A Day in The Life of a California Department of Corrections Librarian

>> So, I'm the career consultant for [inaudible] students and alumni. And I'd like to thank you for joining us tonight for our discussion on a day in the life of a California Department of Corrections and rehabilitation librarian. So, we have Allen Baraldi with us to share his experience and expertise with us tonight. >> Okay. Good evening, everyone. My name is Allen Baraldi. I'm the supervisor, correctional education program for the California Department of Corrections. I've been with the department 24 years. I've been in law enforcement over 30 so I've kind of started my way -- kind of started through teaching and through -- and today. I'm going to go through the slides. I'm pretty sure most of your questions I might be able to answer through the presentation. So, I'm going to go a little bit of background about prison libraries, about our department and how big it is and where it goes. And then information directly related to the librarian. And contrary to all those things you see on TV about Pelican Bay and prison, on National Geographic, they're not. You're not an officer. You're a librarian so it's a big difference. So, I'm going to go on the first slide. [pause] Pretty much 1790 prison libraries were established. They were usually run by the clergy and they were based around Bible studies. Books were still pretty expensive but just about everybody had a Bible. And because of that it was fairly easy for them to get. 1870, they had the Prison Reform Act and libraries were seen as a reward. So, basically, you behaved, you got some books to read. In 1915, they had the first manual published for prison by the American Library Association which, I believe, you guys work with. It's part of your accreditation. And in 1970, which is where they had the Library Services and Construction Act by Congress for prison libraries and that's where CDCR at the time was still pretty small but that's where [inaudible] all librarians kind of followed what happened on this. 1977, there were rulings given by a Supreme Court of the United States which basically had inmate given access to law libraries. The present ruling that we go in is from 1972 which is an earlier ruling. Then it's Gilmore v. the State of California, and it basically provides for the fact that we need to provide inmates access to materials so they can basically work with their cases within court. A little bit of background about the department. At this present time, we have 33 adult prisons. We have three camps. The department of juvenile justice some of you may have known as the CYA, California Youth Authority. It's now known as DJJ. They have three facilities. One in California. [inaudible] Tracy [inaudible] and they're right down the street in Stockton. They have three facilities which is northern California, one in southern, and one camp. The present population for the Department of Corrections is 133,362. At one time, we were almost at 190,000. That was when the court stepped in recently, you may have heard, and told us we had to reduce population. As you can tell, we have 118,400 males, 6,005 females and 1172 juveniles. A little bit of information about how we basically place inmates within the institution. They're put by custody level. It's usually their commitment and then how well they behave and play nice with other people when they're in the institution. Level 1 is the people they put in fire camp, minimum support which is things like the ranch where they work out in the field. Firefighters, work -- for example, for here, we have a PI dairy. They milk cows, take care of the fields. Those are low level inmates. Usually, drunk drivers, petty theft, parole violation. A Level 2 inmate is usually somebody who might have a little bit higher crime or they may even get a little bit higher sentence from the court. These people are usually behind the secured perimeter which is the gate area where you walk into the -- level 3 inmate they kind of go from a medium to a high classification. A lot of these people are lifers. They have 25 to life. Most of these individuals are the ones that pretty much maintain the prison. They're the ones that usually have jobs in prison industry. They're the cooks. They're the porters. They're your workers in what could be facility. They've been down for a fair amount of years. They've got into a situation. They're usually your best workers, the ones you can depend on, and they usually help keep your program going. There's a lot of them in the institution depending where you're at. Some institutions are mixed. They'll have level 1, 2, 3. Level 4 is high security and a example of that is Pelican Bay which is the equivalent of Alcatraz. That is pretty much where they put the -- probably the inmates that basically usually are issues as far as behavior. Institution mission. Reception centers are one of the missions. This is where we have new commitments come into correction system. And then they're placed to other institutions depending on their crime and commitment. Or a violation for parole and then they come back into custody and usually spend maybe six months back in institution. Then they're released again. We have women facilities. They are mixed, level 1 through 4. Women facilities are a little bit different from the men's as far as how they're housed. They're not segregated too much by race. And it's almost [inaudible]-like setting. General population. What they tell inmates that are not reception or if they're in for a period of time anywhere from a year, two years to 12 or more. And those are people that are being there for a period of time. So, they don't transfer out. They're at the institution. And so, if you hear the buzz phrase "general population," that's people that are basically stationed at that prison. They're going to be there for a while to serve their sentence. They're based at level 1 [inaudible] in the previous slide. And different institutions are based on different custody levels and that's how it works. We have medical facilities. California -- California medical facility in Solano. We have a new facility that's going to open up in Stockton. We have the psychiatric center in, like, Coalinga. These are primarily for inmates that have medical needs. They get you and out geriatric needs. We have a lot of older inmates. And then, of course, we have high security which is Pelican Bay, Salinas Valley, High Desert. Continued community correctional facilities. These are kind of specialized private prisons and they're on contract with the state. There are very few of these left. I think there's only two. The budget cut and the redistribution of inmates has pretty much restricted that and so I think there's only two left. We do have the inmates out of state in Arizona. We have [inaudible] in Oklahoma. We are reducing that population and bringing them back to California. But, like I said, at this point in time, we still have to move inmates out of state to help us meet the total population mandate. Next slide which shows you a map of California. If you'll look, each little icon is a prison within the state of California with the very top left-hand side is Pelican Bay. It's the -- over right on the coast here by San Francisco is San Quentin. A little bit below that to the middle is -- which is where I'm at. And we have Folsom State Prison which is a little above Sacramento. And you see sack. We have a number of prisons. And as you can tell, we have them all the way down to the Mexican border. There's a total of 33 prisons. And every one of them is mandated to have a librarian, senior librarians, and/or LTAs. As you can tell by the pictures, every institution was built -- we have San Quentin which is the oldest. Actually, it was part of a prison ship in 1849. And then it kind of grew from there. And then we have, for example, DVI which is where I'm at and it was built in 1950. And then we have some of the newest prisons in Delano which were built in 2003. So, we spread the gamut as far as how new and old our institutions are. What you may not know is we actually have full accredited school. Now, as I stated, I'm basically the principal of the school here at DVI. I'm also the enacting assistant superintendent at headquarters in Sacramento. We're fully accredited by Western Association of Schools and Colleges. As a matter of fact, they show up on my school Monday to accredit my school for the six-year accreditation. We have an academic program which is basic education. AB 1, 2, and 3 which basically covers from kindergarten all the way up to high school. A number of inmates, especially in some of the older institutions, the average reading level is four to fifth grade. If they can't read at a ninth grade level or don't have a high school diploma or GED, they're required to go to school. We do have high school programs at some institutions. Primarily, we do go for GED because of the transient quality of our inmates. And as they're paroling and served a longer time, it's easier to do the GED. We do have a coach who does physical education program. 'Cause we find if you have a healthy inmate, you don't have medical cost. So, they do stress to have the physical education instructors out there. We do have college programs. The inmates pay for college programs. They usually can get a fee waiver or somebody paid for them. The institution school provides proctoring and helps them with their registration and the issues they need. And they'll do contact with the colleges. We have something called the "Voluntary Education Program." This allows us to go out and, you know, work with inmates that are in cells. Reception center inmates cannot be placed into regular classroom. And because of that restriction, while we still want to give them educational services, we go out to the cells and have them packets. And then when they transfer into the institution for general population, we continue on with a program. Recently, with the new -- they call it "blueprints for correction" they've given us back a number of correctional vocational programs. They're now called "career technical education" but most people probably know it as vocational program. We have a lot of programs, automotive, electronic, computers. Heating, air conditioning, plumbing, [inaudible] masonry. And the list goes on and on. The programs are based on what will provide a livable wage, a viable program to get employment when they get out. And because they're pretty expensive to run, they try to do the best thing for their buck and have the inmate do a Bible program. As I said, this is our school logo. And this is just some of the trades that you'll see. We have auto mechanics, auto body. We have electronics, plumbing, masonry, welding, computers, and a number of things. Inmates do not have access to the Internet. The [inaudible] so they can work with Lexis and West and -- but the inmates basically work off of which is the DVD-based kind of stand all in our computer system. Library services that you would normally be doing is recreational library which are figure books, tapes, CD, DVDs, videos. You support the school in that we do have textbooks for all the classes so that inmates when they got off they can use the books that are on-hand. Because of some restrictions at some institution they won't let them have hard back books in their cell. So, a lot of them are just come hard back will go to the library to cache. We do have law libraries. I said that's probably the primary thing that you would do at the institution. Those of you who know the law libraries and what it has it's the standard stuff. It's nothing unusual. All the law librarians have Internet access and they're able to, you know, access Lexis and that -- Lexis and West. And so, if they need any case law that's not available, then they go from there. We're required to have one hard copy of all the law books so they can be distributed. So, in case we have issues with the Internet connection, whatever, the inmates can still have access. So, you know, we've got a backup with plain old fashioned books. And trust me there's a lot of them out there. Correctional librarian. These are the level of librarians and I've also put the salary scales on them. We have one principal librarian statewide. We have a supervising librarian. At this time, neither of those positions are filled. Every institution has the senior librarian and the librarian. Some have more than one librarian. And then we have LTAs, library technical assistants, in different locations. It depends on the institution. Some institutions have maybe one primary library like I do. Some of them have a different library on each yard. Some of the newer prisons are segregated by yards and so you basically have four mini prisons at a prison. And each one will have a library. So, in some cases, there's a librarian on each yard. The scales are from 4,000 to 5,700 for senior librarians. Close to 4 to over 5 for a librarian and LTAs is 27 to about 33. There's not much. I'm not going to go into a long detail up on this slide. You can see the experience is kind of open for the LTA. Especially, if you are working toward your degree, it's a nice place to start in. And usually, we have a lot of openings for librarians and it's not unusual within anywhere from two to three years you'll become a senior librarian. We just had a number of older librarians and they've all been cycling through the system and retiring and so that's just kind of how it's been going. Bigger librarians. I think what I need to start it's equivalent to graduation. Factor in completion of one additional year of college study in a library or the AL -- American Library Association. You don't have to basically complete the degree to apply and get the job for librarian. It's a good idea to complete it because it qualifies you for senior librarian later on and other positions that I'll go into that are available outside the prison. The senior librarian is a little more exact. And it's basically wants qualification from a combination of experience or just one other -- of them either serve as a senior librarian, a regular librarian, or a combination of inside and outside skill. This is a little more complex but not that more difficult. It's just if you have library experience and a combination that would make the qualification. In some cases, they can waive some of it due to the number of applicants. So, you know, anything is possible at that level but primarily try to get people with some experience in correction. We have a number of openings exist all over department of corrections and department of juvenile justice. And as I said, the position presently open are senior librarian, librarian, and LTA. I did get the numbers last night -- I should say this morning. And then we actually have 35 positions. We filled a few on the recent hiring. But we have a number of applications statewide. The applications are done online. They self-score for your ranking level. At the end of this presentation, I have the link where you can directly log onto, get the application, and see the qualification for each position. And fill out the application online. I've had a number of -- training and advancement. I've had a number of librarians who have left over the years. And they got even better paying jobs once they got all the experience they got within the law libraries at the institutions. DA's offices. There's research position. Court, legal court. Legal law librarians. Private law firms. I had one of my senior librarians left and was making a three-figure salary as a librarian for a -- research legal librarian for a private law firm down in LA. So, he did quite well. And then with fairly low careers some of them lead up to -- to being an attorney. Duties and responsibilities. This is a picture of my library. How to establish collections, how to work with people. Supervise coworkers. And in this case, it would be inmate workers that would work with you that you train. Pretty -- just standard things you're learning now. It goes on a little bit on and on. And it's all on the -- on the website where you can get some of this information so I'm not going to dwell too much on the -- business time is a daily life of a librarian. Basically, my librarian presently works 4, 10. He gets there about 8:00 o'clock. He lets his inmate workers in. He gets them all set up. And the better trained your inmate clerks are, basically, the easier your life usually is because there's a fair amount of paperwork to do, to maintain, and the documents you need to send out to the -- to the inmates. Your staff basically helps you with your card catalogs, book cataloging, repair, copying, legal requests. Pretty much everything that is a standard duty for the librarian. [pause] We do have cataloging software for -- with the computers and things like that so things change a little bit in each library. It depends on what institutions you're at. They'll go to central library. A little bit more traditional. Those with libraries on each separate yard are a little smaller. Kind of like a satellite library. Collection development by detracting -- donations are a big part of corrections 'cause we do have limited funds. We do have what they call "inmate welfare funds" where the inmates actually -- when they purchase things over -- well, not online. When they purchase things through magazines for hobby, crafts, and stuff, they take 10% and they use it and donate it back to the institution. And that's what's used to buy a number of books and periodicals. We have volunteer activities to come in -- NA, AA. A lot of the religious groups through the number of [inaudible] program. The library is used a lot. Especially, those with central, large libraries. We have a lot of activity to go on in there and one of your [inaudible] who kind of make sure you organize who comes in what so they don't overlap. Staff support services you would work with the litigation coordinators and the institution. Sometimes it's just something as easy as some books you need for some inmates so they can continue on with their studies. And some they might need you to pull some cases off the law books. But as a whole, that's kind of a minor issue but it does happen. Coordination support with other librarians within CDCR. We also do the lending library with the state library and so there is interaction with the state librarian through the state of California. [pause] One of your primary jobs is to maintain copies of documentation of policy documents and new laws and regulations with the department. DOMs recall -- refers to Department Operation Manual. And Title 15 is the policy that's followed by all staff and even inmates within the Department of Corrections. Benefits and salary. The librarians are part of CalPERS, the California Public Employees' Retirement System. You have 2.0 retirement which is safety. There is medical benefits and have vision and dental. As far as medical, you have to talk to personnel but you could be Kaiser or you can be private or PPO through any number of things. There's variations to what you can apply for. They do have sick leave. You have either annual leave or vacation leave which you can choose which one you want at this time. You do have professional leave. There's two days per week -- or pardon me -- two days per month. It rotates there. There used to be the old holiday so those two days are not given as professional leave. Librarians are what they call "4SE Professional Status." So, while you're a salaried employee, you're only required to work an eight-hour day. So, it's kind of a special things with corrections. And it's kind of unusual but it's to the benefit actually to the employee. Job information link. What you see here is -- the first one is career opportunity and the exam and where to link on to apply for the position. And then it talks about the job -- the state personnel board, California.gov. And it talks about the virtue of what's open for librarians. The bottom one is an article which was the state library publication. And it was on the Folsom State Prison library. And it was an interesting article about four pages. And for those that kind of want to see what a prison looked like from a publication did a really good job. So, I thank you for your patience. And if there's any questions, I'd be more than happy to answer them. [ Pause ] >> Thanks, Allen. That was great. Lets's open it up to questions now regarding this type of job. And there actually is one question right now, Allen. This is from Glen. And he's asking: What are the mandatory requirements for attending school for inmates? [ Pause ] >> They vary a little bit. There's what we had called the "Sterling Bill." And if an inmate can't read above a fifth grade level, he's required to go to education. Some institution that varies a little bit depending on the institutional need for workers. But with the push on education right now, if an inmate doesn't have a GED or high school diploma, pretty much no matter what grade level he reads at, they stick him in school. So, it's kind of like your kids. If they don't want to go to school but they don't have much of a choice. So, my institution a couple of years ago before we had to cut some budgets had over 206 GEDs in one year and that was the highest of any institution in the state. So, if you have good teachers, they really make a big difference. And with the GED, they have a lot better chance of getting a job. >> Thanks, Allen. There's a couple more questions. Actually, Glen just said: Is it sixth or ninth grade level? [ Pause ] >> Well, it's sixth grade for mandatory. Ninth grade is what they published but we kind of vary that. It depends on how many classrooms we need to fill and I said the institutional need or the institutions know it. Between six to nine, it becomes kind of mandatory. And if they don't have a high school diploma, we pretty much make it mandatory no matter what their reading level is. All inmates, when they come into the Department of Corrections are tested with an educational test which is called the "TABE Test," the Test Adult of Basic Education. And it basically tests up what level of reading that they read at which is whatever reading level they do unless it's their basic nonreader or if their language probably because they don't know English. They're basically placed in educational services by that ranking. Whatever their grade point level is for reading. Once they're placed in that level in the school, then we do a secondary test which is a full battery TABE which is reading, writing, and math. And then we kind of fine tune where we place them. But we just don't pick them and put them anywhere. We have a system where we have an actual test which is public school and the adult school to figure out where we can put them. And then we do more evaluations later with the CASA step which is also a test given to adults in the adult school. So, the tests that we do give are the standard ones given out in the public sector and that's what we use to kind of place and then fine tune the inmate. >> Thanks. So, here's a question from Kristen [assumed spelling]. And it says: Do the correction libraries work with the city public libraries at all? [ Pause ] >> Not too much. It depends on the librarian. I mean, some of our libraries are kind of out in the middle of nowhere. Some of us are like DVI where we're close. They've had some good working relationships with the libraries as far as getting donations and kind of attending some of their trainings they may have. A lot of it depends on the librarian themselves and how far away they are from certain cities and libraries but it's kind of really open-ended. I mean, it's a vector educational thing that the librarians can get. I have usually no problem of having librarians go for additional training so -- and I know that's the consensus elsewhere. In some cases, the education department can pay for it out of general funds. And I usually encourage it 'cause I want a well-trained librarian. But like I said, it depends on how far away you are and just -- and basically, pretty much it's the individual how much they want to -- time with the local libraries. >> I don't know if everybody can hear me, Al, or if you can hear me. I'm Jane Fisher [assumed spelling] and I work with Jill. I do know that there are community colleges that work very closely with incarcerated people in terms of helping them do online learning and support that. And we've had students who have done internships in those community colleges and worked with personal librarians in a partnership. And that was in California. And I can't remember right now the name of the community college. But if anybody's interested, they can e-mail me and I'll see if I can find it out. So, I wanted to throw that out there that a lot of the prisoners who have completed basic education are interested in more advanced education and I believe they are able to do online training -- well, not online. It would be correspondence really. But you may want to speak to that or you may want to take the next question, Al. >> So, next question, Allen. This is from one of our students who is in Texas and that's 'cause our program is all distance learning. But she's asking if you happen to know if there are any similar types of programs in other states -- in Texas where their library jobs are very similar. [pause] >> I really don't know. I do know that, to the best of my knowledge, just about every correctional system has to have some type of librarian because it is mandatory that -- you know, it's a federal law that you have to give and make access to all libraries. It changes a little different. In some cases, they may have a paralegal to do it. But I'm really not familiar with anything in Texas. I actually have hired a couple of librarians from Texas on phone interviews. So, if you're in Texas, give me a call. But, yeah, I'm not aware of all the different programs. Some of them pretty close to emulating us. But I know a lot of them that don't. So, and they have a different way of giving access to the legal services to the inmates. [ Pause] >> Thanks, Allen. It sounds like, yeah, she wants to move to California, she should give you a call. [laughter] Let's see. A couple more questions. Actually, there's quite a few here. >> Hey. I need a librarian. I'm going to need a senior one too. [laughter] >> Let's see. This says. Where did it go. Can you apply for a specific institution? So, if they're interested, can they kind of pick or put what their choices are for where they would like to work? [ Pause ] >> You were a little garbled. Do you mean if they can tell where they want to go to? >> Yeah. Sorry about that. Yes, can they pick which institutions they're interested in working at when they apply? [pause] >> Yeah. When you get onto the website, it'll tell you where there are institutions that have openings. And if for some reason you can't get to that when you put the application online, you can just say statewide. And then they'll -- whenever they get an opening, they'll send you an -- they'll basically send you a letter stating that you're interested, come for an interview. In a lot of cases 'cause we know we're spread all over California and we'll be more than happy to do a phone interview. Where we'd rather like to talk to you personally, we'll do phone interviews. But when you go to that little map that's on CVR's website, when you go over each little institution, there's a link to the page of that institution. So, when you link on that and click, it'll give you a picture of the institution. It'll tell you where it's at. Give you maps. Tell you the custody level. How many inmates. Academic and rotational programs that may be there. So, that little page with a little icon will tell you just about everything you need to know at any prison that you have a little icon on. [pause] >> Thanks, Allen. There's another question asking if there are internships available for people in the prison system. So, do you know about internship programs? I think we have some listed on our internship database but what knowledge do you have about that? [ Pause ] >> I know they have -- and I know they've been talking about internships and I know they used to have them a number of years ago. Because of the changes I don't think we have them right now. I know they were discussing it, as a matter of fact, at the last principals meeting. But I really can't give you any information. I can ask and see where it's gone as far as through the policy. But we used to have them but right now I don't think we do but I know it is something they're trying to look at. >> Okay. Thanks. There's a question too from Kimberly. It says: Are there any records in archives -- oops. It scooped up. Just a second. Records and archives positions that do not work directly with inmates? [ Pause ] >> No. >> Okay. >> Everything is directly with inmates. If you're a librarian with a correctional facility, you're primarily in a library. You're working with inmates. And you're supervising inmates that help run your library. So, there's no non-inmate contact per se as they call it. That one reason that you get 2.0 retirement because part of that what they classify as safety pay. If you didn't have that, your retirement would not be that high because -- for example, if you go to headquarters and if the headquarter position, you don't get safety retirement. So, that's one of the reasons the retirement is higher when you're out into the institution. >> Thanks for sharing that because I don't think any of us really would've known what that meant -- the 2.0. That that is higher than a typical job. And that actually brings up a question that I've been thinking about and I'm sure other people are about, you know, what, in fact -- what is the safety and how is that -- how do you keep people safe or how do you help with people that are concerned about their safety in working in that type of environment? [pause] >> To be honest, I don't know how many of you people remember junior high. Well, we used to call it "junior high" or middle school. You're a state friend of prison and you're [inaudible]. I've been in there a long time. When you're there, depending on the institution, how it's set up, there's an officer usually right outside the door or they're inside the facility depending on what inmate you have. And they're right in there in the library with you. You're issued an alarm which it kind of looks like your garage door opener. You hit that and, you know, your job is not to get in between inmates. If they decide to have a fight between each other, for example, you just back off, press your alarm. And every institution I've been the minute you press that alarm, get away from the door because you're going to have -- you're going to have a lot of officers coming in that door. So, no, it's very safe at the institution. You know, you're going to deal with people that have attitude problems just like you would in the public libraries 'cause I mean they are individuals when you deal with inmates. And some of them are there because they don't play nice with people. But I have never heard of a librarian being assaulted. You may get four-letter words thrown at you but that's not much different from public sector. But as far as safety, I have no problems. I go -- and as I said, it's been 24 some odd years and, I mean, you always have to be -- you know, you always remember where you are. We call it being "correctionally aware." But as far as safety, there's officers everywhere. Especially in the library depending on where you're at to -- because a lot of times you have to help [inaudible] the inmate while they're in there depending on what level and how many you have in there. So, for example, my library I have an officer literally right outside the door. And then when I have them come from segregated and housing unit they have to be kept separate from other inmate because they're not allowed to mingle. And there's officers sitting right there with them. So, doesn't get much safer than that. >> Thanks for addressing that, Allen, because I do think that's kind of something that people think about. There's a couple more questions here as well. This one is from Jane Fisher. And she's asking if you'll speak a little bit about the exam process and the interviewing process. Like how that whole application process for people. [ Pause ] >> The interview process is they're patterned questions. We ask everybody the same questions. What happens is basically we have three people on the panel. We have three people on the panel and -- or if one more. It depends. It depends on kind of who's on the board. Usually, if you're a librarian, we'll have the senior librarian, either the vice principal or the principal, and then probably one custody individual on the panel. The questions are pretty standard. We want to see what experience you have as a librarian. What experience -- kind of what experience you have. You know, we give you some scenarios on how things would handle so we give you some scenarios. You know, mostly common sense. Some of it is how would you some research some law library statistics as far as, you know, an inmate wants the law key. How would you look it up. What experience do you have with Lexis and Shepard and Shepardizing. Pretty much like that. We do usually give a written exam. We're required to give a written exam when you come in. It's usually we take one of the questions that we have on the interview. We pull it off and then we make it a written question. So, they give you 15 minutes either by hand or with a computer to type it out. And then we use that basically to see -- your writing detail, grammar. Because, you know, you are going to have to write reports. You're going to have to do documents through library use. Usual things like that. If you have an inmate that's causing problems, you'll have to write a document per a disciplinary action. To kind of go backwards a little. If you have an inmate that is an issue in the library 'cause they have a behavior problem, you can get them escorted out of the library. You write a -- we call it either "128" or "115" or a disciplinary write-up. And you can get them banned from the library for a while and they can lose time. So, if you have a serious what we call 115 because he basically kind of bad-mouthed somebody, pretty much he'll lose 30, 60, 90 days off his sentence for good time and he spends more time in jail. So, trust me. They don't want to get written up. So, that's one of the other ways that keeps them a little under control. But like I said, we're asking common sense questions: How would you work a library? How would you handle a destructive person? And then we want to see what you can -- you know, how your grammar skills are, typing, et cetera. >> And you definitely do phone interviews 'cause you mentioned that a couple times. So, it sounds like if people are out of state or they're not in a commutable area for the particular interview, you will do it via the phone and you've made decisions based on just a phone interview. Is that true? >> Yeah. Because once you get your name on the list per -- once you get your name on the list per librarian, what will usually end up happening is you're going to have -- you may get four or five interviews and they're all in the same day. And it's a little hard to drive from Pelican Bay with your crescent city to the Mexican border in one day. So, we're used to doing a lot of phone interviews. The last interviews I dialed Thailand. I talked to my former librarian in Thailand. Had a phone interview. Washington state and Chicago and Texas we did phone interviews. So, oh, yeah. Trust me. We do phone interviews. >> Yeah, that's right. That reminds me. When Allen and I first met which was on the phone -- spoke on the phone, he talked about having to interview a person from Thailand to get librarians. And he was like: How the heck can I get librarians, you know, here in California or at least the United States? And so, that's what prompted us to have him on doing this colloquial session to get the message and the information out to all of you about what a great opportunity this is and how many positions he's actually hiring for. It's quite phenomenal. So, do really think about this as a viable option. Again, if you have some questions, more things you're wondering about, this is the chance to ask him. We have about 10 more minutes. And while we wait for some students to ask some more questions, Allen, I have another one that's still kind of on that safety issue about the fact if are there any issues with having a woman librarian working within a male facility. Is there any types of issues around that? [pause] >> Actually, I prefer having a woman librarian. >> Do you want tell us why. >> And the reason is normally -- well, to be honest, they normally react better with a woman to the extent where -- I don't know. I think they think they're their mother or something so they behave when they tell them to be quiet. I mean, with my male librarians, it gets a little bit more confrontational sometimes where, you know: You don't tell me what to do. But, you know, I've had three women librarians and when they tell an inmate to sit down, it's like, you know: Mom, told you to sit down. It's like, yeah, I like this. It's usually stopped a lot of problems. >> That makes sense. I can understand that. We have a question from Kristen. She says I'm one of the students that's across the country from California. Is there a time frame for moving when you are hiring somebody there? I guess that means -- I guess, Kristen, I'm interpreting that question as: If you were to be hired, how much time would they give you to move yourself to California and get yourself settled before starting a position? >> Normally, this is how our hiring works. We will fly a position which we will post it on the Internet, newspapers, on that website I have at the end of it. We then look to see who's on the list, who's applied. Then we take the people off the list -- the first thing we do is take the people off that list that say they want to work at our institution. And then we take people who put anywhere in the state. We then send them a later. We give them two weeks to respond. Then, after they respond by sending in the application, we send out the letters that are you interested -- you know, send in the application. Then after you send in the institution, then we give two week for that. And then we'll do a list and we give about a week to sort that out. For you guys to let us know if you want to take an interview. And then we'll do the interview. So, that process takes about three weeks. And then after we do the interview, we will pretty much ask you -- we have to get it approved by the warden and we have to do a background check which normal. If you've never been through correction before, you have to get a background check, a [inaudible] scan, kind of standard stuff you do with any other public safety institution. If you're not a state employee, you have to have a TB test. So, you have to go through that. That usually takes, from start to finish, it'll take about a month. If we do have you apply, if we say, you know, do you want the job, we can be pretty flexible. I mean, the last time I had the guy from Texas, we gave him about, oh, over three weeks because some of the things he was doing was getting the medical check and the TB test too at the same time. So, we're pretty flexible. Pretty much as soon as you can move, if we'd hire you. But, I mean, we do need a librarian so we can be pretty accommodating for the time it would take to move out. [ Pause ] >> Thanks, Allen. Here is another question. This is from Jane. It says: Do you see this as a good entry level job for someone who is near the end of their library degree program or who is a recent MLIS grad? Such an applicant may not have a lot of library experience but they do need to start somewhere as a professional. And they've learned and practiced library and information skills during their degree program. So, again, do you think this is -- or sounds like that this is a good entry level job for someone who's near the end of their program or who's a recent grad? [pause] >> Yeah. In most institutions, they usually leave somebody to train you. For example, if I get anybody in the next couple of months -- my senior librarian will be retiring in March -- but he would be able to train the individual on what to do and how to do it. It is helpful if you go to places that does a librarian, a senior librarian so that they can kind of break you in. But as an entry level job, it's relatively -- it's relatively not that complicated. And, like I said, library services regarding to legal law library, you're not an attorney. Basically, the inmates look up their own research. So, you just have to provide copies. So, and if they may need some legal documents or civil suit forms or whatever your inmate clerk can provide those. But you're not a lawyer. You just provide them access to the material. So, it's not like you have to have a lot of experience at an entry level. It does help that the more experience you would have in law library and how to do shepardizing and go through the law books would help but that's something you could actually kind of prep for if you know you're going to try to come within corrections. [ Pause ] >> Thank you, Allen. We have just a couple more minutes. So, if you have another question, go ahead and put it in there. We have one here that says: What is "shepardizing"? I don't remember that word coming up but does that sound -- >> Shepardizing. >> Yeah, shepardizing. >> Yeah. Shepard is -- it's case law. And shepardizing is where you go through the Shepard legal material and then you find cases that apply to what they're requesting for for a crime or a court decision. And they call it shepardizing which means it's kind of like Google search without a computer. >> Excellent. Thank you. Let's see if anybody else has any last minute questions here. I have learned a tremendous amount of information. And it sounds like a really fascinating type of work. It sounds actually, as you were talking, in my mind, I kind of imagine like sort of -- almost like this hybrid position of combining an academic library and a public library in some way and pulling it all together into one type of position. What would be some of your -- >> Well, if you're -- >> We have a few minutes left, Allen. Go ahead. Your final thoughts. >> Not too much final thoughts. If you are any place close to one of the prisons in the state of California and you were interested in seeing what a library is like within corrections, you can get a hold of me. I can put you in touch with the principal of the school. They would be more than happy to give you a tour of the institution, show you what a law library looks like. I mean, I kind of -- I'm to the opinion that you need to see what you're kind of -- would be buying into. So, trust me. The principal would be more than happy at any institution in the state to give you a tour of the library, meet with the librarian, and kind of get an idea of what it's really like. And they'll pretty much set up any appointment at any time you need. And it's Monday through Friday. But if you can afford to take the time off and set up the appointment, they'll be very happy to bring you into the prison. We might even let you go. >> That is a fabulous offer, Allen. So, if any students are interested and they wanted to get in touch with you so it's okay if I were to give them your e-mail address? Not the home one but your work one for them to contact you. Are you okay with that? >> Yes. >> Or do you want -- >> No problem. >> Okay. >> And then I can actually put them -- then I can put them actually directly in contact to the principal. >> So, Kate -- oh, we have Caitland [assumed spelling]. She mentioned that prison librarians work eight hours a day. How many days a week is typical? >> Normally, most librarians work eight-hour shifts, five days a week. My librarian drives from Oakland so I have her on a four, 10 shift. She works four, 10-hour days. I'm probably a little different. The normal librarian works -- most of them work Monday through Friday. Some work weekends but not very many of them. And it's an eight-hour day. [pause] >> Great. Thanks. And there's another question here. Let's see. This one is from Teresa [assumed spelling]. Does your salary change depending on how long you've been -- how long you've worked at the library? >> It does. It does change with how long you've been with the state because you get merit increases. The probation period for a librarian is only six months. So, once you pass probation of six months, you become a permanent state employee. So, it's not like a year probation. And then after you get six months, then there's merits as step increases. That's why you kind of saw the beginning all the way to the high end salary. I don't have the total scale of how often. It's about every six months and/or year you get another merit increase to max up in scale. And in most cases, since we have, you know, LTA bump up to a librarian and senior librarian pretty fast, they can be pretty substantial pretty quick. >> Wow. That is fabulous. That is a great opportunity. So, we have hit our time. Jewel [assumed spelling] has put your e-mail address -- your work e-mail address up on the chat box so people can copy that. Aida [assumed spelling] is going to be contacting you later on about a visit. Sounds like maybe the closest prison to me, she says, to San Quentin. So, you're going to be getting probably an e-mail from Aida. Jane. Let's see. We have a thank you very much. We have thanks very much, everyone. That was very interesting. So, I think we are set here, Allen. I would like to thank you so much. I know you went -- Allen jumped through a lot of hoops to make this happen because there's a lot of security issues he has to work through. And then in the end ended up with these technical difficulties. So, I thank you very much, Allen, for your patience and it worked out fabulously just having you call in and work through the slides that way. So, it was great. So, thank you so much. This is being recorded and I will send you a copy of the recording once we have it all cleaned up nice. And I'm sure there's going to be some students getting in touch with you because this is a fantastic opportunity. So, thank you so much.