Fun
A Very Merry SLISmas
Posted December 13, 2018 by Katie Carlson
A little over a week ago, my roommate Chloe and I embarked upon a true ‘grad students living in Boston’ adventure when we went hunting for a Christmas tree! A douglas fir wasn’t really an option when we lived together in dorms, and we are both originally from suburban areas, so Christmas tree hunting usually requires a car and a series of bungee cords! Where would we even begin? We floated ordering an Uber, renting a car, begging friends and even ordering a tree to be delivered, but settled on the old fashion way: hoofing it. Chloe, my favorite person on earth, was able to locate various places to pick up the tree, mapped how long it would take us to walk to each, and ensuring that they sold tree stands. We budgeted, made sure we had the cash necessary for the purchase, threw on our raincoats, and set off (in the rain, of course). When we arrived at the lot, we decided that something between Chloe’s height (5’3″) and my height (5’10”) would…
The SLIS Buffet
Posted November 19, 2018 by Katie Carlson
Hello again! I’m getting ready to register for classes in a few days, and I’m going to explain the way I’m feeling in true English major fashion — via metaphor. I feel as though I am at a Chinese buffet, overwhelmed by mouth watering scents, and surrounded by delicious food. I’ve already grabbed a tiny bit of scallion pizza, a donut, and a tiny bit of sesame stir fry, and about to go up for round two. But, just as I bounce over to the serving trays, someone walks over and informs me that I can only take NINE MORE BITES of food. As someone who (both in terms of course work and Chinese food) likes to sample a bit of everything, I can’t help but feel a bit distraught. In my advising meeting with Laura Saunders, I arrived armed in true future-librarian fashion) with a color coded Google doc, in which I had ranked by preferred courses per semester. That said, I know I will be taking LIS 488: Technology for Information Professionals, to…
If the Shoe Fits!
Posted October 23, 2018 by Katie Carlson
This past Friday, I had the awesome experience of touring both the Reebok archives and America’s Test Kitchen. Check out next week’s blog for ATK! At Reebok I was given a fun looking ID badge that identified me as a guest of Stephanie Schaff, Archive Coordinator, who graduated from Simmons in 2015. She showed us around Reebok’s new digs in the Innovative and Design Building on Drydock Ave. The work area was entirely encased in glass, and we were told that desks are first come, first served. After touring the general building, we entered the actual archive. The space was decked out in white, with sketches displayed across the tables, cases of brightly colored shoes, and a fair amount of moveable stacks. I was very excited to be able to hold the oldest shoe in the collection (forgive me, Stephanie, but I forgot the exact date) which featured spikes that were caked with century old dirt — which is a testament to how well the archive treats its items! I ALSO was able to hold…
Learning about Learning (or rather, metalearning)
Posted October 11, 2018 by Megan Ondricek
I saw a mug in the bathroom at Mt. Holyoke on Saturday that said: “Anything you can do we can do meta” and I’ve been chuckling to myself ever since. You see, the prefix “meta-” is something I hadn’t really encountered before I came to library school and now I can’t seem to get away from it. Librarians love it (and we aren’t the only ones). I’m going to do you a solid today and tell you what meta means and then make up some words with it just for fun. The Google dictionary defines meta as “denoting something of a higher or second-order kind” but I actually like this one from Urban Dictionary better: “Meta means about the thing itself. It’s seeing the thing from a higher perspective instead of from within the thing, like being self-aware.” The example you’ll encounter most frequently in library school is metadata, which is essentially data about data. Right now in User Instruction we’ve been reading about metacognition, which is thinking about your own thinking. And since this…
A Fall Outing
Posted October 3, 2018 by Sarah Callanan
I went on a wonderful fall outing this past week! Ever since I moved to Massachusetts I’ve been working on trying to explore the area more. I research things to do and places to visit online, I ask classmates and colleagues where to go, and sometimes I just stumble across places as I go about my day. One thing that several people told me was that I couldn’t go through a fall in New England without a trip to an apple orchard. I’ve noticed that there is an abundance of apple orchards near where I live, and it feels like there are far more here than there were North Carolina. This past week, I decided to take the advice that was given to me and I visited an apple orchard with my family. We went to Tougas Family Farm in Northborough, MA. At the farm it is currently apple and pumpkin picking season. During other times of the year, you can pick other kinds of fruit such as strawberries (early June to early July), cherries…
Fall is Here!
Posted September 12, 2018 by Sarah Callanan
Fall has arrived! Well, technically fall doesn’t start until September 22, but it certainly feels like fall. The weather is getting slightly colder, the leaves are beginning to change, and the fall semester has just begun (my class literally just started last night). I must say, I really enjoy how classes do not start until September here. Even the elementary, middle, and high schools in Massachusetts didn’t start until last week (at least that’s when they started in my area). My entire life, school has always started in early-to-mid August, no matter what state I have lived in. I’m really enjoying waiting until fall to go back to school. As the seasons have started to change, I have been trying to partake in some fun fall activities. Last weekend, I went to the Autumn Arts and Crafts Festival at the Historic Wayside Inn in Sudbury, MA. It was a great outdoor craft fair with a ton of vendors and exhibits, and I bought some fabulous items! There seems to be a lot of festivals in…
The End of Summer
Posted August 29, 2018 by Sarah Callanan
So, I thought that my fall class started next week- I was wrong. Guess who gets two more weeks of summer?! That’s right, I do! The students in my class got an email from our professor a few days ago giving us details about the class (LIS 488: Technology for Information Professionals), and it said that our start date is September 11, which means that I get more time before school starts! Now that I have the syllabus and some more details about the class, I can see that this is going to be different than other online classes that I’ve had. There are going to be a few “live sessions” where everyone is online and interacting with each other at the same time, which I’m really looking forward to! While I’ve gotten to interact with my classmates during online classes before, it’s been mostly through forums, and we reply to each other at our leisure. With the live sessions (I assume) we will actually be able to see one another and participate like an…
Reading Deprivation
Posted July 13, 2018 by ShanTil Yell
I’m flipping the script in today’s post, meaning I plan to tell you about what I haven’t been reading instead of what I have, or rather, why I am not reading at the moment. I’m participating in an experiment this week called “reading deprivation” as a part of this Artist’s Way book I’m working through. If you think that sounds impossible and a bit insane, then I would have to agree with you. Do you know how difficult it is not to read something, or anything at all on a given day? It takes a real concentrated effort, and maybe a blindfold too. The tool is meant to “monitor the inflow and keep it to a minimum,” according to author Julia Cameron, that way you’re able to tune into your inner voice more clearly and hopefully be rewarded with more outflow. And while it’s true that I’ve seen my writing increase, I’ve also gotten petty and annoyed about the whole idea. What about my work emails? My text messages? Those quotable images that I love…
A Glimpse of Summer
Posted June 28, 2018 by ShanTil Yell
I had almost forgotten about the feeling of that sweet exhale summer break brings until now. I don’t know if what I’m doing 100% qualifies as a “break” since I am working a lot and still managing to keep my schedule quite full, but it is nice to be doing all of those things without having to worry about homework and readings for a few months! In terms of work, I’m still filling in as a senior substitute at the Somerville Public Library. I love it for…well, many reasons. 1) SPL is an awesome place and you should come visit us, okay? Okay. 2) We’ve got three branches, and I’ve been fortunate enough to work in various roles at each of them. Plus, I have amazing co-workers who have been so helpful and supportive. A little circulation here, some reference desk there, and my personal favorite–the children’s room. I got to do an impromptu preschool story time a couple of weeks ago and it was only a little scary, but mostly a lot of fun…
Our Neighbors at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Posted June 26, 2018 by Ashley Jackson
Hi guys! This week I took the opportunity, as a fairly new resident to the Boston area, to explore our neighbors at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. I have heard a lot about this museum and have been itching to get over. First things first, Simmons students get in free! I was prepared to pay the much-discounted student price of $5, but the lovely girl at the desk said no fee with my student ID! I believe this is true for the Museum of Fine Arts which is nearby as well. It’s a gorgeous building and was Gardner’s home as well. She traveled the world looking for fine art, collected it, and brought it back to Boston to display in her house. She picked where each piece went so it is unique in that way and unlike any museum I have been to. Her pieces are amazing. I often found myself wondering how they shipped some of the pieces over to Boston. Now for the juicy part. This museum is home of many works of…