Student Snippets A Window Into The Daily Life & Thoughts of SLIS Students

August 2014 Archives

Five Inspirational Librarians from Film and TV

Since the unfortunate passing of Robin Williams, I’ve come to realize how many of his films in the 1990s defined my childhood. Films like Aladdin, Ms. Doubtfire, Jumanji, Ferngully, Hook, and countless others have and will always hold a special place in my heart. However, in my efforts to both remember Robin Williams for the comedic genius that he was as well as to take a trip down nostalgia way, I got lost somewhere along the way, and what started as a Robin Williams movie marathon turned into an all out nostalgia binge. I’m not exactly sure when I came up with this week’s blog post (the last one of the summer if you can believe it?) but its timing could not be any better. What started off as a quest to remember my first real comedic role model slowly morphed into a re-discovery of other characters that inspired me while growing up. And since I’m currently enrolled in a graduate program for library and information science, I thought it would be cool to compile…


Literary Librarians

It’s August and summer classes have finally ended, which means I have another two weeks of relative freedom before fall classes start in September.  I’ve been spending a lot of time catching up on television (I know people told me Orphan Black was good, but it is so good, you guys) and the lengthy list of books I’ve wanted to read.  People who choose to study the library sciences do tend to be big readers, and the size of my To Read pile definitely means I’m no exception.  Because I’m graduating in less than six months (!!!), most of my focus is on job hunting and my future career, and I’ve been spending my time reading about fictional librarians and their work for inspiration.  The problem with fictional librarians is that a lot of the time they seem to be the stereotypical shhhing librarians who hate fun – even the librarian action figure has sensible shoes and “amazing shushing action.”  Luckily, there are a load of awesome literary librarians to help balance the picture of…


New Adventures

This is my last post for GSLIS as I’m graduating in December. I’ve enjoyed every minute writing for this blog and wish everyone well as they move on to new adventures. As for my journey I will begin this fall as the upper school librarian at Dana Hall school in Wellesley. To read more about my fun escapades check out my blog! I’m on a school library exchange at the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls. Things are amazing here. Librarians are the luckiest people on the planet. Fact.


August Exploration

In the areas surrounding Simmons’ Boston campus, there are countless neighborhoods to be explored. This past weekend, I took a step toward better exploring my own neighborhood of Somerville at the Somerville Flea. Every Sunday, vendors and visitors gather near Davis Square to engage in an exchange of goods from vintage scarves to bunches of carrots, peaches, and plums. Awash with Etsy-worthy ephemera, a stack of enormous volumes stopped me in my tracks. Unbeknownst to me, they weren’t books. They were boxes. And not the kind that butcher books to make them either –  stunning reproductions of War and Peace, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, and other titles. Set on them lining my bookshelves within the hour, I made away with the two enormous false volumes clutched haphazardly in my arms. Arriving home, I soon placed my own copy of Tolstoy’s War and Peace into the box boasting the same title in box format; the daunting pagination of the wartime epic finally matched by a cover of suitable size. Tucked away on my bookshelves, the remainder…


A Night with Google

Sometimes I am purely baffled at the things I’ve gotten to do since moving to Boston almost a year ago. Most recently, I found myself at Boston’s very own Children’s Museum at an event hosted by Google as a means of promoting their online program, Google City Experts. Like Yelp, Google is trying to find a niche for itself within the world of online reviews. Nowadays, if you search for something on Google Maps, a box appears on the left hand side that includes a variety of information such as the address, hours of business, phone number, and website. At the bottom of the box, are reviews for your inquiry. Like Yelp, these reviews were created by users, and can range from being brief to extremely thorough. Write enough of these reviews and Google will eventually consider you to become part of their City Experts program.  So here is the big question, is it worth it? Well, the event at the museum was hands-down awesome. For the most part, me and the other attendants had…