A Day In The Life: Library School Student

Photo of Kiyomi a Japanese American Woman with light skin, long dark hair, side bangs, wearing a gold lock and dark brown Victorian style overcoat.

8:15 AM Log-on to computer. Check Twitter feed for any relevant library news or job postings, read those.

8:32 AM Move on the school E-mail, decide RSS feeds can wait till later. Most of my e-mail was ACRL: Residency Interest Group related, offered to hook up applicant with current resident to help review their material before submission.

8:48 AM Login to Blackboard and catch up on message board posts for 3 classes and Graduate Student community. Only light posting, not unexpected for the beginning of the week, decide to see if I can’t finish listening to and reading my Social Science Resources Lecture for the week (Drexel Weeks run Monday Sunday).

9:15 AM Not quite done with lecture, but will have to save the rest for later, time to go be a volunteer intern at RSABG.

9:45 AM Arrive at RSABG’s research library. Sign-in and catch-up, it’s my first day back after a 3 week break due to the start of classes coinciding with ALA MidWinter. Start researching the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation for a possible grant proposal and open access repository models.

10:30 AM Get handed a Japanese serial publication for original cataloging, plus 3 other Chinese titles. Look up Jim Breen’s WWWJDIC and start looking up characters by radicals. Realize how long it’s been since I’ve studied kanji. Eventually get all the publication data in Japanese input correctly in Connexion.

1:30 PM Take a lunch break. Finish Social Sciences Resources Readings and posting for the day.

2:30 PM? Back to cataloging the Japanese serial publication. Now that I have the correct characters it’s time to start putting the information in the correct fields.? As I start inputting the item description I realize that the book contains articles which are given in both Japanese and English, with some Latin descriptions, look up Latin language code, it’s LAT. Start checking fields for all necessary foreign language additions, measure size of book.

4:00 PM Decide to call it a day since it takes a while to work my way through the CONSER website to check my serials cataloging. Get gas and groceries on the way home.

5:30 PM Log-on to computer, check school e-mail and discussion boards while eating dinner.

6:05 PM Decide to start writing my 3-4 page Learning Context Paper for Information Literacy Instruction Class. It feels overwhelming, but I’ll just start and follow the directions and then it’ll stop being so intimidating.

6:45 PM? Finished a little over a page of my paper. Must stop for now, time to go be Assistant Director for the play Self Help.

10:52 PM Back from rehearsal, time to check the Drexel message boards and then work on that paper again.

11:39 PM A little over 2 pages are written, with a little light editing. Fading fast, time to call it a day after a quick look at my RSS Feed, mainly library related.

Catching Up

It has been a while since I posted and I’m skipping this month’s frugal living post in favor of two separate posts. This first post will let you know what I’ve been up to, and the second which I should finish writing by Monday will list my top picks for finding jobs in the library and information services world.

What have I been up to?

ACRL Residency Interest Group:
On October 1st, 2009 I became the Web Editor and List Administrator responsible for maintaining and facilitating the flow of information on the website and the group mailing list.

ARL Initiative To Recruit A Diverse Workforce: (Now called the Kaleidoscope Program)
October 15, 2009 I was privileged to receive an acceptance letter and became a 2009-2011 ARL Diversity Scholar.

California Library Association Annual Conference:
Although initially unsure of what to expect I greatly enjoyed my first conference in library land. While I did attend a few sessions, those seats are not made for people with short legs, I spent the majority of my time in the exhibit hall promoting the creation of, and application to, library residency programs. I was very excited to learn more about California’s preservation programs, OCLC’s ContentDM, and Mango Languages. I recommend checking all of these out.? Apologies to those who I missed in passing, hopefully I’ll catch up with some of you at MidWinter.

Drexel University:
As I continue in week seven of our quarter I am excited to be past the half way mark and accelerating toward completion of my degree in June. As I finish with my required courses the main problem is choosing between all of the marvelous special topics for my four electives. Next quarter I will be taking my first two electives Resources in Social Science and Instructional Role Information Specialist. 15 classes may seem like a lot but with the variety of offerings at Drexel I could almost do a second MSLIS degree, if I took everything that interests me.

Me:
For myself, I am grateful we are finally back on standard time. I’m busy with my volunteer internship at Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden’s research library, the end of the quarter, and the beginnings of holiday scheduling. Additionally, I am working on an application for a library residency program, special thanks to Megan Perez for his editorial help!

They say that life is what you make of it, and right now life is great!