A New Look at US Graduate Courses in Bibliographic Control

Supply and Demand for Catalogers

“…7 Joudrey's more recent study of the cataloging curricula at 48 library science schools reported that the "percentage of programs that require a basic cataloging course has declined from 63% to 43.8%" when compared to a similar 1997 study by Vellucci. 8 Likewise, Hsieh-Yee observed, "Cataloging education has indeed been reduced. There is a pattern of providing general coverage of cataloging in a required introductory course such as information organization or knowledge organization instead of offering a cataloging course."…”

Descriptive Impressions of Entry-Level Cataloger Positions as Reflected inAmerican Libraries, AutoCAT, and theColorado State Library Jobline, 2000–2003

“…By the twenty-first century the length of graduate library programs, "core" course requirements, and specializations focused on students' interests limit the number and scope of cataloging classes. 2 Consequently, library educators relegated the majority of cataloging classes to "electives" status and apprenticeship activities to internships or practica. Despite these curricular shifts, employers continue to rely on accredited library schools to prepare catalogers and classifiers although they feel that their influence is limited.…”

Teaching bibliographic classification In The 21st Century

“…Eight themes are recurrent: history, the place of cataloguing and classification in the LIS curriculum, theory versus practice, general course contents, specific topics, systems and standards, teaching methods and tools, teaching with online tools, and learning outcomes (Hudon 2010). Several authors have described the trend of eliminating courses devoted entirely to either descriptive or subject cataloguing in the core curriculum, replacing them with integrated courses bearing the words "information" and "organization" in their titles (Spillane 1999;Joudrey 2002;Davis 2008;Joudrey 2008). Papers on the topic of cataloguing and classification instruction tend to offer similar lists of elements of contents to be covered in core and elective courses (Williamson 1987;Connaway 1997;Velluci 1997); bibliographic classification appears on every list, with the proviso that teaching must stress the relation between tools, processes, users' needs and behaviour, and information system functionalities.…”

“…Papers on the topic of cataloguing and classification instruction tend to offer similar lists of elements of contents to be covered in core and elective courses (Williamson 1987;Connaway 1997;Velluci 1997); bibliographic classification appears on every list, with the proviso that teaching must stress the relation between tools, processes, users' needs and behaviour, and information system functionalities. Familiarity with the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) and the Library of Congress Classification (LCC) are required for catalogers (Joudrey 2002), and in core courses, the DDC is commonly introduced as example of a functional hierarchical structure (Taylor and Joudrey 2002;Taylor 2006).…”