“Books are sometimes windows, offering views of worlds that may be real or imagined, familiar or strange. These windows are also sliding glass doors, and readers have only to walk through in imagination to become part of whatever world has been created and recreated by the author. When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror. Literature transforms human experience and reflects it back to us, and in that reflection we can see our own lives and experiences as part of the larger human experience. Reading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books.” – Rudine Sims Bishop
The author Sydney Sheldon is credited with saying: “Libraries store the energy that fuels the imagination. They open up windows to the world and inspire us to explore and achieve, and contribute to improving our quality of life.”
The curators of that world of inspiration, exploration and achievement are the librarians who manage library collections and ensure that they are robust, comprehensive and diverse.
The dedicated managers of Texas State’s books and resources are the subject librarians who make collection development a key priority among the many duties they perform. Research, Instruction and Outreach Librarian Arlene Salazar is a strong proponent for making sure that the Texas State collections serve as the windows, sliding glass doors and mirrors that Rudine Sims Bishop referenced in her powerful quote.
“We have a responsibility as a library and as librarians to make sure that our collection represents and reflects our student population,” Salazar said. “It’s important that people have the opportunity to learn about different cultures and that they can go through that sliding door and actually enter that experience and that people see themselves in our collection.”
Salazar’s passion for enhancing and bolstering diverse collections in our libraries has benefitted our campus in many ways. Her achievements in this area earned her recognition as Texas State’s staff recipient of the 2020 Excellence in Diversity and Inclusion Award.
A native of San Antonio, Salazar studied Education at St. Mary’s University and then earned her Master’s Degree in Education at UTSA. While she enjoyed the research aspects of education, she realized the day-to-day aspects of teaching was not the career she wanted. Libraries were her calling and after receiving her Masters of Library Science from the UT-Austin, she made it a goal to be an Education Librarian in an academic library. When she first arrived at Texas State in 2000, the librarians were generalists and there were not subject specializations. After many years of Salazar and others pushing for subject specializations, Texas State went the direction of many other academic libraries by designating a subject librarian for each academic department.
“It just made sense to take advantage of people’s educational backgrounds and their specializations rather than try to struggle with a question you are not familiar with,” Salazar said. “So over time, that model evolved and eventually it became official and that was one of the happiest days of my life when we were finally able to offer patrons the strength of a subject librarian model.”
Salazar serves as the subject librarian for five different departments including: Education Curriculum and Instruction; Counseling, Leadership, Adult Education, and School Psychology (CLAS); Sociology; Organization, Workforce, and Leadership Studies (OWLS); and Occupational Education. As such, she collaborates with faculty, does class instruction, manages and promotes library resources, creates course and subject guides and provides research assistance for patrons on these subject areas.
But she does not limit her collection development efforts to these subject areas. As a self-described “avid news junkie,” she is always attuned to making sure that the books and resources she hears about are a part of our general collection. She also helps mentor new librarians with how to do collection development and she makes suggestions to colleagues for books that help enhance their subject-area’s collection to make it more diverse and representative. She also strives to make sure that resources that most undergrads can’t afford are available to them through their library.
“Collection development is just one of my favorite parts of my job,” she said.
Salazar is very active on Twitter (@alkekarlene) and loves sharing her knowledge and information and connecting with students and faculty using that platform. She often participates in campus outreach activities to engage with not just students and faculty, but also with staff. She wants staff to know that our resources are for them too and they should come take advantage of their access to them.
When not working, she enjoys spending time with her family in San Antonio including her 16-year old son who is by now an information literacy expert after sitting through many of her instruction sessions over the years. She recently took up riding an eBike to get out and about during the pandemic.
This article was contributed by Debbie Pitts, University Libraries Marketing and Communications Coordinator.