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Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians To better understand the current status of cataloging education and, hopefully, validate or debunk some of my assumptions of how cataloging education has changed over three decades, I consulted the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians, originally approved by the Association for Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS) Board of Directors in 2017 and updated on December 13, 2023 by the oversight successor to the ALCTS Board of Directors, the ALA Core Metadata & Collections Leadership Team.2 The 2017 version of the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians sets out to define "competencies in broad terms to acknowledge the wide variety of work performed by cataloging and metadata professionals in libraries of all types and sizes, regardless of developments in a particular standard or technology. First and foremost, AI has led to the mass automatic generation of cataloging records as part of content delivery for all types of materials. The Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians validates that assumption in that I could locate only the following competency statements that are even remotely related to cataloging record creation and/or maintenance: * Creates and manages machine actionable data using formatting standards, serialization standards, and structural standards * Identifies, evaluates, and assigns controlled vocabularies for appropriate uses in data element sets * Assigns and establishes unique labels for agents and entities by utilizing metadata content standards and best practices * Analyzes and classifies resources by utilizing best practices for subject, genre, and classification analysis and assignment from a metadata value standard Additionally, the bulk of the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians document emphasizes understanding generalities of cataloging concepts and systems, but does not offer many specifics or means of both quantifying and qualifying results. According to John: I have never been a cataloger until I started using WMS [Worldshare Management Services].
When I started cataloging on a regular basis in early 1992, I was fresh out of library school as a graduate of Kent State University's library science program. Cataloging had become a focus of my degree efforts, including my master's thesis, which explored how the yet-to-be-built Rock and Roll Hall of Fame would catalog collection items: artifacts, books, etc. I was even allowed to "borrow" a score and set of drumsticks to catalog donated by composer and drummer Stewart Copeland of the band "Police" on a handshake and a promise to bring them back to Cleveland when I was done.
1990s Cataloging Education
My cataloging courses focused on creating original records from scratch, including the processes for assessing the items (mostly books), building the records, validating content (especially classification and subject heading assignments), and submitting the records for review. We started by creating card sets for these items (using ISBD punctuation and card creation conventions). Once we learned the basics, we were permitted to work online to create MARC records. We were a test site for OCLC, so we had sandbox access to OCLC-based tools and helped to provide feedback for product development at the time.
I am sharing this educational overview to encourage all our readers to reflect back on your own cataloging coursework and training. Looking back, did you also have to replicate the practices of cataloging? Did you learn how to use tools for the following cataloging structures?
* Data content standards, e.g., Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd ed., (AACR2) and subsequent versions, Describing Archives: A Content Standard (DACS), Cataloging Cultural Objects (CCO), and-more recently-RDA: Resource Description and Access.1
* Data structure standards, e.g., Machine-Readable Cataloging (MARC), Bibliographic Framework Initiative (BIBFRAME), Metadata Object Description Schema (MODS), Dublin Core (DC), Categories for the Description of Works of Art (CDWA).
* Data value standards, e.g., Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC), Library of Congress Classification (LCC), Art and Architecture Thesaurus (AAT), Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH).
For the first 20 years of my cataloging career, creating and maintaining cataloging records (either original or copy cataloging) for every item in our inventory (book collections, special collections, archives, etc.) was what catalogers did. When libraries of all types began to obtain access to electronic resources, either as additions to holdings or as part of the library catalog but accessed externally through third-party applications, the pool of cataloging increased exponentially. The ability to touch every cataloging record (including associated item records and, in the case of serials, holdings records) became mathematically impossible due to the sheer volume of records involved and the updates that many third-party applications often made daily or weekly to the number of titles our institutions could access.
This paradigm shift in cataloging made me wonder: What are today's cataloging students learning in library school (or equivalent training), and how much has cataloging education really changed since I entered our profession over 30 years ago? Is it a case where everything changes, yet everything stays the same? Is cataloging instruction still relevant in today's library education? What does the future of cataloging education look like?
Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians
To better understand the current status of cataloging education and, hopefully, validate or debunk some of my assumptions of how cataloging education has changed over three decades, I consulted the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians, originally approved by the Association for Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS) Board of Directors in 2017 and updated on December 13, 2023 by the oversight successor to the ALCTS Board of Directors, the ALA Core Metadata & Collections Leadership Team.2 The 2017 version of the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians sets out to define "competencies in broad terms to acknowledge the wide variety of work performed by cataloging and metadata professionals in libraries of all types and sizes, regardless of developments in a particular standard or technology."3 The document's creators also intended to create a baseline for cataloging knowledge, skills, and behaviors. Furthermore, targeted audiences for the document are library and information science (LIS) program instructors, library and technical services managers as they assess cataloger performance, and LIS students exploring cataloging course and internship opportunities.
Additionally, the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians document advocates for cataloging professionals to incorporate diversity and values assessment when making cataloging decisions to avoid misrepresentation or bias. It also is a broad overview of cataloging skills and does not include specific competencies for specialized cataloging such as serials, audiovisual, music, and rare and special collections.
The 2023 revision of the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians reflects adoption of and/or updates to the Library Reference Model (LRM), RDA, and the "Cataloguing Code of Ethics."4 Also, an emphasis on the effects that generative artificial intelligence (AI) has made and is making on cataloging processes is included in this most recent version.
How I View Cataloging Education Today and in the Future
The Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians revealed several key points that confirmed my assumptions on how cataloging education is changing. First and foremost, AI has led to the mass automatic generation of cataloging records as part of content delivery for all types of materials. These processes have rendered the creation of original cataloging records almost non-existent and the virtual elimination of copy cataloging and record modification/maintenance (this includes item records. if applicable). The Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians validates that assumption in that I could locate only the following competency statements that are even remotely related to cataloging record creation and/or maintenance:
* Creates and manages machine actionable data using formatting standards, serialization standards, and structural standards
* Identifies, evaluates, and assigns controlled vocabularies for appropriate uses in data element sets
* Assigns and establishes unique labels for agents and entities by utilizing metadata content standards and best practices
* Analyzes and classifies resources by utilizing best practices for subject, genre, and classification analysis and assignment from a metadata value standard
Additionally, the bulk of the Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians document emphasizes understanding generalities of cataloging concepts and systems, but does not offer many specifics or means of both quantifying and qualifying results. For instance, is there an acceptable percentage of cataloging records received from third party vendors that are assessed for quality control? How does a library administrator determine if a cataloging professional is performing "at, above, or below standard"?
At least in the past, a library director could look at a technical services department's statistics and an examination of the library catalog to determine if a cataloger's records met acceptable standards, which were universally based on specific rules outlined in AACR2, MARC, etc. The adoption of RDA introduced the idea that cataloging rules could be adapted to reflect the cataloger's interpretation of a particular circumstance. While this interpretive ability did reduce the level of rigidity that often forced many catalogers to make decisions counter to the rule to serve library patron needs, it also introduced a high level of deregulation that made many longtime cataloging conventions and processes either unnecessary or obsolete. The general view of many became, "Why worry about editing existing cataloging records? People just want access to materials."
Today, interactions by library professionals with cataloging records mirror those of individuals like John Fobert, Electronic Resources Librarian at Roger Williams University in Bristol, Rhode Island. I had the pleasure of meeting Fobert at an OCLC WorldShare conference in Columbus, Ohio when I was working in Michigan as library technical services faculty at Monroe County Community College in Monroe. According to John:
I have never been a cataloger until I started using WMS [Worldshare Management Services]. I still do not consider myself a cataloger but understand how to attach to OCLC records and update Collection Manager to represent our electronic resources.
For items such as standing orders, I chose appropriate serial or monograph OCLC records and attach an item. I edit the local holdings record using MARC fields. Very simple.
For electronic resources, I create or select a collection. I will use Kanopy as an example. I select the global Kanopy collection in the CM but within that collection, I select only those titles that are part of our smart PDA. If we purchase perpetual access to a title, I have to create a local collection where those titles are located. I search the title in OCLC, add a local title which I create using an OCLC number to pre-fill the metadata. Once the title is created in my collection, I update a few fields and add a persistent URL. I use separate collections to distinguish what we own and what we have access to. Everything is discoverable in catalog.
We record every item at the item level using copy cataloging. Some items require original cataloging which our cataloger handles. I found using MarcEdit has been very beneficial.5
While I applaud Fobert for managing the cataloging process of his library's vast electronic resources collections (which include many third-party providers), I admit that his assessment of today's cataloging processes makes me regret the fact that creating cataloging records has been relegated to AI-driven processes, and original cataloging, or the art of cataloging, is only a rarity. Thus, the art of creating a cataloging record and reflecting content in a positive vein is often rendered moot today.
One bright spot is the cataloging course taught by Dr. Susan RathbunGrubb at the University of South Carolina. The course focuses on traditional MARC cataloging and process training. Rathbun-Grubb also teaches a metadata course which features discussions centered around DDC with some exposure to CDWA, EAD, MODS, MARC, and BIBFRAME.6
Thus, I believe that cataloging education will continue to direct newlyminted catalogers to adhere to what our AI-centric future dictates should be done to manage an ever-expanding number of resources to which libraries of all types offer access. While I still believe that specialized library collections and unique library items will require original cataloging, the need and opportunity for individuals to describe even those items using their own intellect and interpretive skills will continue to decline as AI-driven processes will extract existing metadata and make those descriptions acceptable for use. While many would say, "That's progress," it still dehumanizes what many spent careers doing for library populations. I do hope that future generations of catalogers will have the chance to, somehow, employ the art of cataloging in their work and create interesting, useful records themselves that both aid in discovery and describe valuable library resources for their future generations to use.
References
1. Michael Gorman and Paul W. Winkler, eds. Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd ed., 1988 rev. (Chicago: ALA, 1988); RDA: Resource Description and Access (Chicago: American Library Association; Ottawa: Canadian Library Association; London: Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, 2010-2017). Now available only in the RDA Toolkit, "an integrated, browserbased, online product that allows users to interact with a collection of cataloging-related documents and resources;" see RDA Description & Access Toolkit, "About," www.rdatoolkit.org/about (accessed March 30, 2024). Note that the RDA Toolkit requires a subscription to access.
2. American Library Association, Core Competencies for Cataloging and Metadata Professional Librarians, approved by the ALCTS Board of Director Jan. 23, 2017; revision approved by the Core Metadata & Collections Leadership Team on December 13, 2023, https://alair.ala. org/bitstream/handle/11213/20799/ REVISED_CoreCompetencies_Cataloging_Metadata_2023. pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y (accessed March 30, 2024).
3. Ibid., 2.
4. Pat Riva, Patrick Le Bœuf, and Maja Žumer, IFLA Library Reference Model: A Conceptual Model for Bibliographic Information, August 2017, revised after worldwide review; amended and corrected through Dec. 2017 (The Hague: IFLA, 2017), https://repository. ifla.org/bitstream/123456789/40/1/ ifla-lrm-august-2017_rev201712. pdf (accessed March 30, 2024); American Library Association, "Cataloging Code of Ethics," endorsed by the Core Board of Directors, Aug. 2021, https:// alair.ala.org/handle/11213/16716 (accessed March 30, 2024).
5. John Fobert, email to the author, Feb. 22, 2024.
6. Susan Rathbun-Grubb, email to the author, March 2, 2024.
Copyright Media Periodicals Division, The Kansas City Gardener, Inc. May/Jun 2024