Students
Pushing Through Spring Semester
Posted April 3, 2024 by Isabella Rodrigues
If you’re like me then you might already be hoping for summer to start. The weather, seemingly, is getting warmer. People are getting antsy in class and in the streets. In a few weeks, the swan boats will be on the pond, crowds of baseball fans will overrun Fenway, and tourists will swarm the city. Whether you stay in Boston over summer break or go elsewhere, we all still have the same hurdle to jump. Ending the semester. We are about a month out from the end of the semester so everyone is cracking down or about to crack down on finals. Here are some helpful tips on staying focused while also keeping yourself healthy.
Welcome New Student Blogger, Aurora!
Posted March 25, 2024 by Aurora Daniel
My name is Aurora and I’m a first year student in the dual LIS – Archives concentration and History degree program here at SLIS. Originally from Oregon, I moved to Boston in 2018 after serving in the U.S. Army as a Motor Transport Operator and paratrooper from 2016 to 2018. I graduated from Wellesley College in 2023 with a BA in Art History with a specific focus on U.S. Art History and building preservation. During undergrad I had a few internships focused on museum collections management and loved the opportunity to connect what I learned in the classroom with my work. I am hoping to continue doing that throughout my career. I believe that Simmons’ program is providing nice groundwork to do so by balancing how to care for archival collections and the research skills to provide the most up to date and accessible information about them. Outside of my studies I love to knit, read historical fiction, and visit museums where I pick their curation apart. I also play and coach Ultimate Frisbee.
Welcome New Student Blogger: Klaire Chandler
Posted February 15, 2023 by Ivy Noonan
(I’m kind of midsentence in this picture, but my friend took it on real film and develop it for me, so it’s sort of special.) Hi, I’m Klaire Chandler! I’m currently in my third semester here at Simmons. I’m in the Archives Management and History dual program. I’m from a very small town in Maine close to Acadia National Park. I grew up riding horses through the woods and collecting various “historical artifacts” (mostly just bits of trash) that I kept in my own little “personal museum,” (aka a cabinet in my room). The things I didn’t find in the woods, I found while combing through yard sales and flea markets with my dad. My prize possession was a WWI address book I found in an estate sale. Before coming to Simmons, I attended Salem State University where I majored in English and minored in Art History. After I finished my undergrad I moved to Seoul, South Korea to teach English for a year. Traveling to the other side of the world in the middle…
Navigating Off-Campus Housing in Boston
Posted June 7, 2022 by Elizabeth Poland
Moving out of Boston has been weighing heavy on my mind recently; I live with my boyfriend in Allston, a neighborhood of Boston, and we are both itching for a bit of freedom from the hustle and bustle. My boyfriend has lived in the city for a few years and grew up in a town nearby, while I on the other hand grew up and lived in various parts of Connecticut until December of 2021. Now that the Spring semester has ended, I’m realizing that I’ve actually been extremely homesick. Not necessarily for Connecticut (no one is homesick for Connecticut, I can vouch for that), but for my high school and college friends, parents, grass, space to move, the sun! Our 450 sq. ft. basement apartment that seemed very cozy in December is now suffocating us. Compounded with us both getting covid recently, we are very ready to look outside and see greenery instead of traffic. I should say, I do really love Boston. It is a beautiful, walkable city that has so many parks,…
Simmons Students Present at Boston College Conference
Posted May 2, 2022 by Johnna Purchase
Over the weekend, the Boston College History Department hosted their first annual graduate student conference entitled “Grad Student Voices.” The student leadership team possessed a simple yet bold vision – a conference for graduate students by graduate students. Especially as a student just finishing her first year of her M.A. in History, I found it refreshing to attend an history conference that uplifted graduate voices rather than relegating their voices – and the students themselves – to the corner. Since the dual degree Archives and History program here at Simmons pairs the M.A. in History as a complement to the M.S. in Archives Management, at times I have struggled to engage with my peers as fellow historians. The dominant attitude is that we are archivists first. And while I take my role as an archivist seriously because of the authority it invests in me in determining what records make it into the archives that future historians will rely on, sometimes I just want to dive deep into the theoretical frameworks and dizzying array of possible…
A Snowy Boston Day
Posted February 1, 2022 by Bryanne McArdle
Over the weekend, a huge blizzard hit the area and blanketed everything in snow. I’m a born New Englander, so this weather doesn’t faze me at all. I actually really love all kinds of storms, but especially snowstorms, since you can ski and snowshoe after. But there is always an issue when the snow falls, and if you aren’t used to snow, you may not realize it. Where to put all of it? Snow stays around, especially when it’s cold. And after the storm on Saturday, there’s was a lot of snow that’s wasn’t going anywhere. For me, I simply just strap on my boots, put on my warm jacket, and off I go. Sure, the commute into Boston took longer and the trains had some issues, especially since some plows accidentally took out a few of the crossing guards while cleaning up (oops). But I realized when I got to campus and chatting with fellow students, that my attitude of how normal this is, is not always the case. For the Simmons students who…
Wellness Week
Posted December 14, 2021 by Johnna Purchase
This past week LISSA – the student library organization here at SLIS – organized a week of activities to help promote wellness in the run-up to finals. Designed to facilitate relaxation, these bite-sized events were thirty minute moments every evening at 7:30 so that students could break seamlessly without needing the added stress of carving out an entire evening to practice wellness! On Monday, pet-owners and pet-lovers alike gathered to introduce their pets to their SLIS colleagues. Chris, a Ph.D. student studying accessibility in public libraries and LISSA Community Liaison, hosted the event with her two dogs Boomba and Lacey and foster dog Tripp. On Tuesday, students engaged in meditative journaling to reflect on the past semester, set goals for the semester to come, and remind themselves of their “why” for being in the SLIS graduate program. Rosie, LISSA President, provided prompts on dreamy powerpoint slides that participants could journal directly onto while the old at heart wrote out their intentions on paper. Wednesday evening turned physical as Johnna, LISSA VP of Events, helped participants…
Why I Enjoy Finals
Posted December 9, 2021 by Bryanne McArdle
I’m probably one of the few people who really enjoys when the end of a semester approaches and all our final projects and papers are due. I understand why others don’t share this sentiment; all of the deadlines are certainly stressful. But there’s something about that chaos that creates this comradery across the students. I noticed this at Simmons when my classes were online last year, but now that I am on campus, there is no denying it. There is something I personally enjoy walking through the hallways and seeing everyone studying, helping each other, offering seats to people who need them so you can go over those notes before the exam, to just letting people nap when they need it. There’s just something so, I would say magical, but really, it’s that sense of community everyone gets and encourages each other to push through it to make it through to the other side. And that’s what I really enjoy, this sense of community that everyone gets around this time. All of the students, regardless…
Ode to the SLIS Lounge
Posted November 12, 2021 by Bryanne McArdle
Opine for gossip The long knowing microwave beeps The sound that fills the space before a bite or sip ~~~ Discussions of theoretical leaps Of job postings that best fit our skills The latest weekly crisis crawls in, seeping ~~~ It all shows the academic hills that we climb everyday Trying to understand our own desires within what the world wills ~~~ But this is the point of spaces like this, the way for us to connect, whether physical or digital we find to connect and stay ~~~ It’s multifunctional And never illogical
Taking a Moment to Enjoy the Semester
Posted October 28, 2021 by Bryanne McArdle
It feels like only yesterday that the semester started, even though I know that’s not the case. I could get into the semantics of how short in reality a semester is, usually a mere 14 weeks, and how much shorter seven weeks are. But debating time and how long (or what it is really) doesn’t have much of a place on a Library and Information School blog. Unless we’re discussing the concepts of cataloging or creating dates for Metadata. This is the first semester that I have had an on-campus course, mainly due to the pandemic. Last year they were all online and mostly asynchronous, with the exception of one that had a synchronous lecture via Zoom. And while it was not how I originally intended to study for my MLIS, I wasn’t too bothered by it. I had always intended to take a mix of online and in-person courses as I wanted to continue working a day-job while working towards my degree, the pandemic just made me change the percentage I envisioned with more…