Library Jobs Don't Suck

By Matthew Weinberger
Staff Writer

There are many places for a student to find a paying job on campus, but the university library system may be among the best, students say. 

Most students find these jobs through notifications on SOLAR or other inquiries into campus employment, but there are exceptions. 

Amanda Burdine, an anthropology major in her final semester at Stony Brook University, was hired two years ago in the gifts and donations department of the Melville Library for a relatively uncommon skill. The library had received a large donation of books in Russian, and a friend who worked in the department called on Burdine and her knowledge of the language for help. She continues to work for the department to this day. 

“I like it,” Burdine said on her job. “It’s not retail, which is what I did before. It’s in a library, which I love.” 

This satisfaction is echoed by the library’s administration. The library would simply not run as efficiently without the 300 workers the library employs annually, Pamela DiPasquale, the student employment coordinator, said. 

The library is unusual among other employment opportunities on campus as the student workers are expected to handle “important work,” DiPasquale said. 

A current student worker in the library’s north reading room, Dung Tran, might beg to differ, however.
“I mostly sit there waiting for someone to come to the front desk so I can help them,” he said. 

In the university branch libraries, such as the Computer Science Library or the Chemistry Library, there is often only one professional librarian on staff at a given time, DiPasquale said. Students do the vast majority of work, clerical or physical, at these locations. 

“Students,” DiPasquale said, “are picking up the slack.” 

While the pay for many campus jobs comes solely from state or federal work-study grants, most of the 160 of the currently active library student employees are paid out of the library’s own budget, making it “unique” on campus, DiPasquale said. In addition, “99 percent” of those students who do come in under work-study wind up coming back as fully paid employees of the library. Approximately $450,000 was budgeted for student salaries last year. 

Victor Santiago had a different sort of return, however. A student worker from 1998 to his graduation in 2002, Santiago returned to the library and turned it into a career. He now works in the circulation department as a billing supervisor, overseeing the collection of overdue book fines. His reason for returning was simple: 

“I enjoyed the people,” Santiago said. 

Not everyone is like Santiago, however. When graduation day comes around, there is always some sadness in the library, as many of the more experienced workers graduate and move on to their new careers, never to work there again. 

“We build a rapport here with our students,” DiPasquale said.