The Agony and Ecstasy of Group Work
Posted February 23, 2014 by Gemma Doyle
One of the main differences between undergrad and graduate school that I would probably have appreciated knowing about ahead of time was how different the workload tended to be. Instead of lots of small assignments, you usually only get 3 or 4 big projects per class per semester. I hate to tell you this, but most of them involve group work. I have to admit that I didn’t know that going in. For some people it doesn’t seem like a big deal – group work? So what? For others, though, myself included, knowing that my entire academic life at Simmons was going to depend on groups of peers working together was enough to make my heart sink. The first time I heard about the approaching group work storm, I was sitting at a table with five or six other new GSLIS students at the Orientation Day last spring, and we were shooting questions about GSLIS classes and professors at someone who was about to graduate. I swear that when he mentioned group work, every single…
There’s Nothing Part-Time About My Schedule
Posted February 21, 2014 by Emily Boyd
As of this semester I’m officially a part-time student, doesn’t that sound nice? It implies that I have tons of extra time when I’m not doing schoolwork. The same applies when I mention my part-time job, sounds like I’ve got all the free time in the world. The picture quickly changes when I start doing the math: one part-time job of about 25 hours a week and another of 10 or more hours and I’m quickly at 35 hours! Add in two classes, one in person and one online, a weekly commute to Boston and all these part-times are suddenly adding up. You thought being a full-time student was hard? Try being a part-time student. At first this seems like an oxymoron, how would taking fewer classes be more demanding? I’d never thought about this until I became one of the part-timers, and six weeks in I’m finding it incredibly challenging. It’s no wonder, just look at my schedule! When you’re a full-time student, school is your primary focus, this is no longer the case…
A Feast of “Air and Stories”
Posted February 20, 2014 by Alec Chunn
Because of Maggie’s previous post, I decided to take a chance and go to massmouth‘s Storytelling Festival last Saturday at the Boston Public Library. Well, maybe “chance” is the wrong word. I have long been a fan of the “idea” of storytelling. I decided to fulfill a dream, perhaps? Since I was a child, I have always feasted on stories. I know that I am not alone in this–certainly not in a program like ours. When many of us think of stories, though, we often think of books. Certainly I do. Yet, the raconteurs of my childhood were my father and my grandfather, who delighted in inventing tales that thrilled and terrified. It wasn’t until I grew older and learned to read on my own that my stories transformed into printed words narrated by a voice in my head (he’s quite good but, unfortunately, you’ll never get to hear him). Now I’m trying audiobooks. But nothing quite replaces the physical presence of a storyteller. Results of a survey released in September of 2013 revealed that…
A Valentine for my Macbook
Posted February 18, 2014 by Carolyn Lucas
Roses are redViolets are blueMy dear MacbookI love you. For a long time, I was a pen-and-paper kinda gal. If you read my most recent post about office supply rehab, this should come as no surprise to you. However, in the last few years of college and all of graduate school I have found myself starting to take more and more notes on the computer. This can be attributed to the fact that I was an art history major taking a Japanese art class, and my mutilated spellings of “Hiroshige” along with descriptive phrases like “View of Mt Fuji with Plants and bridge No. 2” led me to need to insert the actual piece of art itself, and since then I realized how much more easy it is for me to take notes on a computer. It hasn’t stopped there. I have started buying and reading my textbooks on my iPad, which is an absolutely amazing resource when it comes to not having to lug textbooks on the train if I want to refer to…
Weekend at the Boston Public Library
Posted February 17, 2014 by Jill Silverberg
Sitting right outside of the Copley T stop are two connected buildings that couldn’t appear to be more different. The first building is old and scholarly, the type of historic landmark that is almost begging to have its picture taken. Its classic charm makes one feel as if they are about to enter some sort of sacred place, an historic institution where knowledge is both value and shared. The second building seems to lack the romantic charm of its brother although that does not seem to hamper its popularity amongst the general public. Everyday, a wide range of people pass through this modern building’s rotating door, each looking for something different amongst the building’s vast collection and other offerings. Although both buildings might appear to be aesthetically different, they are actually one in the same. Together, these two buildings make up the Boston Public Library. Over this past weekend, I had the pleasure to visit the BPL not once, but TWICE! Starting with Saturday, I took a friend who’s lived in the city for the…
Crowdsourcing the MFA’s New Exhibit
Posted February 16, 2014 by Gemma Doyle
On Friday, the Museum of Fine Arts opened its first crowdsourced exhibit after letting the public vote on what works should be included in the “Boston Loves Impressionism” show. Over 10,000 people voted in three rounds, showing that Bostonians are pretty passionate about their art. Simmons is only a few blocks from the MFA, and one of the great perks of being a student is that we get free admission to a lot of the local museums with our student ID, so I usually end up visiting the MFA at least five or six times a semester. I’ve been paying particularly close attention to news about this exhibit lately, because I think this is a great use of the idea and technology of crowdsourcing. Instead of letting curators have all the power to create the shows they think people want to come to the museum to see, why not let people tell curators exactly what they actually want to see? One of the big topics of discussion at Simmons, one that has come up…
Ladies and Gentlemen – Nicole Cunha!
Posted February 15, 2014 by Maggie Davidov
Every semester I interview someone so fantastically excellent from the GSLIS program so I can share him or her with the Student Snippets fan base. This semester I have chosen a friend and colleague of mine from Beatley Library at Simmons. Nicole Cunha, a graduate of Simmons College, has been working in the library since her junior year. She is now a dual degree major in Children’s Literature and Library Science at GSLIS. She is a constant inspiration to me. She works in almost every department at Beatley and when she’s not working, she’s here working on all of her homework. She is a rockstar. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Nicole Cunha. 1) What made you choose the GSLIS program and what is your focus while here at Simmons? How did you get here? Long story short, my hometown/elementary school librarian told me about Simmons when I was younger; or she at least tried to get me interested in it. If I remember correctly, she had mentioned Simmons to my mum because she recognized…
Write. Edit. Repeat.
Posted February 14, 2014 by Emily Boyd
I started writing this blog just over a year ago, right as I started at GSLIS. When I had been a prospective student I enjoyed reading the posts of current students and was happy to be able to contribute experiences when I became a student. Lately I’ve been happier than ever that I got involved outside of classes in the form of this blog because my job is requiring a lot of writing. When I first started writing blog posts that would be posted at the end of the week I would write an outline one day, a first draft the next day and edit a third day before finally submitting. I promise I’m not a perfectionist, very far from it, but writing has always taken me a long time, and in order to prevent typos I need to look at it more than once. While this may sound excessive, I’m ultimately glad I spent so much time editing and reworking my writing last spring while I had more time to devote to it. Not…
Construction Paper Revelations
Posted February 13, 2014 by Alec Chunn
Before the first day of The Picturebook, Professor Megan Lambert sent us an email requesting that we bring the following items to class: a stack of construction paper, a pair of scissors, and a glue stick. If you’re anything like me, these magical three are the things you bring to craft nights because you can’t sew or embroider or knit or [insert equally awesome skill here]. They’re the essentials. They’re the things that make you feel like an artist even when people say you aren’t. Therefore, you can imagine my delight when I realized that the activity planned for class was nothing other than starting the project that would be creating our very own picturebooks. In grad school. Awesome, right? When I found out, I told everyone. As I rejoiced and Instagramed my process over the next few weeks, I realized that the people I was telling were making certain assumptions about the level of difficulty of my program. I can imagine why they would. Picturebooks, normally 32 pages, tend to have simple text and…
Papercut Zine Library
Posted February 9, 2014 by Gemma Doyle
The Papercut Zine Library takes up the back corner of Lorem Ipsum Books in Inman Square, Cambridge. Zines have been around since the rise of punk subculture in the ’70s, and continue to thrive as small handwritten or typed booklets today. There are zines on every topic imaginable, and thousands of new ones produced every year. I’ve always loved the personal stories found in most zines, and the time and energy put into making them tends to mean more to me than simply reading a blog entry on the same subject. The Papercut Zine Library is home to more than 15,000 zines, with new arrivals constantly being added to the collection. A year’s membership costs just $12, and unlimited zines are lent out for 4 weeks. Better yet, at least for me, they are always looking for volunteers to help out with cataloging the zines and running the zine library, and that was what really interested me. I still haven’t taken a cataloging class, but what better way to navigate the tricky cataloging rules than…