Survival Tips for LIS Distance Learners and their Group Projects

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Sarah Brown.

As an LIS graduate student at the University of South Florida, I have had group projects for at least one of my courses each semester. At first, I feared the idea of group work because we were all distance learners. How 20th century, right?

I think of distance group work as important training for my future as a librarian. I imagine that much of my work will entail communicating with others via the Internet to retrieve information, share access to information, and archive in some capacity. Obviously, not being face to face can pose challenges, so learning to navigate the technology and maintain effective communication is a large part of modern librarianship.

Whether you were assigned your group or you were able to choose your members, here are some tips and personal advice to guide you through to the presentation and/or final paper.

Lessons Learned Halfway Through Library School

As of right now, I am officially halfway finished with my Master of Library Science and Master of Information Science. I am finally beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Professional librarianship! Benefits! A means to pay back my student loans! It is gratifying to recognize that the work I have been putting in for the past year and a half is building to something. Today I wanted to share some tips with you in the hopes that they will help guide you through your own library school experience.

Hack Library School/Hiring Librarians Career Center Interview Series

At Hack Library School, one of the most exciting things we get to do is collaborate with other individuals and groups within the library community. We are lucky to be starting off 2013 with some great collaborations, the first of which is with Hiring Librarians creator Emily Weak. We partnered with Emily to develop an interview series focusing on the career services offered by LIS programs across the US. The series debuted last week on Hiring Librarians with an interview with the Indiana University-Bloomington School of Library and Information Science; the second post about the University of Tennessee School of Information Sciences went live today. While some of the interviews will be completed by the Hack Library School writers, the majority are completed by representatives of the LIS program in question.  We wanted to give the programs a chance to discuss their services and philosophies in their own words, and often what they have to say and how they say it is quite telling.

Our hope is that these interviews will:

1. Provide more information for current students (and alumni) about how they can best take advantage of their school’s career resources.
2. Help people who are thinking about going to library school focus on their post-graduation employability, and how their choice of school might affect that
3. Encourage library schools to provide high-quality career resources for graduates and alumni. Allow schools to share information about their strategies for providing career guidance.
4. Engage library students in career-focused dialogue with their schools.

These interviews will be posted each Tuesday on Hiring Librarians, so make sure you visit frequently!

Informational Interviews for LIS Students

Last week I found myself suddenly teary-eyed during a meeting with a librarian. No, I wasn’t sad or upset. The librarian’s obvious love for his work had just inspired and moved me so much that I couldn’t keep my eyes from filling.

I’m only a little bit embarrassed to admit that this wasn’t the first time I got a little misty about librarianship. There are few things I find more inspiring than talking to people who love what they do, and that goes for librarians especially. Accordingly, incorporating informational interviews into my supply of professional development tools was one the best things I did during my first semester in library school (shout out to Zack Frazier and his tips for the first semester). Talking to librarians about their career paths and current positions has given me opportunities to learn about specific library settings, the skills involved in certain positions, and the challenges and joys of librarianship as a profession. I have also expanded my professional network, gained confidence in my interviewing skills, and boosted my enthusiasm for the future.

via flickrCC

The web has lots of resources about informational interviewing. This tutorial from Quintcareers.com and this article from About.com offer guidelines for preparation, active listening, and follow up. Instead of rehashing all of the information found on these and many other sites, I’d like to offer my thoughts on two aspects of informational interviewing that I see as most challenging: working up the courage to ask for an informational interview and figuring out how informational interviews can play a part in job hunting.

[Series] So What Do You Do? My Practicum Experience at a Small Academic Archive

This post is part of a new series called “So What Do You Do?” in which LIS students talk about their experiences as interns. We want to showcase the wide range of things people are doing in the world of library and information science.

Tell us a bit about yourself.

My name is Nicole Helregel and I’m in my second year of the MLIS program at the University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign. My undergraduate degree is in American History, from Beloit College (in Wisconsin!). I’m currently a graduate assistant at an academic library, where I mostly work the reference desk, create exhibits, and update web content. On a more personal note, I’ve recently come to the conclusion that delicious soups are good for the soul and perhaps the best way to combat the winter blues.

So what do you do?

This past semester I spent over 100 hours working at the Illinois History and Lincoln Collections (one part of the larger University of Illinois Library system) as part of a practicum experience. Because I’m a townie, I was able to start my practicum during the summer (even though I was technically registered for it in the fall semester) and worked, on average, about six hours a week from August through December. It’s a small unit, with two full time employees and no graduate or student assistants; thus, they were very grateful and receptive when I approached them about a practicum.