Interested in cats, #critlib, cycling, and contemplating how we relate to the world around us.
During my last semester of library school, I always tried to keep the finish line in mind and my motivation going. I told myself that once I finished, I’d have all the free time in the world to finally watch Doctor Who and finally learn to cross-stitch. Turns out I […]
Greetings readers! Here at Hack Library School, we pride ourselves on providing engaging, thoughtful, and useful resources for Library and Information Science students. The best part of this experience, in my opinion, is the community the writers have with each other and our readers. Unfortunately, because we’re a blog by […]
Recently, library-land has been buzzing about the soft launch of EveryLibrary, a non-partisan , national organization dedicated to helping libraries at the ballot box. As we move towards election time, I’m sure we’re all reading about what measures and initiatives we’ll be voting for and against (because we’re all responsible […]
In this installment of Hack Library’s School’s Emerging Career Series, Caro Pinto explores the role of librarian as project manager. Caro Pinto is the Social Science & Emerging Technologies Librarian at Hampshire College where she oversees collection development, outreach, and instruction for the School of Critical Social Inquiry, works on […]
Joanna recently wrote on why you should attend conferences, Brianna wrote about presenting at them, and PC Sweeney wrote about how to be awesome at going to conferences, but what happens when you get there and you are starving for food you can actually eat? Vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, dairy-free, Paleo/Primal […]
Editor’s Note: We are happy to kick off our second annual Hack ALA week! We’ll be dedicating posts this week to all things conference-y and professional. As students, it’s important to get your feet wet in the LIS professional world early, and as often as your budget allows. While these […]
I am pleased to say that HackLibSchool will be holding two events at this years ALA Annual conference. Awhile back, I wrote about trying to bring HLS and the issues we care about to the conference level. Well, I’m happy to say that our Conversation Starter was accepted! To be […]
Who is ready for summer? Several of us are finishing up our schoolwork, dealing with stress, and ready for a quick breather. Here are a few summer reading recommendations from your dear HackLibSchool editors. We’ve broken the list down into Leisure and LIS reading. Please add your own recommendations in […]
Job hunting is a tricky beast to master. The process is emotionally draining at times, there are so many things to be excited/anxious about. For some of us who have just finished our last semester of school, this is the prime time to start looking. Most people advise that you […]
Guess what everyone? We are pleased to announce that we have our first Conversation Starter Proposal for ALA Annual this year! Conversation Starters are 45 minute, discussions focused on emerging topics and trends. Ours will be a facilitated conversation focused on issues surrounding the library school experience. We hope it […]
Librarianship is a profession that’s all about helping people, which means we need to be able to work with them. Even if you don’t work with patrons, you’ll still have to work with coworkers that run the gamut. Cat lovers(ahem), gamers, tattooed drinkers, the sweet old lady who doesn’t know […]
About a year ago, I started spying on the HackLibSchool project. Anonymously peeking at the original Google doc, figuring out how to use Twitter so I could see what the big deal was, reading other students blogs. I had no clue what I was doing online then, I was just […]
The job market is lurking in the minds of many of us who are about to finish up our degrees. It’s a tough market out there and getting a library job is not an easy feat. Fortunately, ALA has great webinars that help prepare job seekers for the library job […]
How many of you have had to do group work in graduate school? What’s that? All of you? Okay, I thought so. Like it or not, group work is integral to library science curriculum. When I first started, I wondered why I had to do do so much group work. […]
Many of us start out library school with a particular area of focus in mind. Mine was art libraries, and while I have explored other areas of librarianship, this one is still of interest to me. There are many ways to be an art librarian, so when people would ask, […]
Usually within the first few weeks of library school, you are asked what type of library you want to work in. If you’re like me, you might have had some vague idea of what you wanted to do before you started school. I had wanted to be an art librarian, […]
As a library school student or a recent graduate, it is all of our hopes that we’re not getting this degree in vain. The job market however, cannot support all of us and we have to wonder how to keep the balance. Many people point to the library school programs […]
Everyone’s getting ready to go back to school, including your fellow hackers! Part of the library school experience is keeping up with what’s going on in the library world. That way you can discuss the latest trends or scandals with your classmates and professors. We’ve compiled a few library related […]
We’re proud to present our next installment in the Declassified Series! In case you need a reminder, we take two schools, the same class and compare them to see how they’re similar or different. Our first post was written by Annie and Micah and covered Information Architecture. This time around […]
A little late on the jump here, but here is our wrap-up of the American Library Association’s annual conference. Of the HackLibSchool team, Annie, Micah and Lauren attended the conference. Believe it or not, this was actually the first time we all met face to face! Aside from conference business, […]
ALA is the largest library conference in the nation. It brings together different librarians from across the country, all in one place. It gives everyone the opportunity to meet new people and network. This is pretty fantastic if you think about it, but for a newbie student or librarian who […]
*Disclaimer: These are my personal opinions and are not representative of the student body. I started in Fall 2010 as a full-time, out-of-state student. All criticism is meant to be constructive. I go to the School of Library and Information Science at Indiana University-Indianapolis (a.k.a. IUPUI). It’s a nice campus […]
Self-assessment is a life long learning tool that helps guide us in identifying what our personal strengths and weaknesses are. Whether you are a working professional or a student, this is a valuable skill to have and to work on. Taking the time to reflect on what you’ve learned and […]
Welcome to the inaugural post of our Declassified series. This series will feature two writers laying out the basics of one class that is similar at two different schools. The point is to allow interested students to get a peek into the coursework that the MLIS offers, and also to serve as […]
For the second installment in this week’s TMI series, we caught up with our very own Julia Skinner to talk about why library school students should get involved in independent research. Julia has done her own independent research and has presented at conferences. Library history is one of her many […]
“Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be” -Walter Benjamin I work with digital collections and part of what I do at my job is digitize […]
First Post by Annie Pho, a new member of the HLS editorial team! Stuff about me: I’m in my second semester of SLIS at Indiana University-Indianapolis. I currently work on the digital library team at IUPUI (my university library). My interests are the digital preservation of culture, art librarianship and […]
HLS 