Chronicle Careers: 03/03/2005

Chronicle Careers: 03/03/2005: "I remember a guest lecturer in one of my library-school courses -- a woman who headed a department in a significant research library -- telling the class about her preferences when it came to potential employees: 'Someone once said a Ph.D. is a person who has plodded along long enough to get the degree,' she said. 'And I have to tell you, in my experience it's true.'
What shocked me was not that she thought that, or even that she said it to a class of graduate library students -- which typically included a few Ph.D.'s -- but that the acid rolled off her tongue so trippingly it became clear she had said it countless times before and encountered no objections.
One reason for such attitudes is that librarians conflate the categories of 'Ph.D.' and 'faculty member.' And the truth is, many faculty members regard librarians more as support staff members than as colleagues. Librarians know that, and some bristle at the thought of being lorded over by Ph.D.'s 'slumming it' among their ranks. Many librarians assume that the administration will regard the Ph.D.'s as superior, or that the Ph.D.'s will see themselves that way, which is just as irksome. "