy.
5. What do you as an academic librarian contribute to your campus? As Social Sciences and Music Librarian, my primary role is to ensure that faculty, staff, and students have efficient and effective access to the information they need for both instruction and research in my subject areas. Helping them to learn how to use these resources efficiently and effectively is also very important. In addition, Weber State understands the importance of information literacy for our students and I contribute to our information literacy program by teaching a for-credit course and providing several course-integrated instruction sessions each semester. As a faculty member, I contribute by serving on faculty senate committees and also tenure/promotion committees in the library, in several colleges, and at the university level.
6. In your own words: To me, life as an academic librarian can be exciting, challenging, stressful, rewarding, and enjoyable all at the same time. It’s exciting to me because of all the changes and improvements in information resources that keep coming our way. These changes, of course, are part of what makes librarianship a challenge as well, along with the fact that we’re always trying to do more at the same time our financial resources are dwindling. These challenges can also make it stressful at times, not knowing what new challenges we’ll face when we arrive at work each morning. In the end, however, all of these and more combine to make academic librarianship a most challenging, intellectually rewarding, and thoroughly enjoyable profession. I’m very happy with the choice I made to become an academic librarian even though it was not my first choice as a profession.
Editor’s Note: Are you an ACRL member? Would you like to be featured as ACRL Member of the Week? Nominate a colleague? Contact Elizabeth Caris at ecaris@ala.org for more information.