Site Visit
Posted July 1, 2013 by lazylibrarian
I went on my first site visit on Friday. A site visit is a visit to a prospective archives donor to see the size/condition/subject matter of a collection to see if it’s appropriate for the archives before accepting the responsibility to move the entire collection. This visit was half site visit, half social call since the Cambridge History Room had already accepted the collection from this donor and we were only going down to pick up two more boxes she had found. We were to meet the donor at her house in Marshfield, about a 2 hour ride from Cambridge. Once we got off the highway into the little cape towns, it was gorgeous! All those trees! Boston is a lot greener than some cities I’ve been in but you forget the amount of foliage that lies undisturbed right beyond its borders. We saw old farm houses, little town markets, and even a few horses. Our directions, written by the donor (who is an author), told us to take such and such a road “winding…
GSLIS Goes to Rome!
Posted June 28, 2013 by Emily Boyd
Ciao! I’ve been absent from blogging for the last few weeks because I have been on a whirlwind tour of Europe. My travels took me to Rome and the surrounding countryside; including day trips to Florence, the Mediterranean Sea, and a day of wine tasting in Orvieto. After the course ended, I extended my visit further east to Slovakia, Austria, and Hungary. I’ve returned to the states inspired, overwhelmed, and reassured once again about how much I love GSLIS. This was the first time Simmons has taken GSLIS students to Rome and while the trip was not without its glitches, overall the experience was wonderful. We stayed in a beautiful neighborhood full of cafes, wine bars, and restaurants and had easy access to all of Rome’s historic sites. Highlights of the trip included our day trips outside of the city, a fabulous tour of the colosseum, and eating my way through the city of Rome. Lest I forget, I should also mention that we were in Rome to take a class. My Intellectual Freedom and…
Drawn to Being Withdrawn
Posted June 24, 2013 by Sarah Barton
I have recently done an unusual amount of reading about solitude while also living a more solitary life than usual – I do not have classes, work less than thirty hours per week, and my significant other is interning in Washington, DC this summer. I am an introvert by nature, so this temporary low-key lifestyle is right up my alley. Any doubts about my chronic introversion were nullified by Susan Cain’s Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. I also read The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Peale (as a counterbalance to The Positive Power of Negative Thinking by Julie Norem, which confirmed that I am quite the defensive pessimist, but that is a whole different story) and this speech by William Deresciwicz, both of which touch upon the importance of solitude and reflection in developing one’s thoughts and cultivating one’s best self. Over the past two weeks I have spent a bulk of my free time reading and writing instead of watching TV and socializing, and it has…
Busy, busy, busy!
Posted June 20, 2013 by lazylibrarian
You’d think summer would be less stressful….but no. I’m running around like a chicken with its head cut off. New job, new internship, new apartment, new bank account, even a new boyfriend. Breathe in, breathe out. But my internship is so much fun! I’m in the midst of planning two exhibits, both based on the same collection. Today, I worked on the second one which is going to trace how a children’s book is published since we have all the steps represented in the collection. Notes, contracts, illustrations, mock-ups, royalty checks! So cool! But I also got to see some other sides of the archives today. Wednesday is our “late” day. The archive is open from 5-9 instead of the regular earlier time frame so that people who work full-time can have a chance to stop by. That makes it a little more busy than usual. Today we had three patrons in the room at the same time! That might not sound too amazing, but the manuscript portion of the collection is very small since…
Alternate Reality and Library School
Posted June 17, 2013 by Julie Steenson
When I started my summer classes, I walked into an alternate reality – literally. I have never been a gamer, but this summer, I am joining my colleagues in LIS 404 Management, LIS 407 Reference, and LIS 450 Management in Public Libraries in an online alternate reality game to Save Kingston, a fictitious town in central Massachusetts that suffers from time and space issues; It appears and disappears due to the instability of its Library & Information Science (LIS) industry. A team of talented Simmons GSLIS consultants have been tasked with saving Kingston, by providing their services to the many LIS organizations in this town – Kingston has public libraries, a school library, high school library, corporate library, hospital library, law library, an archive, an art museum, and of course (my personal favorite), a correctional facility library. This is, by far, the most creatively designed and empowering class I have encountered anywhere. Our leader in this endeavor is our very own Dr. Mary Wilkins Jordan, who explained her motivation to create this alternate world for…
Privy to Privacy
Posted June 13, 2013 by Sarah Barton
I haven’t heard much, if any, nitty-gritty library lingo since classes ended in April. In my GSLIS experience, it seems that most of the jargon-y, theoretical stuff happens in the classroom while the more practical, practice-oriented application occurs in outside jobs, internships, or volunteer activities. Anyway, a big news story caught my attention last week not only because of its national ramifications, but also its parallels to things I have learned at GSLIS – right down to the jargon. Throughout the day last Thursday I followed an article on the New York Times website called “U.S is Secretly Collecting Records of Verizon Calls.” I will spare you the details of the article (its title alone provides a succinct synopsis), but the main thing that stood out to me about this news story was the amount of library lingo being thrown around. A senior Obama administration official was quoted as saying that the government was only collecting the metadata about, not the content of, the phone calls. It is one thing to… Wait, hold on a…
Just a Liberian
Posted June 11, 2013 by Maggie Davidov
I talk about the school library I work for far too much. I think this is mostly because I love my job and its challenges. My students’ unreturned laptops haunt my dreams and their evaluations of my teaching darken my doorstep, though I have no doorstep to speak of in a 4th floor apartment. When asked what they would most like to change about their information literacy class, my 9th graders deemed the professor, me, to be the element that needed changing the most. “You need to just chill. You have to remember you’re not a real teacher, you’re just a liberian.” For further clarification, I am not a citizen of Liberia. Nope, that was just a real punk of a student trying to set my teeth on edge. Just a librarian?! Not even a librarian, a LIBERIAN! It is at this moment that I am choosing to see the up-side of the upcoming summer vacation. My students’ resentment of bibliographic instruction and citation styles is reaching maximum capacity. I am losing my patience. Teachers…
Designing the Ultimate Exhibit
Posted June 7, 2013 by lazylibrarian
It’s the age old question….how do you design an exhibit on a budget that appeals to both adults and children while educating them about a subject? Well I’m having my first go at answering it. At my current internship at the Cambridge History Room in the Cambridge Public Library, I am taking the materials and knowledge I have gathered from my processing of the John Langstaff collection and trying to turn it into something that will interest and engage the public. The biggest issue is that most of Langstaff’s collection is paperwork (largely unreadable paperwork I might add) and his greatest contribution to the area is in theater and music, both things that are difficult to showcase in the middle of a library on a budget. But considering that I did a conference presentation on integrating archives in museums via technology, I am not ready to give up yet. I have been able to create QR codes to link to some wonderful video clips of Langstaff and his performances. However, not everyone has a smart…
The Friends of the Library Book Sale
Posted June 4, 2013 by Julie Steenson
The majority of my weekend was occupied by the Friends of the Library Book Sale at the library where I work. Most people don’t give much thought to library sponsored book sales, other than, “Do I have books to donate?” and “Oh, such great deals to fill (and overfill) my book shelves!” Like many other public library Friends’ groups, our library’s Friends raise money for all kinds of programming expenses and museum passes, and we rely heavily on their continued support and generosity, especially in these lean fiscal times. The most vital piece of the Book Sale that I had, until recently, overlooked was how much this was a community event and what community really means for public libraries. Here are all the pieces of COMMUNITY that came together to make our Book Sale a great success: Donors – So many members of our community cleaned out their homes and donated great books and movies. Town support – The Firefighters and the Community Church shared their tables with us so we had a great organized…
Does Your Job Feed Your Soul?
Posted May 31, 2013 by Maggie Davidov
It is often the topic of many GSLIS classes whether we know it or not, this question of feeding the soul. However, it is frequently discussed because vacancies do not often arise in libraries. Why is that? Why don’t librarians retire? They must have dreams of seeing those places from the books on their shelves. They must long for the hot sticky air outside the airconditioned hum of the library…well, maybe not. STILL, it’s brought up time and again. Any professor worth their salt will discuss life outside of grad school and the job market. They will discuss this, and as a result, come to the conclusion that librarians are generally happy in their jobs, hence the lack of job opportunities. A healthy library will not yield a great many vacancies. And when I say a healthy library, I mean a library that is well-managed and where people feel that their work is valued. I only bring this up because quite a few job listings have popped up on the GSLIS_info list-serv. And if you’re…