Recruitment of Subject Specialists to Academic Librarianship

Library faculty at the University of Colorado at boulder developed a fellowship program for current graduate students to provide them with a work experience in an academic library. Under the mentorship of a library faculty member, they completed meaningful projects, often using their language or subject expertise, while exploring career possibilities in librarianship. The goal was to introduce academic subject specialists to a career in academic librarianship as a viable career option. Based on the results of a follow-up survey the program was quite successful. The survey indicates that over half of the respondents are considering working in an academic library, and over half are attending or have graduated from a library science graduate program.