Diane Rehm and Me

The now-famous Adri has asked me to post a brief item about my call-in to the Diane Rehm show a couple of weeks ago. Here's a brief rundown: Diane Rehm hosts a national call-in radio show based in Washington, DC and carried on many NPR stations. On Wednesday, May 5, her guests in the first hour were talking about the upcoming Google IPO and the significance of Google in general. I'm a rabid NPR listener, and like most librarians, I try to point out our significance at every opportunity, so I tried to call in to the show to give us "human search engines" a plug. Unfortunately, I didn't get through before the hour was up. I expected that to be the end of it, but to my surprise, Diane devoted her second hour to libraries on the following day.

The panel was impressive: Toni Garvey, director, Phoenix Public Library and past president of the Public Library Association; Carla Hayden, executive director, Enoch Pratt Free Library and president of the American Library Association; and Winston Tabb, dean of university libraries and director of the Sheridan Libraries at Johns Hopkins University. I knew I wanted to get in on the conversation, so I made my call first, before I even thought of what to ask. The group over at the NEXGEN-L listserv had just been talking about issues they would like to see library leaders take up, and one of the big concerns, not surprisingly, was pay equity. I decided that would probably not be something the panel would bring up directly, but I thought they'd be happy to discuss it if somebody else posed the question. I was on hold for some time, and when I got on air, I made reference to missing the call-in on Google day, then posed my question.

My instincts had been right. The panel was enthusiastic about letting listeners know that librarians and other library workers are underpaid relative to professions with similar educational and skill requirements. I was happy to hear Diane make the connection between library salaries and teacher salaries, as I think that's important for listeners to know. My only real regret was that, for some reason, they didn't pipe in audio from the show while I was on hold. I had to turn my radio off so that it wouldn't cause feedback, so I missed about 20 minutes of the show while I was waiting to be put on-air. It was a great experience, though. I got a chance to put an important issue before the general public, and that was a good feeling.