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The MLS Is Not the Problem: A Response

Editor’s note: We welcome a guest blog post from Ben Rawlins, Associate Dean for Outreach, Engagement and Collections at the University of Kentucky Libraries.

Bryn Geffert’s recent Inside Higher Ed essay argues that the MLS degree is an obstacle to hiring, a barrier to diversity, and an increasingly optional credential in academic libraries. His survey data from R1 and R2 institutions is real, and the hiring challenges he documents are real. His diagnosis, however, misses the mark, and his argument carries implications that deserve more scrutiny than the piece provides.

I write as an Associate Dean at an R1 research institution where librarians hold faculty status, where I have been involved in hiring, mentoring, and evaluating MLS-holding colleagues for years. My concern is not with the idea that library education needs to improve. It most certainly does. My concern is with the slide from that legitimate observation to the conclusion that the credential itself is the problem.

The MLS Is a Formation Credential

Geffert treats the degree primarily as a skills-delivery mechanism, then faults it for not delivering every skill administrators want. The MLS is not principally a skills credential. It is a professional formation credential. The ALA’s Core Competencies of Librarianship place the foundations of the profession first among all competency areas, requiring graduates to “employ the ethics, values, and foundational principles of the library profession” and to “promote democratic principles and intellectual freedom” (ALA, 2022). The ALA’s Core Values, updated in 2024, explicitly ground the entire accreditation framework for library and information science programs in commitments to access, equity, intellectual freedom, privacy, and the public good (ALA, 2024). Practitioners and scholars have long argued that the MLS provides the foundational knowledge and values necessary for socialization into the field and that degree completion unifies librarians with a common professional identity (Holley, 2016). Research on librarian professional identity supports this framing, finding that professional formation is understood as a process over time, defined in part by benchmark events and the internalization of professional norms and values, rather than a one-time credential transaction (Pierson et al., 2019). A subject PhD does not initiate that process. On-the-job experience may eventually transmit some of it. But that is a longer and less reliable path, and it places the burden of professional socialization entirely on individual institutions rather than on the shared educational infrastructure the profession has built.

One Size Does Not Fit All Institutions

Geffert’s argument treats R1 and R2 institutions as if they share a uniform personnel structure, but the reality is considerably more complex. Academic librarians are classified differently across institution types, some hold faculty status with full ranks, tenure, and governance rights equivalent to teaching faculty; others hold academic or professional staff status; still others occupy hybrid classifications unique to their institutions. This variation is not incidental. It is structural, and it has direct implications for how the MLS functions as a credential.

At institutions where librarians hold faculty status, the MLS is not simply a hiring preference. It is the terminal professional degree that anchors the faculty appointment itself. The ACRL Standards for Faculty Status for Academic Librarians state explicitly that “the MLS/MLIS degree is considered the terminal degree for this appointment.” The ACRL Standard for Appointment, Promotion, and Tenure is equally direct: “any librarian appointed to a college or university library faculty shall have the appropriate terminal professional degree.” Notably, even the ACRL Standards for Academic Librarians Without Faculty Status, written specifically for institutions where librarians do not hold faculty rank, still identifies the MLS from an ALA-accredited institution as the terminal degree for the profession. In other words, the professional standards framework treats the MLS as foundational across classification types, not just in faculty contexts.

The ramifications of devaluing or treating the MLS as optional are therefore not uniform across the profession, they are most acute precisely at the research-intensive institutions Geffert surveyed. At institutions where librarians hold faculty status, moving away from the MLS as the terminal degree credential does not simply expand a hiring pool. It raises fundamental questions about the basis for faculty appointment, the legitimacy of promotion and tenure review, parity with other faculty in governance and compensation, and the standing of librarians as full academic partners. These are not administrative details. They are the foundation of the professional standing that faculty librarians have built over decades. An argument for credential flexibility that does not account for these downstream consequences is not a complete argument, it is an administrator’s convenience framed as a professional reform.

Two Different Arguments

The claim that library schools are not producing graduates with sufficient skills in data science, GIS, digital scholarship, and other areas may well be true. This supports the conclusion that library schools need reform, not that the credential should be treated as optional. These are different arguments, and Geffert slides between them without acknowledging the distinction. The appropriate response to a medical school producing graduates with clinical gaps is to reform the curriculum, not to suggest that hospitals hire biology PhDs instead of MDs. Treating the MLS as optional undermines the case for investing in library education at exactly the moment that investment is most needed, and sends a signal to the market that the programs producing that credential are dispensable, even as we ask them to do better.

Economics and Politics

Geffert frames difficulty hiring candidates with skills in data science, GIS, and digital scholarship as evidence that the MLS pipeline is failing. There is a more direct explanation he does not consider: the compensation structures of academic libraries make these positions economically uncompetitive for the candidates he is hoping to attract, and the political environment in many states makes certain institutions genuinely difficult places to recruit to regardless of credential requirements.

On compensation, the numbers are telling. The median annual wage for academic librarians was $64,320 in May 2024, with early-career positions frequently starting between $50,000 and $65,000 (BLS, 2024). By contrast, the median annual wage for data scientists, one of the specific skill areas Geffert identifies as a gap, was $112,590 in May 2024, with projected job growth of 34 percent through 2034 (BLS, 2024). A candidate with a PhD in data science or geography who is weighing a position in an academic library against industry or government alternatives is not being deterred by credential requirements. They are being deterred by a salary structure that academic libraries largely cannot compete with. Opening the credential to subject PhD holders does not change that math at all.

The broader political environment compounds these economic pressures. Across a significant number of states, legislatures have targeted DEI offices, restricted curricula, and weakened faculty governance structures, creating conditions in which recruiting becomes genuinely difficult, independent of credential requirements (AAUP 2024a; AAUP 2024b). Professionals with the specialized skills Geffert identifies have substantial labor market mobility. A data scientist or digital scholar with options is unlikely to accept a below-market salary at an institution operating under political constraints that threaten academic freedom, regardless of whether the position requires an MLS or a subject PhD. The credential is not the barrier. The conditions of the work are.

This matters because Geffert’s argument implicitly assumes that relaxing the credential requirement creates a larger and more capable pool of willing applicants. If the economic and political conditions of academic library positions are what is actually limiting the pool, widening the credential gate does not address the underlying problem. It simply shifts who is excluded by those conditions from MLS graduates to subject PhD holders.

The Diversity Argument Collapses Under Scrutiny

Geffert argues that because the MLS pipeline is 87 percent white, opening hiring to subject PhD holders would help diversify the profession. The fields he identifies as sources of the skills libraries need are themselves deeply homogeneous. The NSF’s Diversity and STEM: Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities 2023 report documents that underrepresented minorities (Hispanic, Black, and American Indian or Alaska Native) collectively account for 37 percent of the U.S. college-age population but earned only 16 percent of science & engineering doctoral degrees in 2020, a gap that widens at every step up the degree ladder (NCSES, 2023). Women remain underrepresented at all degree levels in physical and earth sciences, mathematics and computer sciences, and engineering (NCSES, 2023). Black students earned only 5 percent of engineering bachelor’s degrees in 2020 despite constituting 14 percent of the college-age population (NCSES, 2023). Geography, the home discipline for GIS, and one of the specific skill areas Geffert names as a gap, “is behind virtually all other fields of study examined across all degree types in terms of racial and ethnic representation,” with doctoral geography programs consistently trailing even other social sciences in diversity (AAG, 2023). Research on doctoral training across science and technology fields finds that Black men and women experience the greatest and most consistent loss of representation across the transition from bachelor’s to doctoral to postdoctoral stages (Hofstra et al., 2023). Swapping MLS pipelines for PhD pipelines in STEM, GIS, and related fields does not solve a diversity problem. It trades one homogeneous pipeline for another while abandoning the professional formation infrastructure the field has built.

The Unasked Question

There is a dimension this piece does not address at all, and it may be the most important one. Librarianship is approximately 82 percent female as of 2023 (BLS, 2024). Calls to bypass or devalue the credential of a female-dominated profession have a well-documented history that should give us pause. Sociological research by Levanon, England, and Allison found that as the proportion of women in an occupation grows, relative wages in that occupation decline — evidence of what researchers call occupational devaluation, the systematic undervaluing of work done by women (Levanon, England, and Allison, 2009). Seale and Mirza have argued directly in the library literature that academic librarianship’s turn toward non-MLS credentials is “inextricable from its search for markers of professionalization outside of librarianship, in the form of non-MLS degrees, more appealing domains of knowledge, and nonfeminized types of labor,” and that removing the MLS requirement “will not address these broader issues” (Seale and Mirza, 2020). Research published in College & Research Libraries has further shown that “the feminization of library work, and in particular the undervaluing of emotional labor required of public-facing roles like reference and instruction, serves as a way to continually devalue feminized work to uphold patriarchal norms” (Bryant, Bussell, and Halpern 2019).

We are watching the same dynamic play out in real time across other female-dominated professions. In 2025, the Department of Education reclassified nursing, social work, teaching, physical therapy, and audiology as non-professional degrees for student loan purposes — fields that are between 70 and 88 percent female (National Nurses United, 2026). As one university dean observed in response, “it is concerning that many of the professions in this category are women-dominated professions. This appears to be part of a larger attempt to undermine and minimize professional roles of women in our society” (University of Pittsburgh, 2025). The pattern of credential devaluation in female-dominated professions is not abstract. It is structural, it is historical, and it is happening now. An argument for treating the MLS as optional that does not engage with this pattern is an incomplete argument.

What the Profession Needs

None of this means the status quo is acceptable. Library schools must do more to develop graduates with the technical and interdisciplinary competencies the field needs. Institutions should invest in professional development that builds skills not fully addressed in graduate programs. The profession should have an honest and sustained conversation about where library education is falling short and demand better from its accredited programs, and work with them to make those changes. What the profession should not do is treat the credential as the source of its problems. The claim that library schools need to do better and the claim that the MLS itself is an obstacle are not the same claim. Conflating them, as Geffert does, redirects the profession away from the more important conversation about how to strengthen library education rather than abandon it.

To be clear, this is not an argument that subject PhD holders cannot succeed as academic librarians or that institutions should never consider candidates without an MLS. There are contexts where such hires make sense, and many non-MLS professionals have made genuine contributions to the field. The argument here is narrower and more specific: that Geffert has not made a sound case for systematically devaluing the MLS as a professional credential. His survey documents real hiring frustrations, but frustration is not analysis. The problems he identifies (skills gaps, diversity deficits, unfilled positions) have causes that his proposed solution does not address, and consequences for institutional classification, professional formation, and the gendered history of credential devaluation that his piece does not engage. A better argument for credential flexibility is possible, thoughGeffert has not made it. The MLS is not a barrier to a better profession. It is one of the foundations on which a better profession can be built, if we are willing to invest in it rather than look for a way around it.

From Technician to Librarian

I graduated with my Library & Information Technology diploma in Spring 2013. I went to Red River College in Winnipeg, Manitoba, being the only library-related program in the province. I can remember, in a pre-interview to the program, one of the instructors asking me, “how come you don’t you get your MLIS instead?” Good question–I had thought about it, but there isn’t a graduate-level library school in my area, in my province even; I would’ve had to move.

I started in academic libraries as a library technician (‘library assistant’) in January 2015 at the University of Manitoba, and soon after began thinking about completing my Master’s degree. Two years prior, in 2013, the University of Alberta began an online, course-based MLIS program that students could complete entirely online. This program opened a door for me, where I could complete the degree part-time while continuing to work at the University of Manitoba full-time. I applied in Winter 2016 and started my Master’s program in Fall 2016. Of course, this was a busy time for me, working full-time, mainly evenings and weekends, going to grad school part-time, and with the birth of my son in 2017, my plate was full, but it was worth it—as after I graduated, I was doing the work I wanted to be doing.

Why had I been thinking of getting my MLIS so soon after starting work as an academic library tech? Immediately I saw the separation in job responsibilities of library assistants and librarians, and I knew I wanted to be a librarian to do the work of a librarian, things like library instruction and working on my own research.

There’s a major difference in the assigned duties to library technicians versus librarians. One of the major differences was technician duties were focused on day-to-day tasks, like staffing the public service desk, book pickup requests, and managing the reserves collection. As a tech, I would spend time making analytics reports in our ILS, Ex Libris’ Alma or contacting patrons with overdue fines. I also spent a lot of time troubleshooting and solving patron questions, either during shifts at the public service desk, on virtual reference, or helping a coworker. Sometimes these questions weren’t library-related, but I would do my best to find the right campus service or department that the patron needed; I don’t get those types of questions nearly as often as a librarian.

Librarians have day-to-day duties, of course, but in contrast, there’s a lot more long-term planning and project work; you’re removed, in a lot of ways, from the on-the-ground functioning of the library. There’s a lot more meetings, a lot more opportunities to plan or change how the library works, and a lot less of ‘keeping the lights on.’

There’s increased decision-making throughout my role as a librarian. I would often as a technician defer challenging or difficult questions to my supervisor. Now, I have the latitude to make judgement calls on my own. When I was working as a public-facing technician, there was a real team aspect to the work. We would debrief about challenging reference questions or give background to something we anticipated in the coming days or weeks, things like popular reserve items or students needing to complete an assignment by speaking with a particular librarian.

Although I work as part of a team of science librarians, there’s much more independence in how you structure your week/month/year as a librarian—not to mention the lack of shift work. Independence makes it natural to look ahead to advancing throughout your career, with my professional performance, professional development, research, and service as a major function of this. I have more of a growth mindset as a librarian, compared to my work as a technician.

I can remember helping to put together our health sciences’ library newsletter, with several librarians. After a year or so of this work, one of the librarians thanked me profusely for my help, and asked if she could write me a formal thank you letter if that would be useful. As a library technician, I declined as I didn’t think it would be useful. As a librarian, I look for those physical acknowledgements of volunteerism and accomplishment, to use in future performance reviews and promotion packages. As a technician, I didn’t have that mindset since those formal processes of career advancement weren’t a part of the job. But thinking back on that offer, a physical recognition of dutiful and intentional work, even as a technician, should’ve been a priority of mine. Technicians can have growth mindsets as well, and advance through their career, even if there aren’t the same institutional markers, like promotion in rank, available.

I wanted to become a librarian not only because of the differences in duties and type of work, but I wanted to challenge myself. Like most people in our profession, I’m a lifelong learner, always wanting to learn something new and to challenge myself. And because I’m challenged more often, I have increased job satisfaction as a librarian, in addition to the differences I outlined above: independence, decision-making in my work and the work of my library system, and career advancement.

Claire Hill (2014), in her study exploring work relationships between library technicians and librarians, found 77% of survey respondents mention a need to improve relationships between the two groups. Examples from respondents include a need for mutual respect (regardless of educational qualification), more library technician professional development, and modern reworking of library technician scope-of-work and career advancement. Based on my experience, I never felt a lack of mutual respect—in fact I felt recognized by my librarian peers for my work as a technician, such as the librarian offering to write me a thank you letter for my work. I do think there could be more technician-focused professional development, but it’s out there if you look for it (and if you have the time and/or funding).

But there certainly could be more done in rethinking technician work and career advancement. Personally, I think along with rethinking technician scope-of-work, there needs to be a shift from seeing library technicians as “paraprofessionals,” only useful to assist librarians. I’m a big fan of the phrase “library worker,” to encompass technicians and librarians alike.

New models of academic librarianship, such as the functional specialist model, threaten to sideline library technicians, disrupting their work as the academic library shifts to prioritize and restructure librarian work, and putting aside library technicians. This is an area where technicians can be involved in decision-making, and by extension, demonstrate mutual respect. Technicians can bring their professional interests and expertise to the forefront of functional work. As argued by Hoffmann and Carlisle-Johnston (2021) who write about librarians, but certainly can encompass technicians as well, in current or future reorganization, we can keep in mind foundations of liaison library work by “building relationships, anticipating and meeting needs, and drawing on specialized expertise” (Conclusion section, para. 1).

While it has now been some time since I worked as a technician, I still draw upon those experiences as a librarian; and of course, I remember the dull and gruelling shift work in the late evening and over the weekend. I certainly won’t forget the work or those I worked closely with any time soon.

How many of you are library technicians? Once were library technicians? It’s a surprisingly common career trajectory for librarians to have been library techs. Leave a comment, I’d be happy to hear from you. If you’re a library tech thinking about getting your MLIS and want to talk more, get in touch!

References
Hill, C. (2014). The professional divide: Examining workplace relationships between librarians and library technicians. The Australian Library Journal, 63(1), 23-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/00049670.2014.890020

Hoffmann, K. & Carlisle-Johnston, E. (2021, March 26). “Just like when i was a liaison”: Applying a liaison approach to functional library models. The Journal of Creative Library Practice. https://creativelibrarypractice.org/2021/03/26/just-like-when-i-was-a-liaison-applying-a-liaison-approach-to-functional-library-models/

Prepared? Reflecting on grad school after 3.5 months on the job

Lately, I’ve been thinking about how well my MS/LIS degree and its related experiences prepared me for my job now as a Research and Instructional Services Librarian. It’s important to note that I worked in my undergraduate library for three years while receiving my bachelors. I also worked in my hometown public library for a year before heading off to graduate school. I’d worked at a physical reference desk before, had worked with LibChat, and had a base knowledge of databases. I had more library experience than some, and therefore had a better idea of what classes I needed to be taking to become an academic librarian.

I feel like a broken record saying this, but my graduate experience was quite different and chaotic at best; my first year, I was entirely online (unplanned), assistantship and all. Online classes weren’t necessarily a surprise, given my alma mater’s strong online MS/LIS program, but setting foot in the library I worked for exactly once during the 2020-2021 school year wasn’t something I was expecting. I did chat and email reference, team meetings, and taught workshops all from my tiny bedroom in Urbana, IL. I’d moved to Illinois specifically to have an in-person program, but alas – Covid ruined those plans. My supervisor and the other librarians I worked with did their best to train my cohort remotely, but as you can imagine, the physical reference desk is a whole other beast compared to a virtual one. Even when we went back in person in summer 2021, things felt constantly up in the air. Policies were changing left and right as folks tried to reconcile COVID-19 restrictions with being back in person. If anything, my “chaos cohort” of other graduate assistants were prepared to be adaptable!

collection development

With that being said, one aspect of my degree that might seem controversial to some is that I actively chose not to take collection development, despite never having done that in any of the previously mentioned library jobs. This was based on some of my friends’ experiences in the class; it was useful, for sure, but there were other classes they’d wanted to take that they couldn’t as a result. I had the thought too that wherever I ended up, they would “do” collections differently. I’d have to learn new processes no matter what classes I took. Now that I’m here at Salisbury, I am responsible for collections in areas like Environmental Studies, Public Health, and Exercise Science, to name a few. I lean on my faculty for book recommendations, as well as Choice Reviews from ACRL and book reviews in journals. I am also part of our Leisure Reading committee, where our main responsibility is to develop our leisure collections for students, faculty and staff. Here, the collection development is a group effort. Personally, I don’t feel like I’ve missed out on too much; I’ve learned how to use GOBI on the job, and my university has a great faculty request system in place.

instruction

A theme I have noticed in literature regarding the master’s degree is that many academic librarians feel they weren’t adequately prepared to take on instruction. It’s also been written about on ACRLog before. This is something I felt fairly confident about, as I took the class “Instructional Strategies and Techniques for Information Professionals” with Merinda Hensley. We created a lesson plan, struggled through writing learning outcomes (emphasis on the struggle), and wrote teaching philosophies. I also took “E-Learning” with Melissa Wong, which gave me language and strategies for teaching virtually. On top of all of this, I was teaching for the UIUC library via my graduate assistantship. So when setting up instruction sessions with my faculty at Salisbury, I felt confident. I’m always going to be nervous before teaching, but it’s never been because I have no idea what I’m doing.

faculty communication

Where I feel shaky in regards to my job duties is in communication with faculty. Some of this is to be expected with a new librarian, but where I find myself unsure is how many emails to send, how to reach faculty that don’t already request library instruction… essentially, I am struggling in this aspect of “proving” myself and my job to other faculty at the university. I attended the CLAPS (Critical Librarianship & Pedagogy Symposium) two weeks ago, and Baharak Yousefi’s closing keynote has really stuck with me. Some of these tweets capture the essence of this powerful keynote, which had some focus on one-shot instruction:

“No physicist, historian, or geographer on our campus teaches this way – going around begging for the right to teach in a one-off manner.” (tweeted by @lydia_zv)

“We are deprofessionalized by being given work we can’t do well, and the very fact that we can’t do it well makes us reluctant to resist the condition of our de-professionalization” (tweeted by @RoxanneShirazi)

I didn’t have the words for what I was feeling, but Yousefi has captured it perfectly. I was hired at Salisbury to perform a job, I have faculty status, and yet, it sometimes feels like I need to prove the merit of library instruction. I’ve got some great faculty who know the value of a librarian for their students, but even then, I’m in front of them maybe once a semester. If the timing of our session isn’t quite right, students won’t see the value of what I teach yet or won’t want to re-do their research based on what I’ve shown them. I imagine that confidence in faculty communication will come with time and effort; is this even something an MS/LIS could prepare a new librarian for? I’m inclined to say no. We can perhaps be warned about the phenomenon by professors and mentors, but it strikes me as something a librarian has to experience and address themselves at their institutions.

These are just a few things I’ve been pondering since graduating. How did your MS/LIS prepare you for your library position? How did it not? Feel free to sound off below. This post by Sarah Crissinger on tips for graduate school might be of interest too.