12.02.09
Selecting References
Recently I’ve had students emailing me for job searching advice, so I thought I’d post a bit about selecting references (for more on asking for references, see this post).
Whoever you select should be able to speak to your skills, knowledge and aptitude for professional librarianship. Although advertisements often request three references, job seekers often will have a pool of five or six people willing to serve as references and then use the three most appropriate names for a given application (or they will provide more than three names).
Potential References include:
- Professional Librarians – If you have library experience, whether paid or through an internship, practicum or other volunteer gig, it would be best to use your supervisor as a reference. If your supervisor is unable to provide a reference or you are concerned that he or she did not see enough of your work to write a good letter, you can ask a colleague. In fact, if you have any library experience, you may be able to find more than one reference from that experience (ideally people who can speak to different aspects of your work).
- LIS Faculty – As a new graduate without library experience, it would be appropriate (and expected) to use faculty from your MLS program as references.
- Non-LIS Faculty – If you have another graduate degree and it is both recent and relevant to the position, you could list that individual. For example, if you have a master’s in history, are applying for a tenure track position in a library, and plan to continue researching the history of libraries as part of your scholarly contributions to librarianship, it would be appropriate to list an advisor who oversaw your research in history.
- Other Employers – If you have work experience in another setting, you should consider listing a supervisor from that position. Supervisors, regardless of the nature of the work, should be able to speak to your interpersonal skills, initiative and creativity, etc., which will be of interest to a future employer. However, consider this carefully. If you worked for years in the publishing industry and are now earning an MLS and moving into librarianship, you would definitely want to list a former supervisor or colleague. If, on the other hand, you’ve been a full-time student and your last job was two years ago, working the checkout counter in a drugstore, listing a supervisor from that job may be less relevant (you’d probably be better served by listing another LIS faculty member who can speak to your grasp of professional issues).
When you provide a list of references, give the full name, title and contact information (mailing address, email, phone) for each person, as well as an indication of your relationship (phrases like, “Practicum Supervisor” or “Professor for 3 LIS courses, including Instruction in Libraries”).
09.27.09
Tips for Success in Distance Education
Last fall I had a group of new students struggling to adjust to the unique demands of online education. Since fall is here again and I have a lot of new students, I thought I’d post some basic tips for success.
The most important thing is to have self-discipline. Since you aren’t “going” to class every week, it may feel like nobody will know if you don’t keep up and it becomes very tempting to fall behind. But, if you fall behind, you hurt your own learning and cause yourself even more stress. You must have the discipline to keep yourself on track.
- Set a schedule for schoolwork and stick to it. Most students are balancing multiple responsibilities, including work, family and school. You need to be sure school doesn’t become your last priority and that you are realistic about setting aside the time needed to do well in your studies. In addition, setting a predictable schedule can help you manage the expectations of your family. For example, I try not to work on Saturdays, which is a day to rest, run errands and spend time with family. But, I do work much of Sunday, something my family knows to expect.
- Devote two or three big chunks of time every week for concentrated study – reading, working on assignments, etc.
- Put all your school-related due dates on your main calendar – you want all your important dates in one place. Having assignment due dates on your calendar will also keep you from making mistakes like volunteering to chaperone a school event the day before a big paper is due.
- I find it helpful to print syllabi and schedules and check things off as I get them done – it is an easy way to keep myself organized and not miss anything, plus I have a visible reminder of what I am accomplishing. A former student created a weekly “to do” list of readings and assignments, including an item for mandatory forum participation – this ensured she kept up with participation, since she had to check it off each week after she posted a contribution.
I invite those of you who are more seasoned distance education students to share your ideas as well. Just as someone helped you, this is your chance to help someone else!
ACRL’s Internet Resources
Students often ask me how I learn about the various websites I highlight in my courses. Like most librarians, I learn about sites from various sources – links from other blogs, recommendations from friends, and reviews in print media.
One source you can use for web reviews is Internet Resources, a monthly column in College & Research Libraries News. Each column focuses on a timely topic, such as healthcare reform, providing information on 15-20 relevant, good quality websites. The columns are also available (free!) on the ACRL website and can be browsed by topic or date. A wiki provides additional and updated resources.
Reading “Internet Resources” is a good method to build your own knowledge of what is available on the web. You can also browse past columns when you webliography of good sites on a particular topic to create a library guide or to prepare an instructional session.
09.12.09
Managing Forum Posts
Course discussions are an essential part of the learning experience. In distance education, these conversations may happen primarily or exclusively in the forums. This makes forum reading an important part of your coursework.
- Read forums at least every other day, if not daily. If you read forums frequently, they stay manageable (and you’ll have an ongoing feeling of being “connected” to your classmates).
- Figure out if there is a pattern to posts. In my classes, there’s usually a pattern of when people post the most (often near the end of the weekend, when they’ve been reading course materials and are ready to discuss them). This can let you know what to expect in terms of reading load on a given night, and can also be a great time for you to post and get a response.
- Prioritize forums like “news and announcements” where you would expect to see posts from the instructor. These are essential reading and instructors will assume you’ve seen them.
- Subscribe to important forums, such as “news and announcements” or one for your project team, to be sure you see any new messages.
- Look for ways to manage your reading, such as options to mark posts as read, flag important posts, etc.
09.02.09
Do You Love Dictionaries?
A student once posted “I love dictionaries!” in response to a sources assignment. (Yes, folks, that’s how great my assignments are – they lead unsuspecting students to infatuation with inanimate objects.) I’ve always remembered that quote because it captures the enthusiasm librarians have for even the simplest of reference tools, as well as the joy many of us had when we got to library school and realized we’d found a group of like-minded people who love reference books as much as we do (not to mention, we got college credit for studying the dictionary! how cool is that?).
One of my current students shared this link to a TED Talk about the future of the dictionary (thanks, Anne!).
Erin McKean Redefines the Dictionary
This is a thought provoking talk about the future of the dictionary and, by extension, all reference sources. Very interesting if you love reference books and the dictionary.
08.27.09
Broken Links in the Syllabus?
As the semester starts, I thought I’d offer some practical advice on locating a website when the link you have doesn’t work. Many faculty ask students to read articles or other items from websites. Although we may provide a working link on the syllabus, URLs do change and the link you have may not work by the time you need to read the material. So, what to do? Before you contact the faculty member for an updated link, try the following:
- Search the sponsoring organization’s website by the title of the document (e.g., if you need to read ALA’s “Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education,” you can go to the ALA website and search for the document).
- Use the link to work back to the sponsoring organization or author (e.g., Christine Bruce’s “Seven Faces of Information Literacy in Higher Education” was at http://sky.fit.qut.edu.au/~bruce/inflit/faces/faces1.htm; if I cut the URL back to her personal page at http://sky.fit.qut.edu.au/~bruce I see a link to the document, which is now at http://sky.fit.qut.edu.au/~bruce/il/faces.jsp).
- Search Google by the title of the document. Google may provide you an updated link. In addition, Google “caches” images of websites, so if a document has actually been removed from the web, you may be able to see an archived image.
Broken links in a syllabus can be frustrating, but are often beyond the instructor’s control. Use this as an opportunity to practice your web searching skills – after all, one day you want to get paid to do this at a reference desk, right?
08.10.09
Rethink Your Use of PowerPoint
The most recent issue of Reference & User Services Quarterly has an excellent article that is ostensibly about the use of PowerPoint, but is really about good presenting, and by extension, good teaching.
Brier, David J. and Vickery Kaye Lebbin. “Perception and Use of PowerPoint at Library Instruction Conferences.” Reference & User Services Quarterly 48.4 (Summer 2009): 352-61.
The first half of the article documents how librarians use PowerPoint at instruction-related conferences (the conclusion: probably not well). The second half of the article gives recommendations on how to use PowerPoint to create “colleague-centered presentations” – presentations that engage the audience and create a learning environment, rather than just a lecture. The authors’ ideas are applicable not only to professional conferences, but also to in-house and student presentations, as well as instructional settings. This article is really about much more than just PowerPoint and I hope it gets the attention it deserves, given the misleading title. Highly recommended!
08.07.09
Essential Technology Skills
A student post about the desire to learn more technology while in library school has gotten me thinking about how I foster technology skills in my own courses.
So, I’m throwing the following questions out for comment:
- Current students – what skills would you like to learn while in library school?
- Recent grads and experienced professionals – what skills do you think grads need to have? what skills could they develop to make themselves more competitive on the job market?
Thanks for your ideas!
Good Book – The Desk and Beyond
I’m usually not a fan of books that are a compilation of essays by different authors – often the essays are of uneven quality, are intended for different audiences (making me wonder who the intended audience of the book was) or are superficial “how I done it good” pieces.
Thus, The Desk and Beyond: Next Generation Reference Services(Sarah K. Steiner and M. Leslie Madden, eds., Chicago: ACRL, 2008) has been a very pleasant surprise. The book contains thirteen essays on different models of reference, such as embedded librarians, field librarians, and chat. Although most of these topics are well covered in the professional literature, the essays here provide succinct, well written overviews, practical advice for success, and sources for further reading.
Highly recommended for those interested in brief introductions to integrating current technologies into reference and models for service.
07.19.09
Visible Tweets
For those of you who teach, Visible Tweets is a fun site to post on your instructor screen while you are waiting for a class to start. The site allows you to enter a word (try something relevant to your instruction, like library or research) and it displays random tweets featuring your word. You can choose from three animation styles and the screen changes colors as the tweets change, giving you an instant, professional-looking visual display.
Warning: There is no filter on the content of the tweets, so you may see language inappropriate for younger audiences – this is not a site I recommend for use in school libraries.
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