Why work at University Library?
- Student employees are essential to the library being able to provide research, technology, and information services to our campus and wider Indianapolis communities—students make up a third of the library’s staff.
- Library student employees benefit from the convenience of on-campus work, and a wide range of positions to match your interests, skills, and schedule. Those positions include marketing and outreach, IT support, digital content creation, scanning historical documents and images, managing mailroom operations, preserving and making accessible archival materials, and serving as the face of the library at our main Service and Information Desk, among others.
- University Library is invested in your academic and career success as well as your success as a library employee. To support your success, University Library is developing a student-created and student-led Student Employment Program, that will provide all library student employees with programming, training, and professional development opportunities to help you in your work with us, your academic career at IU Indianapolis, and with whatever comes next.
- We serve a diverse community of library users, and actively seek applications from first-generation students, Black students and students of color, LGBTQ+ students, and students with disabilities.
Who are our library student employees?
Our 2023-34 cohort of student employees represent schools across the IU Indianapolis campus.
| School | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Kelley School of Business | 5% |
| IU Indianapolis School of Education | 2% |
| Purdue School of Engineering & Technology | 12% |
| IU Indianapolis School of Health and Human Sciences | 5% |
| Herron School of Art & Design | 10% |
| Luddy School of Informatics | 33% |
| IU Indianapolis School of Liberal Arts | 14% |
| IU Indianapolis School of Science | 17% |
| IU Indianapolis School of Social Work | 2% |
Taken all together, they are pursuing degrees in 25 different IU Indianapolis programs.
- Anthropology
- Applied Data Science
- Art Education
- Biology
- Biomedical Informatics
- Computer Engineering
- Computer Graphics Technology
- Computer Science
- Cybersecurity
- Electrical Engineering
- Elementary Education
- English
- Health Informatics
- Health Sciences
- Human Computer Interaction
- Library and Information Science
- History
- Marketing
- Media Arts and Science
- Museum Studies
- Pre-Dental Hygiene
- Printmaking
- Psychology
- Social Work
- Sports Management
On average, they work anywhere from 4 to 25 hours per week. A little more than half of them are undergraduate students. The rest are in graduate programs. About a third of them have a second job on campus.
In a fall 2021 survey, just under 90% of library student employees reported that working in the library improved their marketable job skills. Communication skills, problem-solving skills, teamwork and collaboration, and applied technology skills were the top ranked skills students reported developing through their library work experience.
University Library focuses on student employees as learners with valuable knowledge, skills, and abilities. We give them a voice in the design of their own training and development, as well as our programs and services, and we’ve developed a reputation among academic libraries for our work in this area.
In 2022, two library supervisors launched the virtual Student Employment in Academic Libraries (SEAL) Conference, which drew 431 attendees from more than 200 higher education institutions in the U.S. and beyond. 30 presenters shared research and ideas related to student employment and the conversation continues through a growing community of practice that began during the conference.
Grounded in research about teaching and learning, STEP supports and advances IU Indianapolis’s Profiles of Learning for Undergraduate Success in important ways. Library student employees develop skills as problem solvers, community contributors, communicators, and innovators.