Although many articles and books touch on this topic, little has been written focusing solely on the role of professionals and paraprofessionals in the cataloging department. ODLIS: Online Dictionary for Library and Information Science defines a cataloger (meaning a professional librarian) as “a librarian primarily responsible for preparing bibliographic records to represent the items acquired by a library, including bibliographic description, subject analysis, and classification. Also refers to the librarian responsible for supervising a cataloging department.”² ODLIS does not define a paraprofessional cataloger, but the general definition for paraprofessional includes a reference to cataloging: “Library paraprofessionals are usually assigned high-level technical support duties, for example, in copy cataloging and serials control.”³

These high-level technical support duties are due, in part, to technical advances in computing and automation that became widespread in the 1990s. The changing role of paraprofessionals was the primary topic at the January 1996 meeting of the Association for Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS) Role of the Professional in Academic Research Technical Services Departments Discussion Group.⁴ Discussions noted that paraprofessionals were performing such tasks as material selection, cataloging (both original and complex copy), and day-to-day supervision, which used to be solely professional duties. Participants further observed that changes in paraprofessionals’ activities led to changes in professionals’ roles, with professionals becoming more involved in strategic decision making, goal setting, and focusing on managing change.

Smith’s 2009 qualitative analysis of staffing trends in technical services indicated that paraprofessionals are now given an increased role in technical services departments, with more responsibility and involvement in department concerns, while low-level work is increasingly outsourced or stopped altogether.⁵ Meanwhile the role of professionals is increasingly removed from the day-to-day operations of technical services in favor of supervisory work, staff training, and higher-level work related to the “big picture” of the library profession.⁶ Intner and Johnson pointed out that even with these changes in staffing, trends in job duties remain the same: professional librarians manage the cataloging department and do original cataloging, while paraprofessionals may serve as assistant managers and do copy cataloging.⁷ However, the authors noted some important differences in this arrangement—paraprofessionals are now often unit supervisors within the department and, increasingly, a few professional catalogers and several paraprofessional or clerical copy catalogers do all the in-house cataloging.

Wakimoto and Hsiung’s 2003 study of the cataloging department at California State University Northridge (CSUN) showed the effects of technology on professional and paraprofessional job duties.⁸ CSUN’s adoption of networked workstations and the resulting job restructuring happened much faster than at other institutions when the 1994 earthquake forced them to rebuild from the ground up.⁹ Staff at all levels reported better morale and increased job satisfaction. Paraprofessionals appreciated having more freedom to exercise their judgment and solve cataloging problems on their own, while professionals had more time to pursue professional activities such as conducting training sessions for the paraprofessional staff and collection development.

Highlighting another cause of this shift in responsibilities, Wells in 2003 looked at how technical services departments adjust to hard financial times.¹⁰ She noted that more than half of the departments that choose to reorganize after losing positions transfer work from professionals to paraprofessionals. She also noted that professionals were often called on to assist in other departments, such as reference or collection development, thereby hastening this type of transfer. Ivey also considered changes related to financial constraints, including having paraprofessional staff perform complex copy or original cataloging.¹¹ He noted that although there has been much discussion, and perhaps some controversy, on this topic, “this practice … is now nearly universal.”¹²

In a 1997 article, Mohr and Schuneman presented both advantages and disadvantages to paraprofessionals performing original cataloging, which was a relatively new practice at the time.¹³ Advantages included freeing professional catalogers for more complex cataloging, management duties, professional duties, and other activities such as collection development, along with better staff morale, better understanding by the paraprofessionals of cataloging issues, greater productivity, a reduced backlog, and improved efficiency. Disadvantages included the time and resources required to train and supervise the paraprofessionals in their new duties, ongoing quality control, supervisors not wanting to exploit paraprofessional staff, paraprofessionals lacking theoretical and educational background in cataloging issues and trends, and institutional rules or union contracts limiting what paraprofessionals may do.

The increased need for education and training of paraprofessionals has become more widely recognized and supported by the library profession as a whole. In 2001 Kao noted, “Many professionals in the field have suggested that some kind of certification for library technicians be established as an educational standard, so that the claims that library technicians are professional workers can be justified.”¹⁴ At the time of this writing, the Council on Library/Media Technicians (COLT) website listed fifty-four library technician programs in the United States, including institutions offering certificates, associate degrees, and bachelor’s degrees.¹⁵ The American Library Association-Allied Professional Association (ALA-APA) has a partial list of state and regional certification programs on their website.¹⁶ The ALA-APA also has created its own program, Library Support Staff Certification (LSSC).¹⁷

Regarding evaluation, Foster described his desired characteristics for a professional in terms of what department heads should look for when evaluating staff. For example, the supervisor should determine if the cataloger is performing professional-level work and making professional decisions. Foster then noted that statistics alone do not give a supervisor the necessary information on which to judge an individual’s work and suggested that other activities such as bibliographic control and work outside the department should also be considered.¹⁸

As the level of paraprofessional work has increased, the role of professional catalogers has expanded outside of day-to-day cataloging activities, particularly in their role as faculty. In 2002, Ferris addressed the issue of cataloging librarians seeking tenure and presented ways that tenure benefits catalogers.¹⁹ These benefits include encouraging catalogers to work at a level of expertise beyond simple cataloging functions, dealing with complex cataloging problems, and publishing their research into these problems, which ultimately contributes to the advancement of cataloging knowledge. Networking with other professionals both locally and nationally can lead to collaboration between libraries. Ferris concluded by arguing that tenure is the ultimate challenge for a professional catalog librarian and that along the way, the librarian will vastly improve his or her cataloging expertise, contribute to the educational function of librarianship, and advance the profession as a whole as well as the goals of his or her particular institution.

On the differences between professional and paraprofessional catalogers, Benaud wrote, “The difference was once obvious: professionals did the intellectual work. … Reality is somewhat different from what is expressed in the literature.” Benaud went on to say that she believes that paraprofessionals now understand the theory (the “why”) in addition to the practical (the “how”).²⁰ But as she noted, this opinion was and is not always the case. Seven years later, Benaud, Bordeianu, and Hanson described how the profession had changed, stating that professional catalogers are more likely to be involved in the rules and management of cataloging such as the Name Authority Cooperative Program (NACO) and the Cooperative Online Serials Program (CONSER).²¹ They observed that “the more ‘core’ cataloging a task is, the more likely it is to be performed by professionals.”²²

One might assume that these changes to catalogers’ roles and responsibilities could lead to work-related stress. Leysen and Boydston’s 2007 study on job satisfaction did not find this, however.²³ When they looked at the effect of changing roles and responsibilities for catalog librarians, they found that most catalog librarians were comfortable with these changes, felt that their duties were clearly defined, and accepted the fact that their duties are expanding beyond just cataloging. The study found some lingering concern among catalog librarians over the deprofessionalization of cataloging activities, but Leysen and Boydston concluded that most of this concern is diminishing.

The amount of discussion in the literature on the changing roles of both professional and paraprofessional catalogers suggests that these changes are here to stay. Professional catalogers are more involved in strategic planning and managing change, and those that have faculty positions are encouraged to broaden their expertise through research and collaboration with colleagues. Paraprofessional catalogers have more freedom to exercise their judgment on cataloging problems and are given more complex cataloging tasks. Concerns regarding the time and resources required to train paraprofessionals for more complex cataloging are diminishing, and profession-wide support for increased education and training of paraprofessional catalogers is apparent. While these changes are clearly reflected in the literature, the question remains: how are the differences between professional and paraprofessional catalogers perceived by the catalogers themselves?

The authors undertook this study to answer two questions. First, do performance expectations differ for professional and paraprofessional catalogers? In addition, do research and publication expectations and service expectations differ? Another aspect of understanding performance expectations is examining the manner and extent to which work is evaluated and how productivity is measured. The authors asked the respondents about how work evaluation and productivity are handled at their institution. Second, do professional and paraprofessional catalogers view their work and its value differently? To answer this question, the authors asked a set of questions that explored perceptions of value of work, nature and level of work, and level of responsibility.

The authors created a survey using a standard Web-based input form, including radio buttons, check boxes, and text blocks. Responses were gathered in the Southern Illinois University Instructional Support Services’ survey generator, provided under open-source licensing by Virginia Tech University.²⁴ Four library colleagues (two catalogers and two administrators with previous cataloging experience) reviewed the survey questions. In compliance with the requirements of the authors’ university, the survey was vetted by the Human Subjects Committee and approved on September 24, 2008. The survey questions can be found in appendix A. Question 14 addressed perceptions about work and is the only question that provided the opportunity to add comments. These comments are referenced in the survey results.

In October 2008, the authors contacted staff in ARL member libraries via e-mail with a request to participate in the survey. The authors chose to focus on ARL libraries to limit responses to institutions that share characteristics similar to the authors’ institution and because the authors lacked the resources to survey more widely. The e-mail message, with a link to the survey, was distributed to 122 individuals representing the 124 ARL member libraries; contact information was not available online for two of the institutions. The individuals who received the e-mail held one of the following titles (identified on each institution’s website): head (or equivalent) of the cataloging department, head (or equivalent) of the technical services department, or applicable library administrator. The individuals were strongly encouraged to distribute the survey request to all professionals and paraprofessionals in their cataloging departments. The survey was open from October 14 through November 15, 2008. The authors sent a reminder on November 5, 2008.

As with any project, one finds room for improvement after the fact, especially with a survey instrument. Although this survey was pretested, some confusion was apparent over the meaning of terms. For example, although the authors explained the meaning of “professional” and “paraprofessional” for this survey in its introduction, some respondents still expressed uncertainty about how to respond. More extensive pretesting with a larger test group likely would have identified this and other problems with terms.

Although some questions were geared specifically to professionals or paraprofessionals, the survey instrument was unable to limit who answered which question. This allowed paraprofessionals to answer questions intended for professionals and vice versa. A more effective instrument would automatically direct respondents to those questions directed to their type of employee class. Another approach would be to create a separate survey instrument for each group. Because respondents identified their class, the authors were able to address this problem when compiling and analyzing the data.

Three statements in survey question 14 where respondents were asked to report the extent to which they disagreed (or not) lacked clarity and resulted in unclear and ambiguous results. The problem statements were

• (14.c) Professional catalogers should have more responsibilities.
• (14.d) Staff catalogers should have fewer responsibilities.
• (14.q) I feel that being a staff cataloger allows me to do my job without any greater responsibility.

Responses have not been reported in this paper. The authors’ intent in 14.c and 14.d was to determine whether respondents thought professional catalogers should have more responsibilities than paraprofessionals and whether staff (i.e., paraprofessional) catalogers should have fewer responsibilities than professional catalogers. Because this comparison was missing from the statement, the responses were not meaningful. Statement 14.q presented a similar lack of clarity.

In addition to areas of improvement, this research could be expanded. This survey reports the perceptions of professional and paraprofessional catalogers in ARL member libraries. Comparing these findings with those gathered from catalogers in different types and sizes of libraries might reveal differences based on the type and size of library. One respondent in particular noted that the disparities between professionals and paraprofessionals can be different depending on the size of the institution and its hierarchy. Second, many respondents commented on outsourcing and its effect on cataloging, especially copy cataloging. This could be another related area for research. Finally, many of this survey’s comments from paraprofessionals dealt with salary and compensation, an issue that was not covered in the survey questions. A study comparing salaries across positions, types of libraries, and geographic regions could be useful.

This study investigated how professional and paraprofessional catalogers view their work, how their work is evaluated, and how they perceive the value assigned to their work. With regard to how catalogers view their work, the findings show that the majority of both professional and paraprofessional catalogers feel that paraprofessionals can and should do complex and original cataloging. Comments in the survey also revealed that both groups feel that there is not or should not be any difference in the cataloging work done by professionals and paraprofessionals. Survey results found that the distinction between professional and paraprofessional catalogers arises from the activities beyond cataloging done by professionals, such as administrative work, service on committees, and research.

The majority of professional catalogers reported that their cataloging work is seldom checked after an initial training period, while the majority of paraprofessionals undergo continuous evaluation of their work. Comments in the survey indicate that periodic checking of everyone’s work, regardless of position, may be required to ensure consistency across all areas.

With regard to the value of work, the majority of both professional and paraprofessional catalogers felt that paraprofessionals’ work is important but that it is undervalued. While both groups felt that professionals’ work is also important, a majority of professional catalogers feel that their work is undervalued, while more paraprofessionals feel that professionals’ work is overvalued. These data reflect opinions expressed in comments in the survey, which indicate that catalogers feel that their work is undervalued by the library community as a whole, while professionals’ work is overvalued within the cataloging community as it is seen as having more value even when the tasks are the same as those performed by paraprofessionals.

This study suggests a need in libraries for clarity in how responsibilities are defined and assigned, and how expectations are articulated, so that professional and paraprofessional catalogers better understand their roles and value to the organization. The cataloging responsibilities of both groups now widely overlap, and the distinction between professionals and paraprofessionals lies more in the degree to which they participate in activities beyond cataloging. However, as professionals are increasingly pulled into areas outside of cataloging, the degree to which paraprofessionals are recognized for their added cataloging responsibilities and expertise varies from institution to institution.

While not all paraprofessionals engage in more complex cataloging work, those who do can benefit their institutions by helping to reduce backlogs and reduce the cataloging workload of professional catalogers. Paraprofessionals in turn benefit from the opportunity to expand their skills and expertise. As professional catalogers are increasingly called on to perform tasks beyond cataloging, paraprofessional work is becoming especially valuable. Furthermore, as library budgets decrease, libraries may need to have paraprofessionals perform more complex cataloging. The activities of professional catalogers beyond cataloging have become increasingly important. As budgets decrease and administrators look for ways to cut costs, the responsibility falls on the professional catalogers to make the case for cataloging as a necessary function of the library’s operations and services and to tie these functions to the library’s goal of providing access to information.

The authors suggest that the general perception of both professional and paraprofessional catalogers by noncatalogers needs to be improved through advocacy by all catalogers to promote their purpose and importance. Just as professional catalogers need to advocate for the value of cataloging as a whole, paraprofessionals may need to make a stronger case to their administrators about the value of the important work they do.

The authors recommend that the library profession as a whole reach consensus about the level of work paraprofessionals should do and how they should be compensated. The overlap in cataloging activities between professional and paraprofessional catalogers suggests that regardless of title, catalogers performing complex cataloging should be recognized for their expertise whether through changes in job titles or classifications or more informal means. Furthermore, both groups should be given access to the training and education needed to understand both the theory and the practice of complex and original cataloging. The literature has shown a long-standing increase in the scope and importance of paraprofessional cataloging, and this change has only further increased in an era of tightening budgets. The number of paraprofessionals engaged and interested in higher-level cataloging work makes them vital contributors to the profession as a whole, and they deserve recognition for that contribution. By providing a snapshot of cataloging work in the early twenty-first century, the authors have provided a baseline from which individual catalogers and the community as a whole can move forward.