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By Julia Vogl

The Oberlin College Library is taking a lead role in a program that challenges the expanded provisions of the USA Patriot Act, while also seeking to recruit undergraduate students to become librarians.

The program is a joint project between Oberlin College and five other colleges: Mount Holyoke College, Occidental College, Wellesley College, Atlanta University Center and Swarthmore College.

Ray English, Director of Libraries, and Megan C. Kinney, Mellon Libraries Recruitment Program Coordinator, were instrumental in bringing the educational program to Oberlin for library employees and anyone else interested in the subject.

The timing of this program is also fitting, since data released by the College shows that within the next ten years 60 percent of the present librarians will retire.

The program was launched this year owing to a grant given by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to all participating institutions. The grant will be used for this and similar programs over the next three years, as well as for internships that will enable undergraduates to gain experience in the profession.

“The program was specially designed through a series of conference calls,” Kinney explained. “We centrally created a pull-out-of-the-box program, and then we customize the session at each school.”

This year the recipients of the grant chose the Patriot Act as the focus of their initial program, as it is of great concern to libraries across the country.

Like many other topics that the program hopes to highlight, the Patriot Act is a concern that students should take an interest in, English said.

“We really want to make the profession visible to students,” he said. “We hope to enable them to see broader aspects of the library profession, and hope more undergraduates take interest in the library profession.

“Librarians are taking a leading role in challenging the Patriot Act,” English said.

Both pointed out that the recent spate of press surrounding the Patriot Act makes it a great starting point for the focus of the program.

“So much national discussion has evolved around attorney general Ashcroft’s attack on the library profession,” English said. “The libraries’ response to that is something that makes me very proud to be part of the profession.”

Kinney added that such a response has helped to counter the general image of librarians. “With our efforts, we can show that there are radical librarians speaking out against the administration [and] standing up for what they believe in,” she said. “Right there, [we are] presenting them in a different light then they are normally portrayed.”

The program focuses on confidentiality as the heart of the issue concerning the USA Patriot act and libraries.

“The law currently impinges on the fundamental value of library profession,” English said. “It is important to anyone who uses libraries; it is a fright on an important principle.”

The program discusses the concern that libraries – traditionally a place of confidentiality – can now be accessed very easily by the FBI, if they wish to see individual records.

As a gesture of protest, many libraries have deleted records, and Oberlin is currently sorting through records and only keeping what needs to be kept.

“[This confidentiality] is what the library profession is trying to protect,” English said.

During one session, the organizers showed the two different points of view in a movie that featured Vermont congressman Bernie Sanders taking an anti-Patriot Act stance, juxtaposed with an interview of the Attorney General Ashcroft defending the Act. The movie gives all details from section 215 that pertains to library records, but also emphasizes the importance of the issue.

The movie encourages students to help the cause by writing to congressmen or senators about the five Patriot Act amendment bills concerning the library clause which allows FBI to break the confidentiality policy of personal library records.

So far the students seem enthusiastic about the sessions.

“Students are responding very well,” English said. “The Patriot Act is of concern to many students here and nationally.”

“One of the reactions I saw was that [the students] were pretty surprised,” Kinney remarked. “They didn’t know that this is what librarians stood for.”

Taught by six different staff members, the sessions are small and are required for all library employees. It began in late October and will continue till late November, although additional sessions may be added due to the amount of interest the program has generated.

The program also hosts special one-hour sessions to provide condensed information to students, enabling them to participate without interfering with their schedules.