A Great Group Project
Posted April 23, 2020 by Amie Grosshans
I completed my group project for Metadata and honestly it was one of the most enlightening group projects that I’ve done. Each group was assigned a different metadata schema. This is usually how it goes for a group project, but what was different here was that the schemas were for unusual items like Tweets (Tweet Object Records), music (Music Encoding Initiative), cultural heritage objects (MIDAS Heritage), biological records (Darwin Core) and even math (MathML)! I watched all the presentations and learned a ton about how metadata is used. I did not know that you could create metadata for a math formula or that metadata for a simple Tweet contains huge amount of information, including the number of followers the person had at that time, the number of likes the tweet got, and how many times it was re-tweeted. It was so interesting to learn how each schema described its resources. My group was assigned PBCore, which is used to create metadata for audio and visual resources, like tv episodes or radio shows. I enjoyed…
Is This Real Life?
Posted April 23, 2020 by Maria Reilova
There is no denying that nothing is like it used to be, and that a lot of the future will not be like what we expected. School is different, work is different, socializing is different, everything is different. This past month, I have had a dramatic increase of “free time” with every aspect of life being moved digitally, not only my job and my classes, but even my yoga studio and grocery shopping. I am so lucky to be able to work remotely in my role on the Research Services team at Fidelity Investments and my classes have translated to online without much stress considering I was taking 2 out of 3 online anyway. Regardless of that, I can’t say that it has been an easy transition. I chose to return to Florida to be with my family since staying in Boston alone (all my roommates moved out to be with their own families) would have led to complete and utter insanity. Ironically enough, panic flying to Florida wasn’t really a solution to fix the…
Almost to the Finish Line!
Posted April 17, 2020 by Sarah Callanan
We are in Week 13 everyone! It’s the second-to-last week of the semester! We’re almost across the finish line! Usually at this point in the semester, I’m working on some sort of big final project to turn in at the end of the class, but oddly, this semester that’s not the case. I suppose you could call the Social Media Assignment my big project, as it was supposed to last until the end of the semester, but I actually met all the requirements for the project itself a while ago. Since my last post, I’ve completed my other two assignments, so all that stands between me and the end of the semester is some forum posts, readings, and lectures. This has been the strangest semester–and I didn’t even have to deal with too much disruption or transition as I was in an online class anyways. Even though the pandemic has been going on, and we’ve been surrounded by change, chaos, and uncertainty, LIS 453: Collection Development and Management has been one of my favorite classes…
Tips for Remote Work
Posted April 15, 2020 by William Crouch
Like everyone else, both my school work and class work has been severely disrupted by the ongoing pandemic. I just wanted to share a couple of tips that have been helping me work at home. The main one is pretty obvious but it’s incredibly important to set aside a place solely dedicated as a workstation in a place without distractions. For me, this is my living room that does not have a television or anything that could make me lose focus. Working on your bed has been studied to cause sleeping issues so even just getting up and working on the floor can help you prevent this. The next one is one that I have done in the two semesters I have been here already, create a calendar or list of due dates for assignments. This will help you keep in your mind when things are due and prevent accidentally missing a deadline. Finally, the most important one, is to make sure you’re practicing good care of yourself physically and mentally. We all know that…
Mentee-ing 101
Posted April 13, 2020 by Adaliz Cruz
Today I’m going to hype up my mentors. I can honestly say that without them, I wouldn’t have even considered librarianship, let alone finish my degree (in a few weeks). I have many mentors from different parts and times of my life; some are “official” mentors, some are people I look up to, and some are even self-appointed. I even started a newsletter because there were too many to keep up with! At one of my conferences, I found myself surrounded by a crowd of people introducing themselves to each other as “I’m her mentor”, “I’m also her mentor”, “Wait, I’m a mentor too”. I’m not going to lie, it was stressful! I can’t emphasize enough what the value of having a mentor is. This is a person that you look up to and who has your back and your best interest. They help guide you in your professional career and provide moral support when things don’t go the way you planned. They talk you up to their peers and give you a reassuring push…
It’s That Time Again
Posted April 9, 2020 by Amie Grosshans
Fall registration is this week. I always love registration time but this year I’m a little stressed out because the Fall semester is my last one at Simmons! I only have three classes remaining–one summer class and two fall classes–but I’m interested in a lot of classes. I’m trying to narrow it down and I am not succeeding. For the summer semester, I’m taking LIS 447, Collections Maintenance. It was supposed to be an intensive two week in-person class, but it, along with all the other summer courses, was moved online due to coronavirus. It’s going to be interesting to do it online because it’s traditionally a hands-on class where you work directly with the books. However, the professor emailed all of us who registered and said that she’s made some changes and is confident it will work online. I was considering taking LIS 484, Theories of Information Science, to get the Information Science and Technology concentration, but I’ve decided not to do that. I think I’ve taken a great mix of technology centered classes…
How-To Cope During COVID-19: Katie Style
Posted April 8, 2020 by Katie Carlson
Learn how to propagate plants from your favorite Student Snippets blogger: me! Host virtual coffee hours//dance parties with your friends. Gather mailing addresses for everyone you know. Doodle. Send said doodles to your friends (pineap-PALS) via mail with the Gwen Ifill stamps you’ve purchased from USPS. Suddenly become someone who enthusiastically participates in chain Facebook//Instagram challenges. Keep your nails looking IMMACULATE even though only your roommate will see them. Don’t forget to show your plants//pets//kids on Zoom meetings. We could all use the break! Make LOTS of buttermilk pancakes. Use chocolate chips. (This is essential.) Hate-watch Love Is Blind. Love-watch Full House. Host your own version of chopped with pantry items! Binge watch all of Tiger King. Videochat your parents about Tiger King theories. Play endless games of Yahtzee! (Mail your girlfriend some dice so she can play along!) Jazzercise. Do a chemical foot peel. Feel nothing but regret (and very soft skin). Break out the watercolors you bought for a costume design class in college. Force your roommate to craft with you! Take advantage…
Still in Boston
Posted April 6, 2020 by Peggy Hogan-Rao
It’s been over two weeks now since everything changed, starting with St. Patrick’s Day being cancelled. A lot of my friends went back home to their families during this hard time, but I am still in Boston. My parents keep asking when I will go visit them, but considering I am from Upstate NY, where there are a lot of cases, it is a bit scary to travel there. The hardest part is knowing that there are COVID-19 cases in my hometown in the Albany area. This is real, and so close to home now. I am not completely bored in Boston, as we are in the home stretch of the semester. When I get all of my work done for student teaching, I hope I can find a way to see my family. Today, I had a video call with my online technology class. It was my first time connecting with these classmates over Zoom – so nice to see their faces! The video call was a tutorial on how to prepare for doing…
Uncertain Times
Posted April 3, 2020 by Sarah Callanan
It’s now April and things are still….not great. When I wrote my last post in mid-March, while many people were working from home, I was still going in to work. However, by the end of that week, I was working from home, and since that post, all non-essential businesses have closed their physical spaces until May 4. Simmons had made the decision to transition to online learning when I wrote my last post, and that has been going on since March 23. That decision didn’t actually affect me too much as I was already in an online class. New changes are happening every day and I’ve basically not left my home since my last day “at work.” COVID-19 has really thrown this semester, and future planning, for a bit of a loop. I’m taking LIS 453: Collection Development this semester, and as I mentioned, it was already an online class, so I didn’t really have too much of a transition, but the virus has definitely messed with my sense of structure, time management, and overall…
Admitted Student Session
Posted March 31, 2020 by William Crouch
On Saturday, we had our first admitted student information session. With everything being remote now, the session had to be moved online through Zoom. It was actually a really interesting way of having the session work. Everybody, about 120 admitted students, started in an initial Zoom session that went over the basics of SLIS such as campus, professors, rankings, that was presented by our admissions team. Some faculty members from all the concentrations then introduced themselves to give students a sense of who their future faculty will be. After some questions that came from a chat function, everybody moved into various different Zoom breakout sessions based on their specific interests or concentrations. I was placed in the Archives and History session with Professor Kathy Wisser of SLIS, Professor Sarah Leonard of the History department, and alum Sarah Nafis, to answer questions that these students had about the program. One question that was asked was about the feasibility of working fulltime and taking classes full time. I was able to address that by detailing how Simmons…