Before she discovered a passion for libraries, Jacqueline “Jacquie” Kociubuk—a PhD Candidate in the iSchool—worked in fisheries in the Pacific Northwest, studying salmon and Albacore tuna. “I worked on boats and in canneries,” she said. “It got really slimy.”
But after an unexpected move to Ohio to help care for a family member, Kociubuk landed a job shelving books at Cleveland Public Library, where she learned that “being a librarian is something you need to go to school for.” She fell in love with the way libraries serve as “community education spot[s],” where children and adults alike can learn, connect and belong.
Nearly a decade after she got her first job in libraries, Kociubuk is now both an experienced librarian and a published researcher. And as she enters the final stretch of the iSchool’s PhD in Information, she has been selected as one of three Public Humanities Fellows from across UW–Madison. The fellows, PhD students selected in a competitive application process, partner with organizations around Madison, including museums, hospitals, businesses and nonprofits, to offer resources and expertise from their unique academic and professional journeys. The fellowships are offered through the UW–Madison Center for the Humanities and supported financially by the Graduate School and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
In her fellowship, Kociubuk will partner with the Madison Public Library Foundation to explore the history of Madison Public Library in preparation for its 150th anniversary next year, using unique local resources to inform the library’s efforts to celebrate a century and a half serving the Madison community.
“Lots of people have already started to do this work,” she said, “so what I’m doing is looking at questions like, ‘What are the gaps that we missed? What other voices can we add to this narrative? How can we think about telling this story in new and different ways that get the community excited about the library?’”
A ‘circuitous route’
Kociubuk had always loved science; she studied biology and chemistry at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, before working in fisheries. But she hadn’t considered the science of libraries until she worked in one, taking what she called a “circuitous route” to librarianship. “I don’t think anyone really dreams, as a little child, of being a librarian,” she said. In her job at Cleveland Public Library, though, she saw firsthand how libraries often play an integral role in their communities, serving as accessible spaces for children and families to learn and grow.
Kociubuk decided to apply to graduate programs and landed in 2017 at Kent State University to pursue a dual master’s in Library and Information Science and in Education. Subsequently, she worked as a youth services librarian in two different Ohio library systems, largely with communities that had been historically underserved and under-resourced. “There was a need for some sort of community organization to help provide holistic learning for youth and families, and it was really clear to me that one of the institutions that could step into that role is the public library,” Kociubuk said.
At the same time as Kociubuk gained experience as a library practitioner, she began to wonder if she could impact the field in a broader way through research. “I knew that I could continue working at a library and have a very deep impact on one community, or I could turn to research, where I could study how libraries do all the wonderful things they do and how they can do them better. That way, I could have a very broad impact.”
Following this line of thinking, Kociubuk decided to pursue a PhD, and after much consideration, she chose the iSchool at UW–Madison as her destination, beginning her PhD here in 2021. “I knew I wanted to work with Professor Rebecca Willett, who is a phenomenal researcher and scholar in fields that I’m interested in, so that was a big draw,” she explained. “And when my husband and I came out to visit, we felt like we were already in a community with others, which was really important for me.” Because completing a PhD takes several years, she added, “You want to do it in a place where you feel supported.”
Now, as she nears the end of her PhD, Kociubuk expressed gratitude for the array of people who have helped support her along the way, including the faculty members on his dissertation committee—Willett and Associate Professors Jonathan Senchyne and Emilee Rader—as well as the iSchool staff, whom she said were “vital” to her UW–Madison journey.
Connecting library science research and practice
During the PhD program, Kociubuk has published and presented research with Willett and others in leading library and information science journals. In one paper Kociubuk co-authored with Willett, the researchers found that during the COVID-19 pandemic, public libraries became an invaluable resource for parents and families. Specifically, they wrote, during the height of the pandemic, “caregivers had new appreciation for the community aspect of libraries and for libraries as providers of social resources.”
Kociubuk has also conducted research examining the role of public libraries in promoting equity in educational outcomes, including by reaching out to communities in need. In a 2022 study, Kociubuk and co-authors used a mixed-methods approach (focus groups, interviews and a national survey) to explore libraries’ impacts on underserved communities. They found, encouragingly, that “libraries are helping to increase educational equity for children and families in underserved communities by taking free educational programs, services, and resources out into community locations to meet families where they are.”
In her research, Kociubuk said, she has tried to consistently keep library practitioners at the front of her mind. “I’ve worked really hard throughout my career to bring research to practitioners and to bring practitioners into my research,” she said. “The hope is that it can empower them to realize what an impact they can have for families.”
‘Very exciting and a little nerve-racking’
Kociubuk’s latest project through the Public Humanities Fellowship differs from much of her previous work, a prospect she sees as a welcome challenge. “It’s very exciting and a little nerve-racking,” she said, adding that in the past, “I have positioned myself more as a social scientist rather than a humanities scholar. So now I’ve had to learn these new skills, like how do I do archival research? And how do I do it in ways that recognize unheard voices?”
During the nine-month fellowship, Kociubuk will be working with the Madison Public Library Foundation as a Public History and Engagement Fellow on a project researching, documenting, and shaping the 150th anniversary of Madison’s public libraries. Her role in the project is twofold, Kociubuk explained. First, she is creating a public history of Madison’s library system, “focused [on] the ways the library has supported community engagement over their 150 year history,” she said. This part of the project involves some digging that Kociubuk described as “super fun,” like combing through newspapers from bygone eras.
Secondly, Kociubuk said she will be “providing recommendations and guidance on how we can celebrate the library’s 150th year. After all, “there’s not that many libraries in this country that have been around for that long,” she noted. “It’s something to celebrate.” Kociubuk added that throughout this aspect of the project, she is asking herself:
“How can we recognize and thank the community for supporting the library for 150 years? Because it’s not just the library giving to the people, it’s the people giving back to the library.”
Jacqueline “Jacquie” Kociubuk
After completing the fellowship and her PhD, Kociubuk hopes to pursue tenure-track faculty positions, likely at information schools and education schools, to continue her research into the evolving relationships between libraries and the communities they serve. For example, she said, “I’m doing a project right now on embodied learning, studying how libraries can support movement, because movement is connected to helping children learn.”
Kociubuk is also interested in place-making theory, or the idea that people and places shape one another, through the lens of public libraries, and other topics she sees as underexplored. “I have a giant document of research questions that I add to every week,” she said. “No matter where I end up going, whether in a tenure-track role or not, I know one thing, which is that I will continue to learn. And I will continue to share what I learn with the communities where it can make a difference.”
The Public Humanities Fellowships program is offered through the UW–Madison Center for the Humanities and is made possible with the essential financial support of the Graduate School of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Learn more about the program.