Illinois State University
ISU ReD: Research and eData
Faculty and Sta6 Publications – Milner Library Milner Library
2013
Surviving SLIS: A Guide to Geing rough
Library and Information Studies Graduate School
Eric Willey
Illinois State University, emwille@ilstu.edu
Follow this and additional works at: h8ps://ir.library.illinoisstate.edu/fpml
Part of the Library and Information Science Commons
7is Editorial is brought to you for free and open access by the Milner Library at ISU ReD: Research and eData. It has been accepted for inclusion in
Faculty and Sta6 Publications – Milner Library by an authorized administrator of ISU ReD: Research and eData. For more information, please contact
Recommended Citation
Willey, Eric, "Surviving SLIS: A Guide to Ge8ing 7rough Library and Information Studies Graduate School" (2013). Faculty and
Sta Publications – Milner Library. 59.
h8ps://ir.library.illinoisstate.edu/fpml/59
SURVIVING SLIS
A guide to getting through library
and information studies graduate school
by Eric Willey
Table of Contents
Introduction.............................................................. 5
What Is Library Graduate School?...........................6
How Much Work Is Library Graduate School?......10
Should I Go To Library Grad School?....................12
How to Fail Library Graduate School and Still Get a
Diploma.................................................................. 15
Does Where I Go to Library Graduate School
Matter?....................................................................16
Getting in to Library Graduate School...................20
The Letter of Intent, Admissions Essay, Statement of
Purpose, etc.............................................................23
What If I Still Don’t Get In?...................................32
When Will I Hear Back?.........................................35
Hardware and Software.......................................... 38
Paying For it All.....................................................40
Applying for Scholarships......................................44
What If You Don’t Get the Award?........................47
Picking Classes.......................................................50
So Which Professors Should I Take?......................52
Online Courses in Library Graduate School..........54
Writing Papers........................................................ 56
Handing in Papers...................................................62
Group Projects........................................................ 64
Freaking Out...........................................................66
Really Screwing Something Up.............................68
INCOMPLETES BAD! TREE PRETTY!.............70
How to Meet Deadlines.......................................... 72
How Much Should I Worry About Grades?...........73
Student Organizations.............................................75
Getting Published...................................................77
Self-Publicizing...................................................... 83
Conferences............................................................ 85
Social Media...........................................................87
How Do You Get Ideas for Projects?......................90
Project Tips............................................................. 93
E-Portfolios.............................................................95
Making the Job Search Less Stressful....................98
Unusual Job Hunt Circumstances.........................103
What to do After Graduation but Before you have a
Job.........................................................................106
Volunteer vs. Work Experience............................109
Miscellaneous....................................................... 111
Wrap-up................................................................ 113
Introduction
This is a blog about getting into, getting through, and
getting what you can out of library graduate school. Most
of it is drawn from my experience in a library and
information studies graduate program, some of it from a
history graduate program, and the rest from conversations
with fellow students, colleagues, and instructors.
First of all, a word of caution: Some of this won’t
generalize to other schools, programs, Ph.D. programs, or
even your individual situation. It’s all different, and even
if you’re in the same program I was things will change
over time, and be different for you.
With those limitations in mind, let me tell you what I am
going to discuss.
What graduate school is, because if you do it well it isn’t
just more undergrad. Advice about getting into graduate
school, from increasing your chances of getting in the
conventional way to some less obvious methods.
Surviving your classes. Dealing with professors. Applying
for grants and scholarships, and stacking the odds of
getting them in your favor as much as possible. Writing
papers, turning them into articles, and getting them
published. Choosing student groups to join. Choosing
classes. Writing papers and other assignments. Outside
projects. And hopefully, getting a job at the end of it all.
I mostly hope that you’ll have some idea of what’s in store
for you in library grad school, and some ideas to make a
plan of your own. No guarantees on any of this advice,
this is just one guy making suggestions on one day.
Also, I’m pragmatic about this stuff. Some people, myself
included, would even say cynical at times. But from one
perspective graduate schools are bureaucracies, and the
better you are at understanding how those bureaucracies
function the better you will be at understanding what they
can do for you. I think I’ve had some pretty good success
at doing that, and I’m hoping you’ll have a better
understanding of how grad school works after reading this
as well. So take what you’re comfortable with, leave the
rest, and do something amazing.
It’s probably not as hard as you think.
So what is library graduate school anyway?
What Is Library Graduate School?
It’s not just two more years of undergrad, and you can’t go
into it thinking that way. What you’re going to do in grad
school is learn how to take the skills you acquired while
getting your bachelor’s degree and do them quickly,
particularly location, analysis, and presentation of
information.
Let me elaborate. In the course of getting your bachelor’s
degree (no matter what your major was), you should have
acquired three basic skills: finding or locating
information, compiling and analyzing information, and
reporting your findings back to an audience. Sure, you
memorized some dates and facts, some math formulas, but
the real training was in finding, analyzing, and reporting.
You learned how to learn.
Even for STEM majors, part of what you learned was how
to learn because some of the factual information you
memorized will be obsolete at some point.
That’s really what all those papers were about. No one
cared about your opinion of what the river symbolized in
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Professors have
read hundreds if not thousands of those papers, and you’re
probably not going to say anything they haven’t already
heard unless it’s really dumb. When you wrote that paper
you were actually being taught to find sources, extract
relevant information from them and analyze it, and then
use that information to answer a specific question for your
audience.
In graduate school you learn to do that quickly. You read
more, write more and longer papers, and report your
findings. Hopefully your program has you doing this to a
live audience at least a few times, so you get comfortable
speaking in public.
You do this because, as someone with an advanced
degree, you are more likely to have a job where you are
solving problems. If you have a high school or bachelor’s
degree, you are much more likely to have a job where you
report a problem to a supervisor. With an advanced
degree, people notice a problem and report it to you.
Ideally anyway, plenty of people are under-employed.
It is then your responsibility to either have a solution, or
find information on the problem, analyze it, and report it
back in the form of a solution. Either to the people you are
supervising or the people who supervise you, depending
on the problem and your job. Sound familiar?
So what does this mean in practical terms?
Well, you’re going to take fewer classes in terms of credit
hours, read a lot more for those classes, and write longer
papers. You’re still not doing original ground breaking
research (for one thing you probably don’t have the time),
but you could be adding to the established literature in the
field. If you’re determined and good enough, this results
in a thesis or maybe a published article by the time you
graduate.
You’re going to be expected to talk in class. To have
insights and questions. When you talked in your
undergraduate classes (hopefully you did talk in those
classes) it was probably a little more factual. It probably
took the form of asking or answering a question about the
material. There’s not a lot of discussion about when the
Battle of Hastings was, because it’s a date. English and
philosophy classes might have been a little more free
wheeling, but you’re still probably discussing the texts in
question, answering largely factual queries without much
in the way of gray area.
The point of this memorization was to give you enough
factual context to understand what authors are talking
about in upper level and graduate level classes. It’s hard to
discuss an author’s arguments about the Civil War without
knowing some factual things about that period of history.
So you memorized a lot of facts.
By the time you’re sitting in a graduate class, you’ve
moved beyond that. You read more specialized literature
that interprets those facts, and discuss what they mean.
This means you need to have done the assigned readings
and be able to discuss them in relation to each other, other
courses, and the larger context of your discipline. Have
some semi-original insights or questions of the “But how
does this interact with that?” variety. You don’t need thirty
questions for each text, but try to jot down one or two as
you go. Why a certain author’s ideas won’t work in some
other context, how you could make them work, or what
that says about their argument.
You do this because you need to be able to analyze
information (and most professors kind of love it when
people add to the class discussion with their own insights
and questions). That’s really the point of getting an MA.
You’re past the point of gathering facts, and you’re doing
a lot of analysis and refining of other people’s arguments.
If you really want to create brand new stuff to add to the
field, you go on to get a Ph.D. For now, you’re pretty
much tinkering with other people’s work, adding little
what-ifs and yeah-buts.
If you’re coming to an MA program right after your
bachelor’s degree, this will probably be the hardest thing
you’ve done so far. That doesn’t mean it’s actually hard. If
you spend the time, you’ll probably get through it. Ask
most people who have done a previous graduate degree
and they probably won’t describe a library degree as
rigorous. Some people go so far as to describe the MA in
library science as an "MA-lite." I did an MA in History
previously, and while I would by no means call that
program “the meat grinder” it was more difficult than the
MA in Library Studies.
Working a full time job, raising kids, and especially doing
both are probably harder than library school. The main
difference is in graduate school no one’s going to hold
your hand or bug you to get stuff done, so you need to
find the time and make it a priority to get things done
yourself.
So that’s what graduate school is. You read a lot. You talk
some. You write a lot. But how much is a lot?
How Much Work Is Library Graduate
School?
This is going to vary widely. Really widely. Depending on
your program, course load, professors, how efficient you
are, and how much work you put into it.
So consider these very rough guidelines...
You’ll probably read around 50–100 pages of material per
credit hour per week. So for a 3 credit course you’re
looking at 150–300 pages a week. This goes up and down
(especially in library school) depending on the course and
instructor. If you’re taking a database design class, you
might only read 30 pages a week, but you spend a lot of
time putting together a database for class. If you’re taking
a course about something that is very abstract, like ethics,
you’ll probably be reading closer to the 300 page end of
things, or even more.
The difference is, you don’t have to memorize the whole
thing. This isn’t the factual memorization we talked about
last chapter, where you had to do a close reading of each
paragraph. For MA level reading you usually just need to
know an author’s thesis, what evidence they use to
support that thesis, and their conclusion.
So basically what you do is read the introduction, read the
conclusion, and skim the body (in that order). For
skimming I usually read the first and last sentence of a
paragraph and skim the rest, but figure out what works
best for you. The good news is you get faster at skimming
with practice. By the time you’re done with your degree
you should (ideally) be able to get through a decent length
book of around 300 pages in an evening. Take some notes
while you’re doing it, jot down any questions or thoughts
you have, and be ready to contribute to class.
As for how much you need to talk, that depends on the
class, professor, and grading scheme. I like to try to say
something at the beginning, middle, and end of class that
is relevant and interesting. If you see your professor
making a chicken scratch on a piece of paper after
someone talks, they’re probably keeping track. You’ll
have to talk more in classes with only a few people, less in
classes with more. If you find yourself dominating the
discussion, it’s probably a good idea to shut up a little and
let other people talk. People will appreciate it, and there
are almost always some people in the class that will make
it difficult to get a word in edge-wise. Everyone usually
knows who these people are, except the people that can’t
shut up.
As for writing, library schools love group projects, so how
much writing you’ll do is actually a little hard to gauge. In
a history program, a 20-30 page paper per class based on
original (primary source) research is pretty standard for
each class, and a few shorter (5-10 page papers) along the
way, most of which get incorporated into that final paper.
Most library classes seem to run about half that, with a
fifteen page and ten page paper, or a bunch of shorter
papers. Archives classes are a little more rooted in a
history background (library courses usually fall more in
the social sciences) so if you’re in an archives class you
might expect more writing. Database or information
science classes will probably have less writing, but a final
project which is technical in nature and still a comparable
amount of work.
If you’re doing online classes, most of your class
discussion will probably be in the form of writing on the
equivalent of a forum or message board. So quite a bit
more writing, but less or no talking. Some people prefer
this arrangement, some people don’t. It’s probably not a
bad idea to take at least one online class even if you’re on
campus, so you can say you have experience with online
instruction if it comes up in a job interview.
Overall, three classes at three credit hours per semester is
considered full-time by most programs (and pretty typical
for a full time student), twelve credit hours a semester is
maximum for most schools. Less than nine hours is part-
time and typical for people with jobs, families, or just
taking their time working through the program. This is for
Fall and Spring by the way, nine hours is usually the
maximum course load in the summer, and six full-time.
But always check your program for what is considered
full and part-time. So, if you think you have the time and
self-discipline to do that, the next logical questions is,
should you go to library grad school?
Should I Go To Library Grad School?
Remember earlier, when I said I was cynical? You’re
going to see that here.
Graduate school is expensive, in terms of time and money.
Before you go, you need to figure out what you want to
get out of it.
There are good reasons to go to grad school, and bad
reasons to go to grad school. Some of the good reasons:
You want a job you can only get with an LIS graduate
degree, you already have a steady job that will pay for it
(either up front or in terms of increased wages and
promotions) and make it worth your time on top of paying
your tuition, and... erm, that’s about it really. You’re
independently wealthy and want to hang out with college
students, maybe.
That isn’t to say that you won’t experience other good
things at grad school, but if you have a passion for
reading, you can satisfy that with a library card. Want to
discuss books, join a book club. Like books, buy some
bookshelves and start filling them up. Want stress, late
nights, and bills, have a kid. Except for the kid, these
options are a heck of a lot cheaper and don’t take two
years. Ultimately, LIS graduate school doesn’t offer a
damn thing you probably can’t pick up somewhere else
for less money and time, except a degree. If that degree
can get you something you want, you probably have a
good reason. If not, I’m skeptical.
So what are some of the bad reasons? You’ve graduated
and don’t know what else to do, you like school, or you
can’t find a job anyway. These seem to be the big ones,
and you can figure out who these people are in the
program pretty quickly. They do what they have to in
class, and nothing extra. They’re on a damned expensive
vacation for two or more years. And some will argue that
they’re making themselves more employable, and they
are, but they’re doing it very, very inefficiently. Unless a
job requires an advanced degree two years of practical
experience probably counts for more than a graduate
degree, and it pays a hell of a lot better.
That two years of experience at a job will also come with
cash in, not tuition and fees going out. Seriously, most
people would be much better off joining the Peace Corps
for two years than going to graduate school without
knowing exactly what their goal is in getting an MA. At
least the Peace Corps will give you medical coverage and
six grand when you’re done with your tour, instead of
billing you for student insurance the whole time and
hitting you with interest on 50k worth of student loans
when you graduate.
As an aside, colleges and universities (administrators at
least) are perfectly okay with students who are just there
because they like school. Their tuition money spends just
well, they increase enrollment in classes professors want
to teach (damn near all professors like teaching graduate
seminars much more than intro survey courses), and they
don’t take up much of the professor’s time with outside
class projects because they don’t do them.
Ultimate point being you need a reason, a goal, to tell you
why you want to drop 5-figures (add up tuition and lost
wages to see what you’re really spending, this is probably
6-figures if you’re not fully funded and going out of state)
and two years of your life in graduate school. And make
sure graduate school is the only way you can get that.
Because that goal tells you what you need to do while
you’re in graduate school to make it all worthwhile. Not
the graduation requirements, those are just a bureaucratic
hoop to jump through at best.
They're also a good way to fail at library graduate school
and still get a diploma.
How to Fail Library Graduate School and
Still Get a Diploma
It’s deceptively easy. Just satisfy the graduation
requirements without doing anything more.
Seriously, no one wants to hear this, but 36 credit hours
(or however many your program requires) and a 3.x GPA
is the minimum. If that’s all that you do, they might as
well write “DID THE MINIMUM” on your diploma in
that fancy Gothic script, because that’s what every hiring
committee and employer will see.
But, but, but... you did get the degree, you can still get a
job now, right?
Maybe, but I wouldn’t bet that way. Not in this job
market.
Because while what classes you take are important, they
don’t make you stand out from your classmates. A lot of
your classmates will have the same or very similar classes,
and if they’ve done extra stuff outside of class you’ll be
fighting an up hill battle on the job market. Because there
are other candidates who didn’t do the minimum, and
most employers prefer to hire people who will do more for
the same pay, and who have enthusiasm for their
profession outside of class, or the job.
The exception here is that if you already have a job, and
your employer has said, “If you get an MA we will make
it economically worthwhile.” That’s different. Do the
minimum, take the easiest classes, spend as little time as
possible on things, look at the technical requirements to
graduate and don’t do a single ounce more. If you just
need the diploma, and that’s all you’re there for, why
spend extra time or effort? Go to classes, be a good
student, but unless they’re going to pay you more for
being in a student group or publishing an article outside of
class, why bother? Goal directed behavior people, figure
out what you want, and if something doesn’t help you get
to it, then that something is a hobby. If you already have
the job and just need the MA graduation requirements are
a great checklist.
If, on the other hand, you want to compete in the job
market with your classmates after graduation, you’re
going to have to do something to make yourself stand out.
And you’ve only got two years. You can’t wait until your
last semester and make it happen, you need to start right
away or you’re competing with people with an eighteen
month head start. Be aware of all this, and take it into
consideration when you’re deciding if you want to go to
graduate school.
Because next chapter we’ll talk about whether where you
go to school matters or not.
Does Where I Go to Library Graduate
School Matter?
You need a program that is American Library Association
(ALA) accredited. That’s the only hard and fast rule.
Check job ads and if it requires a degree in LIS odds are it
says “from an ALA accredited institution” right
afterwards.
There’s a list of ALA accredited programs here:
http://www.ala.org/accreditedprograms/
If the program is on probation that could go either way.
I’d suggest talking to someone in the admission’s office
and asking why the program is on probation and what
they’re doing to correct the deficiencies. It’s not the end of
the world, but might raise some questions and some
checking probably wouldn’t hurt.
If you’re doing archives or another sub-program, see what
job ads require. For example quite a few archives jobs
want a program that meets the Society of American
Archivists (SAA) criteria. Here’s a list of those programs:
http://www2.archivists.org/dae
If you’re looking to work in a foreign country, for a
specific organization, or for a specific type of library (a
law library for example) you’ll need to check those out on
your own. Look for job ads or find a relevant professional
organization and they should be able to give you some
idea of what you'll need to do.
That’s about the only hard and fast rule, but there are
some other criteria to keep in mind.
Cost is a biggie. In state will almost always be cheaper
than out of state tuition. Check residency requirements
and reciprocity agreements for your home state, and
compare cost of living for the cities the various schools
you are looking at are located in (plenty of cost of living
comparison sites can be found with the search engine of
your choice). Add up your total bill for each institution.
Opportunities to get practical experience should be
something you seriously think about. Practical experience
is a good way to make yourself stand out, and shows
employers you can actually do the job and won’t hate it
when you start. Some schools have mandatory practicum
courses (read: internships you get class credit and pay
tuition for), some have good student jobs, some have
libraries in the area that are known for giving students
jobs. I would have a hard time suggesting someone go to a
school that didn’t give them practical experience working
at a library for at least a semester, and the more experience
you can get the better.
Check the course catalog to make sure they offer classes
you want or need. Some classes will show up everywhere
(cataloging class, for example), but some things like
conservation and preservation or technical classes will be
more hit and miss. Also check course schedules for classes
that are a must have. If a class is in the catalog but hasn’t
shown up on the schedule (not the catalog) for three years,
I wouldn’t count on getting it. You can always contact the
department and ask, but it’s something to be wary of.
Online programs versus meatspace is something to think
about, but it’s almost totally down to individual preference
and varies from course to course and instructor to
instructor. Some programs only charge in state tuition and
fees for their online courses, look around for these if
you’re thinking of going the online route. For online
programs you’ll want to see if all of their courses are
offered online, or only some of the courses. If they only
offer some of the courses, or require frequent campus
visits, that’s a definite consideration.
If you can visit the campus, that might tell you something,
but it’s down to what you think is important and how you
feel about the campus. If the program devotes some space
for students, such as a lounge or break-room kitchenette
style area, those can really help your quality of life and
also tell you something about how the program views its
students. Floor space is valuable, so if the program is
turning it over for student use, that’s usually a good sign
that they care about your experience.
You should also be aware of what type of university or
college it is. R1 or R2 (Very High Research or High
Research Universities) will have different cultures than a
SLAC (Small Liberal Arts College). At a research
university faculty get promotion and tenure for research,
and teaching is given comparatively little weight in their
promotion. This means the newer professors are going to
be spending a lot of time doing research. SLACs tend to
value teaching more, and there’s less emphasis placed on
original research. There’s still a lot of variation in
individual professors, enough that this isn’t that useful of
a metric, but if it’s down to a coin toss the type of
institution can tell you something about what that
institution values.
Beyond that, I don’t think which school you go to is all
that important. A professor once suggested what school
you went to only mattered if the person hiring you went to
the same school, and thought the program prepared them
well for the job. But that’s probably a little bit out of your
control.
As a brief aside, Library and Information Studies
programs tend to be more social science people based, and
Library and Information Science tend to be more
concerned with the organization of information and
technology based. As best as I can tell anyway. But the
two terms also tend to be used pretty interchangeably, and
I wouldn’t put much stock in the differences without extra
information. Look at what the program offers, and it’ll
give you a better idea of what they’re all about.
So once you’ve figured out where you want to go, how do
you get in?
Getting in to Library Graduate School
There’s the normal way, and then there are some other
ways. The normal way is to apply, pay the fifty or so
bucks, do the paperwork (essay, letters of
recommendation, and references), and see if they accept
you.
Check the admissions page, but most places require a
bachelor’s degree in anything, a certain minimum GPA,
english proficiency if you’re not a native speaker, maybe
GRE scores, an essay, and whatever else.
The bachelor’s degree is pretty much non-negotiable, but I
honestly don’t think it matters what field the degree is in.
You’ll find plenty of English, History, Sociology, and
other humanities and social science majors in LIS. People
from other fields are around, and might have an easier
time finding a job if they’re willing to be a librarian in the
field of their original bachelor’s (so a BS in physics will
have an edge when applying to a science library). Overall,
you need the bachelor’s, but any field will do. It’s also
possible that certain “unusual” degrees will help,
especially fields like computer science or foreign
languages.
GPA is a little more flexible. There will be a minimum
(3.0 seems to be typical), but depending on the program it
can be overall, in your major, or in your final sixty credit
hours (about two years) of classes. If you don’t have the
GPA in one area, stress the other in your application or
contact the admissions office and see if they’re flexible.
They might okay it, or require you to take the GRE. Or
they might just say no, in which case you’re probably
better off looking at another program. If you have a prior
master’s or other graduate degree they’ll probably take the
GPA from that degree rather than your bachelor’s.
I don’t know anything about The Test of English as a
Foreign Language (TOEFL), so you’ll have to find
someone else for advice on that criteria.
The GRE is the Graduate Record Exam. You’ll probably
need decent scores on the English portion, lower scores on
the Math (for most places just don’t embarrass yourself
too terribly), and a decent score on the written. There are
whole guides written on this test, so you should be able to
find a much more detailed discussion than I can provide
here, but I can offer a couple of suggestions.
Briefly, I would suggest taking the practice test they send
when you register (mine came in the mail on a CD) so
you’ll be comfortable with the format and not stress out
over the instructions on the exam. For the English portion,
you can subscribe to one of those word a day emails or get
a calendar. Read the word and the definition to try to
improve your vocabulary. For the math, sometimes it’s
easier to just substitute each of the multiple choice
answers and see which one works correctly than to solve
the equation for the correct answer. For the written, just do
it like an essay test: read the topic, make an outline in the
margin, and use the five paragraph essay.
You'll probably also need letters of recommendation, and I
like to spread them out a little. The program might give
you criteria, otherwise I like to get one from an instructor
(it is a school after all, they’re going to want to know how
you did in school), and if you have practical experience in
a library setting, a letter from a supervisor. Third one, I
would probably go with another instructor or supervisor,
but if you have someone else who can write a good letter
you might consider them.
One thing to keep in mind, depending on the program they
might not expect everyone to meet every single criteria.
Some programs don’t require the GRE at all. You might
be able to get away with lower GRE scores if you have a
killer GPA or vice-versa.
It’s not always mentioned, but anything you can do to get
practical experience in a library before applying is helpful.
Part time work or even volunteering shows you have at
least some idea what the job entails and won’t graduate
with a degree that prepared you for a job you will hate.
Finally, follow the directions to the letter. If it’s a 750-
1000 word essay, those are the acceptable number of
words. No more, no less. If it says three letters of
recommendation, send three. No more, no less. You might
have four absolutely killer letters of recommendation, but
if you send all four in and they only want three, you are
going to come across as someone who either doesn’t read
directions, or doesn’t follow directions. Nobody wants to
deal with a student like that, no matter how brilliant. Then
there’s the letter of intent or statement of purpose,
whatever they happen to call it. That is big enough to
warrant it’s own chapter, so we’ll tackle that next time.
The Letter of Intent, Admissions Essay,
Statement of Purpose, etc.
These are very unique to each person and even the
institution you’re applying to, so these are just some rough
guidelines.
You need a letter of intent, or admissions essay, or
whatever they call it. It’s basically an explanation of why
you want to go to library graduate school. More than that,
it needs to explain why you want to go to that particular
graduate school.
Some places will give you criteria (UW-Madison lists
“what you hope to accomplish from this program, your
reasons for choosing UW-Madison’s SLIS program, your
tentative career goals, and your leadership experience and
potential for leadership in the profession”). That’s from
their website at:
http://www.slis.wisc.edu/students-application-ma.htm
but some places are a little more free-wheeling and just
tell you to write an essay. For those places, check their
website and do some digging, and see what the program is
all about. If they have a big social justice component, and
you’re into social justice, that would be a good thing to
mention in your letter. If they’re all about organizing
information and you are too, great. If you’re not very
interested in their primary goals, you might want to
consider if that’s the program for you. It doesn’t mean one
or the other of you is superior, just that you might not be a
good fit in the program. In any case, explain why you
want to go to that particular graduate school, as opposed
to graduate school in general.
I would avoid the “I want to work with Professor Jones on
their research in the area of...” For one thing Professor
Jones might be way more into the research than mentoring
students, or taking a year long sabbatical. For another
thing, you’ve kind of given the finger to every other
instructor at the institution. It might be true, but it’s not
very tactful. If you really do want to work with a certain
instructor, get in the program and then see if you can make
it happen.
One thing you should try and cover is why you want to be
a librarian or archivist. Don’t just say you like books,
because librarians tend to be about patrons more than
books (many librarians and instructors will tell you that,
anyway). A lot of people will tell you just liking books
doesn’t make you a good fit for grad school, and it
probably won’t help your application.
If you had an “A-ha!” moment when you realized you
wanted to be a librarian, this is probably a good place to
bring it up.
Otherwise, the five paragraph essay isn’t a bad thing to
break out for most of these. You probably learned it in
high school or even earlier. It’s an introduction, point 1,
point 2, point 3, conclusion. It at least gives you a starting
structure, and if you need to expand or contract it later you
can.
Word count wise, keep it near what they suggest. Don’t go
over the limit under any circumstances, and I usually try
to keep it within 20% or so of the upper limit of what they
want. In other words if they say 1000 words, go for 800–
999 words. Anything shorter you risk getting bad
attention. Anything over is right out, because you can’t
follow directions.
If the program is a large geographic distance from your
current location, consider mentioning if you’ve researched
the area or visited before and liked it. Any local support
structure (relatives or friends) you have in place might
also be a good thing to mention. It sounds irrelevant, but
the people looking at these applications genuinely want
you to succeed (seriously, they really do, and if nothing
else people dropping out looks bad for the program), and
if you’ve never left your home town moving across the
country is going to be a big chunk of stress. They don’t
want you to implode because you went into graduate
school with no support structure.
Using humor in your essay can be -iffy. Make sure it’s not
the least bit cruel or offensive (if you have any doubts
whatsoever, don’t use it). Personally, I used humor
because I didn’t want to spend two years with people who
couldn’t laugh, but I admit that it was a gamble. This is
also an area where if you have a strong GPA and good
recommendations you can probably afford a little levity in
your essay. If not, you might want to concentrate more on
selling yourself.
These essays can be miserable, horrible things to write. If
you’re pulling your hair out you’re probably not alone.
Everything else is pretty cut and dried, but this is personal
and you’re going to be evaluated on it by strangers. Just
follow the guidelines, or if there aren’t any cover why you
are a good fit for that program, why you want to be in that
program, what you have done to prepare yourself, and
your plans for after graduation (they don’t have to be
elaborate, but showing you have some idea what you want
to do can help, and you can always change your mind
later). Throw in anything else you think will help, and if
you have better reasons than these by all means use them.
Never type one of these up and send it right in. You will
probably finish writing this, be feeling a lot of stress, and
just want to hit send and get it over with. That might be a
mistake. At the very least let it sit for awhile, go have a
snack, and come back and reread it. Ideally, let it set
overnight and have a couple of other people look at it.
Spellcheck, proofread, and read it aloud to see if it flows
well.
If you’re currently getting a degree and your major has a
graduate program, you might ask the grad adviser or
someone else on the admissions committee to read over
your essay. Another pair of eyes is rarely a bad thing, and
your friends are probably just going to read it and say it’s
great. Let it sit for awhile, get some critical readers,
revise, and then send it in.
Below is a copy of the template I used for creating letters.
All my schools were in the Midwest, and I was committed
to doing an archives track, so it didn’t change much from
school to school. I overwrote the word counts, then cut it
down to meet the correct word count depending on the
requirements for the institution I was applying at. Frankly,
looking at it now I don’t know that I’d say it’s that great,
but it worked.
It’s ultimately up to you how you want to do this. Just
don’t give them any reasons to turn you down, and present
yourself as knowledgeable about the program and well
prepared.
And now, my letter of intent in all it’s glory...
Bear in mind, this is a template I used to apply to graduate
schools. I wrote it out, and then made changes depending
on the specific requirements of the program I was
applying to. Generally I find it easier to overwrite and cut
parts out than add to writing, so I took the highest word
count any of the programs required (I think that was UW-
Madison at 1200 words maximum) and wrote to exceed
that, then cut things out until I met the needed word count.
I have added some notes in italics above certain
paragraphs to explain what I was trying to do. The square
brackets are blanks I filled in depending on the program.
I wanted to give some background explaining why I was
going back to grad school in my 30s. I also figured I
might not be the most qualified person, but the giant
googly-eyed robot would make my application stand out
and be something people would remember. Hopefully for
good reasons.
It was ultimately the googly-eyed neurotic robot who
convinced me to go to graduate school. I was working the
night shift at a factory where I spent most of my time
placing components on conveyor belts for a robot to
assemble and weld. The robot was computer controlled
and the computer would occasionally crash like any other;
however, this computer operated a robotic arm with three
points of articulation that ended in a giant metal claw and
had its own laser welder. In a fit of whimsy, someone had
attached large googly eyes to the casing around the robot’s
claw, giving it the semblance of a face. When the
computer crashed the robot would halt. The googly eyes
would stare through the shatter proof glass at me forlornly,
demanding that I fix whatever had gone wrong. It was my
job to determine what had caused the computer program
to crash and restart it, thereby restoring order and purpose
to the robot’s existence. As life experiences go solving an
existential crisis for a giant, orange, googly-eyed robot at
4:00 in the morning may not offer much in the way of
cosmic answers (generally it was just “You dropped a part,
pick up another one,”) but it certainly encourages a person
to start asking questions about their own life choices.
It was during one of these binary therapy sessions that I
decided to go to graduate school, because keeping the
robot sane was making me crazy. I continued working, but
enrolled in the history graduate program at Western
Illinois University with plans to become a history teacher.
Soon after, I was offered a position as a paid intern for the
Illinois State Archives at their Regional Archives
Depository (IRAD) on campus. I said my farewells and
started a job whose main attraction (at the time) was that it
didn’t occur in the middle of the night, and didn’t have
insane robots.
This is my a-ha! moment.
Then I found out that I really like working in an archives.
A professor had told me that most historians have one
particular part of historical research that they really enjoy,
whether it be reading the previous work, finding sources,
or writing the paper itself. For me, it was finding the
sources. My work at the archive mainly consisted of
performing reference tasks for genealogists. For a person
who liked finding sources, this was great. I also got to
look at records, examine original, unique primary
documents, and got paid to do it.
A list of stuff I’ve done academically.
I certainly enjoy history, and plan to continue to actively
participate in the field even after gaining a Master’s
Degree in Library Studies. I have presented papers at
multiple conferences, and written journal length articles
for classes several times. I have had one article published
in the Illinois State Genealogical Society’s quarterly
journal, and another article is currently undergoing the
peer review process for publication in the Journal of
Illinois History. I like history, I like historians, and I like
talking to people about history, but not enough to do it as a
career. As a career I want to work in a library around more
sources than I could use in a lifetime, and assist others in
finding those sources.
Why I want to go there. One thing, where I said “library
science” I should have changed that to “library studies”
for programs that describe themselves that way. In
practice the two terms are used interchangeably a lot of
the time, but some people are pedantic about it. It was a
very small but potential reason not to accept my
application, and should have been corrected.
While my time as an IRAD intern has given me ample
experience in finding records for patrons, I would very
much like to learn the theory behind acquisitions,
cataloging, digitization, and in general gain an
understanding of library science at all levels. Eventually, I
hope to apply this education to a career in a university
library, gradually taking on greater responsibilities than I
currently have with an emphasis on the digitization of
information.
The MLS program offered at the [wherever I'm applying]
is ideal for my own immediate educational goals and
future career plans, with its [whatever they say they do].
[Another reason to go to this school]. I believe that the
city of [wherever] itself would be a great place to live, and
somewhere that I could easily envision myself happily
residing for many years.
Tentative career goals.
While the job market will be a large factor in where I
eventually do locate, my ultimate goal is to work as a
librarian in a university or with local government,
preferably at the state or even county level. The sheer
magnitude of larger archives (the National Archives and
Record Administration for example) actually make them
less attractive as a career for me personally. I would prefer
to work with a smaller, more localized collection of
documents. While these documents may not have the
broad scope that national records have they can be tied
into local history, and may offer more opportunities for an
individual to make a greater impact and work in a
leadership role, something I have enjoyed doing in my
time at IRAD.
Practical experience. Since I was applying for archives
tracks I skewed it to archives experience hard.
I have been the senior intern for the WIU IRAD
depository since January of 2009. My daily tasks include
performing reference work for patrons, answering queries
over both telephone and through formal letters, processing
documents, and creating indexes for our patrons and
inclusion on the Illinois Secretary of State website. I have
prepared training material for future interns, and worked
with the IRAD adviser to standardize and improve
restoration methods, record-keeping practices, and
internal procedures. I have also prepared digitized
versions of our materials for use in presentations to county
genealogical societies.
Leadership experience.
Currently, I am developing instructional material and
procedures to implement a co-operative program between
IRAD and the history department’s First Year Experience
(FYE) program. This program will have freshman
students create indexes of immigration and naturalization
records as part of their FYE requirements. The program is
being developed with the goal of encouraging students to
take a more active interest in local history, while
simultaneously generating an index of records which will
be made available to IRAD patrons. Once completed the
program will be used to create guidelines for similar
projects in the future benefiting both library patrons and
the history department FYE program.
Any extra skills or experience I might have that might be
relevant to the program.
I have also processed a medium sized collection of
documents from beginning to end as part of a graduate
level internship in the library archives. Under the direction
of a trained archivist I processed the 3.2 cubic foot Scott
Jones Industry School District Anti-Redistricting
Collection. I was directly responsible for the initial
assessment, creation of series and sub-series, and
generation of a complete finding aid and contents list for
this collection.
For my final semester I will be taking a graduate level
workshop in paleography, and continuing to create
historical articles for submission to peer reviewed
journals. I will graduate with my Master of Arts in History
in May of 2010.
Wrap it up.
I feel that the Master of Library Science Program at the
University of Wisconsin-Madison would be an excellent
way for me to continue these activities, and begin a long
term career working in the field of library science. Thank
you for your time and consideration.
And my thanks to the googly-eyed robot that convinced
me to return to graduate school as well.
Sincerely,
Eric Willey
One thing to remember: This was deliberately written long
so I could move chunks around and cut out anything that
wasn’t relevant to the program I was applying to. It’s not
an actual essay, just a starting point to customize
depending on the school. I hope you found it useful, good
luck.
Next up, what if they turn you down? Some other ways of
getting into a grad program.
What If I Still Don’t Get In?
If you are really committed, you’ve still got some options
even if they turn down your initial application.
First you’ll want to make a realistic assessment of why
they turned you down. If you have a bad GPA, and feel
that’s why you weren’t accepted, you might need to go
back for another bachelor’s degree and build your GPA up
over the two years that takes. Usually a second bachelor’s
is another 30-40 credit hours, but good luck getting all the
courses you need in the right sequence in two semesters.
That’s a big investment of time and energy, and you need
to consider if it’s worth it, or if the same things that
resulted in your GPA last time haven’t changed.
On the other hand, if you satisfied all the numerical
criteria (GPA, test scores) but didn’t get in, you might
consider applying as a graduate student without applying
for a specific program. Usually the admissions to graduate
school in general are less strict than to a specific graduate
program, and may not require letters of recommendation
or an essay. I’ve included a link to UW-Madison’s below,
at this time it’s just a 3.0 GPA, a bachelor’s degree,
English proficiency for some students, and financial
information for international students.
UW-Madison Graduate School Admission Requirements
So you apply as a graduate student, but not to the LIS
program. Then you take a couple of core classes (make
sure the core/introduction classes aren’t restricted to LIS
majors before you try this), work your butt off in them,
say smart things in class, ask your professor or professors
for a letter of recommendation to the program next
admission deadline, and try to enter the program again. It
might take you an extra year to complete the program
since you probably won’t be able to take a full course load
the first semester or two, but it might also get you into the
program. Eventually.
Be careful with this, because the rules for part time
students on financial aid are a lot different than full time,
and if you filled out your FAFSA as a full-time student it’s
probably not going to apply. Financial aid offices do
notice this sort of thing, so don’t think you can slip it in
under the radar either. There are also some courses you
might not be able to take unless you’re actually in the
program. The good news is intro courses are usually open
so people from other majors can take them, and they
usually have a pretty high number of seats so a lot of the
incoming students can enroll. Still, check before you
apply.
So you’ve got a shot if you want to try this, but it’s still a
gamble, especially if you’re moving to do it. Personally,
I’d suggest doing this online before going to the expense
of moving, although that might result in weaker letters of
recommendation from your instructors depending on the
class. On the other hand it is cheaper and you can always
do the rest of your classes in meat space later. Look at
your situation and decide what works best.
Another option is just to reapply next admissions. The
university will gladly take your application fee year after
year if you want to keep applying.
While you’re waiting to apply again, do what you can to
improve your chances. Practical experience is always
good, but you also need to look at why you think you
didn’t get in. If it’s weak letters of recommendation, you
can address that with volunteering at a library (provided
you do a good job and your supervisor will write one). If
you have a low GPA, you either need to bring that up (and
address whatever caused the low GPA in the first place),
or realistically look at whether graduate school is a good
fit for you. If you lack leadership experience, volunteer
for one of the local charitable organizations. You don’t
have to run a Fortune 500 company here, organizing a
pancake and sausage breakfast fundraiser is leadership.
Read some of the guides on taking tests and retake them if
your GRE score is what’s holding you back. Point being,
figure out what went wrong and fix it.
The last option I know of is not much of an option in my
opinion. Some institutions offer dual degree programs,
although usually you have to be accepted to both
programs for that option. You might find an institution
that doesn’t have that requirement, but I don’t consider it
likely. You could go for an entirely different degree and
take some LIS courses, since most programs allow a
certain number of outside the department courses (3
courses or 9 credit hours seems to be standard) to count
towards graduation requirements.
All of these options are expensive in terms of time and
resources, and there’s no guarantee they will work.
Evaluate if they’re worth it or even possible before
deciding to pursue them.
But for now you’ve applied, and you can enjoy the feeling
of being thrown into a black pit into which no information
enters and compulsively checking your email to see if
you’ve been accepted. Just how long should that take
anyway?
When Will I Hear Back?
You should get some sort of notification (probably an
email) when your materials are received and your
application is complete. A lot of the programs I applied to
used an online program for this, and you can see boxes get
checked off as test scores, essays, transcripts, and letters
of recommendation are received. Some places just send an
email. If you haven’t gotten any of this, you might do
some investigating and make sure your application was
received. At the very least you should get something on
your credit card or bank statement showing they received
payment, and that can be a starting point.
You will probably hear back from the general graduate
admissions program fairly quickly, and then there will be
a delay until you hear back from the LIS graduate
program. The two are not the same thing, so please don’t
get too excited when you get that first email. It’s good
news, but it just means that you’ve been accepted into the
graduate school, not the LIS program.
If your application was completed and received, and
you’re tearing out your hair with worry you can call the
admissions office and check the status, but I don’t know
how much good it will do. If they were going to offer you
a spot, they would have gotten ahold of you. You might
(maybe) be able to get an approximate timetable, but I
kind of doubt it, and it might not be that accurate anyway.
So all in all, my guess is you’re not going to get an answer
you’re going to like, and you’re better off just being
patient and waiting. It’s rough, I know.
Ultimately, the short and tautological answer is that you
will hear back when you hear back.
Part of the problem is that people apply to multiple
programs. When they hear back from one, they don’t
always make a decision on attending that program or let
the others know right away. That program may not have
been their first choice, or they might wait longer until the
financial aid program gets back to them. When they’ve
finally heard back from all the programs and weighed all
their options, then, hopefully, they let the programs they
won’t be going to know.
That opens up a slot, which gets kicked to the next person
down the line. Then, if that person is still waiting on other
programs, the whole process starts over again. Sometimes
programs will let people know they’re on a wait list,
sometimes people just wait. That whole mess can take
quite awhile to sort itself out, so unless you’re accepted
early you’re not just waiting on that program but every
other program people have applied to for an answer.
Most people (based on my extremely unscientific poll of
asking whoever happened to be around at the time) seem
to apply to between three and five programs. So for any
program that didn’t ask you in the initial wave of
acceptance letters, you’re actually waiting on the slowest
of the five programs everyone ahead of you has applied
for. If you are in that first wave, for some programs you’ll
probably hear back early, but some will still take awhile if
the people reviewing applications go on vacation, or have
other things going on.
Because of this, the programs you do hear from will
probably want an answer fairly quickly. You have a few
options here. One is to just give them an answer, a plain
yes or no. Depending on what other programs you’ve
heard back from and how excited you are (or aren’t) about
the program this might be an option. The other is to ask if
you can give them an answer later. Explain the situation,
and the worst they can do is say they really do need an
answer by the deadline they provided. The third option is
to say yes, and then withdraw if you get a better offer. It’s
slightly, well, shifty, and fairly disingenuous. You’ll want
to make sure they don’t charge you anything for
withdrawing (most places don’t charge until you’ve
signed up for and gotten into a few weeks of classes, but
some do charge a fee after a certain date), but this is an
option. Just keep in mind other people are waiting, and
you’re dragging out the process for them.
The good news is, until you’ve heard from a program,
they haven’t said, “No.” So hang in there, hurry up, and
wait.
You can also kill time by making a shopping list for when
you are accepted.
Hardware and Software
You don’t necessarily need a lot of stuff to get through a
LIS grad program, but some things will help.
First of all, I highly recommend a slow cooker (aka a
crock-pot). Seriously. Unless you have someone to cook
for you or are willing to live off of take-out and
sandwiches for two years, this can improve your quality of
life quite a bit. Get a slow cooker, find a few recipes you
like, freeze portions of whatever for later, and it’ll help
keep you from eating out of boxes or getting delivery all
the time. Hopefully your program has a microwave
somewhere students can access it, and you can take
leftovers in and heat them up.
Otherwise, most hardware is going to depend on your
budget, and how much you think you’ll use it. Monitors
large enough to display two A4 (8.5″ x 11″) pages side-
by-side are nice. You can have a pdf of a journal article
open on one side and a paper you’re writing open on the
other. Or a draft of a paper on one side open and a revision
of that paper on the other. A dual monitor system would
work for this as well, just make sure your operating
system supports multiple screens.
E-book readers (or e-readers) can be useful. I don’t
personally own one, but you’ll probably be reading a lot
of journal articles off of electronic reserves. Being able to
save them to an e-reader means you can look at them
while in class and read them on the bus or whatever. A
netbook is a little bulkier, but more versatile, same with a
laptop. Check out the e-reader before you buy, being able
to annotate (take notes) or at least highlight pdfs is really
handy. Ideally it should be able to copy and paste to
another document or platform as well, unless you want to
retype quotes for papers. The ability to do this is probably
going to change as platforms and the policies and laws
regarding DRM change, so I’m not going to get into
specific brands that might be altered tomorrow.
Think about getting a black and white laser printer.
Brother makes quite a few models under $100, if you’re
just printing text the toner cartridges last quite awhile, and
they save you from having to make last minute trips to the
campus computer labs or wait in line during finals week.
There are still quite a few professors who want hard copy,
and mine made my life a lot easier. Presumably you could
do the same with an inkjet, but I hate buying new ink
cartridges. If you’re short on cash you can always use
university printers so this is by no means a necessity, just
something nice to have.
You probably don’t need much software. Any word
processing program should do, as long as it can save in
doc and rtf format. Being able to export to pdf is also
handy. If you take a database class you’ll need whatever
program it uses if you plan to work at home. That will
probably be Microsoft Access, so keep that in mind if
you’re a dedicated Mac (or Unix) user. It might be
something else though, or you always have the option of
doing your homework in one of the campus labs.
Get used to google docs. There are a lot of group projects,
and this was the preferred way to share papers and
documents (especially if you have a distance student or
students in the group) when I was taking classes. If you’re
familiar with modern word processing programs, google
docs should be no problem. It’s just word processing in
your browser.
For swapping large files online (or “cloud”) storage is
useful. Dropbox and Spideroak are currently two of the
more common programs. They’re both a good way to
backup your stuff as well, which I highly recommend. If
you’re not backing up your work, preferably to your main
computer, one additional on-site platform (such as an
external hard drive or jump drive), and one off-site
platform (Dropbox or Spideroak, or at the very least
emailing it to yourself), you’re asking for trouble if your
computer crashes.
That about covers it, from my point of view. You
shouldn’t need a lot of stuff, and you could probably do
without all of this except the word processing program to
tell the truth. Even that should be available at a campus
computer lab. This stuff just makes things a little more
convenient.
So how do you pay for this all stuff, plus tuition and fees?
Paying For it All
This is super serious could wreck your plans if you get it
wrong stuff, and I’m only giving general guidelines.
Absolutely, positively, check this out for yourself and
learn how it applies to your situation.
First off, there aren’t a lot of TA (Teaching Assistant) or
GA (Graduate Assistant) positions for LIS programs. The
LIS is only a graduate degree, or at least I’ve never heard
of an undergraduate degree in LIS. This means that there
aren’t LIS101 introduction classes packed with freshmen
for TAs to teach like mandatory Intro to Writing classes.
And there tend to be quite a few people in the LIS
programs, so any graduate assistant positions available
tend to be competitive, and for some programs
automatically go to the Ph.D. candidates anyway. LIS
programs also don’t tend to have wealthy alumni to donate
funds to the program, so they’re not always as well funded
as other graduate schools.
Point being, if you’re thinking it’s like majors where if
you get in you have a good chance at an assistantship,
that’s not the case.
There are some out there, check the schools you’re
applying to for postings. Champaign-Urbana in Illinois
had some when I was applying. UW-Milwaukee had some
that went to the Ph.D. candidates (at the time I was
applying, both of these may have changed).
Just be aware that a lot of these are contingent on funding,
and might disappear. Having discouraged you thoroughly,
there are a couple of other possibilities.
One is to to apply for a master’s in whatever your
bachelor’s is in, get an assistantship through that program,
and do a dual degree. Quite a few schools offer dual
degree options, and LIS fits well with several disciplines.
Of course, this requires you to get accepted into that
program, get the assistantship, and do the extra work in a
dual degree program, but it’s a possible avenue if you
think the money is worth the added work.
Another method that requires less resource expenditure
but is less certain is to look around outside the LIS
department for assistantships. You might only be able to
pick it up for a year or even a semester, but some non-
academic departments will offer assistantships for
workers. Library students are involved with technology,
people, and information, and that covers a lot of turf in
university jobs if you spin your experience right. So don’t
restrict your search to just the LIS department postings.
If you do get an assistantship, and you’re going out of
state, make sure you know if it covers full tuition, or only
the in state portion. Either is a good deal, but it makes
quite a bit of difference in the amount of cash you’re
paying.
As far as federal financial aid, it changes, and the FAFSA
website can tell you a lot more about your individual
situation than I can.
http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/index.htm
Apply as early as possible, probably as soon as you’ve
filed your tax return (and your parents have filed their
returns if they still count for your financial aid). Know the
differences between the types of loans (unsubsidized
versus subsidized), and check the interest rates. I think the
FAFSA site is actually one of the more well designed
applications I’ve seen, and while it can still be stressful,
it’s not a bad process. They do ask what schools you are or
will be applying to, so know that before you get started.
As it is now PELL grants are undergraduate only, so
financial aid will probably be loans and/or work study.
Work study is financial aid that you work (usually in a job
at the university) to get. This is pretty much free money as
far as your employer is concerned, so think about what
kind of job you want if you have this option. You can
probably afford to be a little picky, although not every
place has federal work study eligible positions.
Your university financial aid package will usually be
calculated using your FAFSA, and be offered through the
university financial aid office. The procedures and
timetables of these offices vary, some will make an offer
as soon as the program accepts you, some wait until it’s
almost time for classes to start. They’re used to taking
calls, so the financial aid office is one place I would call if
you had questions. The basic method here is that the
university figures out what they think you’ll need, what
you’re eligible for under their rules, and then subtracts
what you can get through FAFSA and decides whether or
not to make up the rest. Some places might have a
financial aid estimator, some you might just have to wait
and see.
Again, you’re probably going to be getting loans and work
study, not grants.
Scholarships are great, and if you’re even remotely
qualified for one apply. Your LIS program should have a
list of department and university scholarships, and search
engines are always your friend.
If you’re wanting or willing to do your degree online,
some places only charge in state tuition for online classes.
It’s still a big chunk of cash, but cheaper than paying out
of state tuition.
There is one last thing you can do that’s not strictly
speaking financial aid, but that can save you a lot of
money. Go to school in state. If it’s ALA accredited and
you can pay in state tuition (or you have a state that shares
reciprocity on tuition), it can save you a lot of cash. It
might not be ideal, but getting through this with the
minimum amount of loans possible is always a good idea.
Compound interest can be brutal.
Applying for financial aid from the federal government
(the FAFSA) is all factual, they don’t need statements of
purpose or essays. Scholarships are squishier, and we’ll
discuss some strategies for applying for them next post.
Applying for Scholarships
When applying for scholarships, a lot of people have a
fear of rejection, so let me get something out of the way
right now for you: If you apply for things you will be
rejected sometimes, but unless it’s an organ transplant you
will live. The more scholarships and awards you apply for,
the more you will receive. It’s kind of like dating that way.
I have been very fortunate to receive a few scholarships,
and while I am not privy to the selection criteria or how it
was weighted, these are some things I have done that I
feel helped my applications. Please feel free to use or
disregard, and use your own judgment in applying these
general suggestions to specific applications.
1. For a general scholarship tell the committee as
specifically as you can how the money will be used, what
problem it will solve, what opportunity it will make
possible, and how that will benefit someone or something.
“With funding from this scholarship I will be able to verb
the noun, furthering the thing.” For awards or scholarships
for leadership or tech projects, or travel scholarships, it’s
probably less important because they have a specific
purpose already or are tied to things you’ve already done,
but a general idea of how you’ll be spending the money
still might help.
2. If you’ve already done anything related to the purpose
of the scholarship, mention it. It shows you’re committed
to the project or work and have a basic understanding of
what it entails. For example, for a leadership scholarship,
write about any leadership type activities you’ve
performed. If an application requires a writing sample, a
relevant paper or research project can also be used to
show a long standing interest in and commitment to the
project identified.
3. If it’s a general scholarship, spread the subjects of your
letters of recommendation out. If you need three letters,
ask for one person to write about your work or practical
experience, another your academics, and another your
student org or other extracurricular activities. Ask people
specifically to do this, and explain what you’re doing to
them, so everyone’s on the same page. It probably doesn’t
hurt if the people writing your letters are active members
of the organization giving the grant either.
4. While on the subject of letters of recommendation,
when you ask for one give the person you’re asking plenty
of time (I try for 4-6 weeks, although I’ll lower that a little
rather than send someone a request during the holidays),
and a list of things you’ve done or accomplished relating
to what you’re asking them to write about. It’s courteous,
and results in a stronger letter when they don’t have to try
to remember all you’ve done. This is basically the same as
the admissions process.
5. Talk about relevant things and scholarships or awards
you’ve already received in your cover letter. People like to
bet on winners, and if you’ve done something you have
every right to be proud of it.
This is important, so I’m going to say it again: If you have
done something you have every right to be proud of it. To
put it even more bluntly, false modesty is bullshit in this
business. The only person who will care more about what
you’ve done than yourself is your mother, so learn to self-
promote. If you don’t care enough to mention it, don’t
expect anyone else to care more.
6. If you just can’t get started, look at past letters you’ve
written for common themes or examples you can use.
Everyone wrote a letter of interest to get into the LIS grad
program, and if you’re at this stage it was at least good
enough. You’ve done this before, you can do it again.
7. Apply for everything. As Woody Allen said, “Eighty
percent of success is showing up.” Especially for some
awards which go to first year or entering students you may
feel like you haven’t done much, but you’re competing
with other people in the exact same boat. A lot of people
just don’t bother to apply, and that helps your chances
enormously. You don’t have to compete against everyone,
just everyone who bothers to show up.
8. Depending on the required length of the letter or essay,
I sometimes like to use the old high school 5-paragraph
paper format (introduction, point 1, point 2, point 3,
conclusion). It fits in well with an introduction,
academics, extracurricular activities, experience,
conclusion list, and helps keep you focused, even if you
just use it as a starting point.
9. Don’t use wishy-washy language. “The scholarship will
allow me to...” shows a lot more confidence than “If
selected the scholarship will allow me to...” Don’t be
arrogant, but do be confident. Attitude plays a part.
10. The usual technical stuff: Proof read everything,
double check to make sure you’ve followed all
requirements (especially word count or page length),
submit the right number of copies of things, make sure
you’re sending it in before the deadline and have the right
number of letters of recommendation.
Like I said, these are general suggestions, so you might
need to alter them for context. And you never know how
things are weighted, or if people will think your specific
situation is compelling. There is also an element of
chance. But if you don’t apply, your chances are zilch.
If you get the scholarship or award, congratulations. So
what happens if you don’t?
What If You Don’t Get the Award?
First of all, you’ll live. Rejection is never pleasant, but it
happens. Find yourself an inspirational poster (there are
many with kittens hanging in there, I believe), stand up
and dust yourself off, and try again.
As far as how to react, there’s a process here, especially if
it’s an in department thing that there is an awards
ceremony for. Basically it’s just being gracious and polite
(or at the very least an adult), but there are actually some
good reasons to do this beyond just being a decent person.
First thing, you need to go to the award ceremony,
applaud when they announce the winner, and congratulate
them. There’s usually standing around and chatting after
these things, and if you know anyone who was on the
award committee, thank them for their time, mention it
must have been a tough decision, and make sure they
know you’re not being a sore loser and you understand
why whoever won did. You don’t have to follow this exact
process, but make sure people know that you’re happy for
whoever did win, and understand that the decision was
fair and it wasn’t personal.
This is important for a couple of reasons. You want people
to know you’re a grown-up about these things, because
when you are a professional you will have ideas that get
shot down, and apply for grants or other funding and be
refused. Letting people know that you don’t take rejection
personally or become petulant can come in handy when
you’re asking for letters of recommendation, and helps
people say you are a person they would like to work with.
If you do take rejection personally, break that habit as
soon as possible.
You might actually be surprised how strong your reaction
or that of your classmates is to not getting an award.
People in graduate school tend to be the people who did
very well as undergrads, and a lot of them are used to
dominating these things or at least doing very well.
Graduate school might be the first time they’ve been in a
large group of individuals as academically competent as
they are. Not being the star pupil any more can require a
cognitive shift.
The second reason is that any award or grant has one or
two winners, and a whole lot of disappointed people. Most
people serving on the committees who make these
decisions are there because they like students, like seeing
what projects they’re involved in, and like giving out the
awards. The downside is at least one of them has to write
a bunch of rejection letters and not fund a bunch of
worthy people because there’s never enough money. Let
these people know that you appreciate what they’re doing,
and don’t hate them just because you didn’t win. They’re
probably doing this as volunteers, and in any case it’s
polite to thank for their time and effort.
This is a little less critical for awards if you mail in
applications and don’t directly interact with the committee
members on a regular basis, but a thank-you note or even
an email can go a long ways. I presented at a conference
once, and eventually turned that presentation into an
article. A couple of people at the conference and the chair
of my panel gave me some great advice, and when the
article was published I sent them thank you emails. The
chair of the panel replied that after years of commenting
on papers, he could not recall anyone else sending a note
of thanks.
Common courtesy isn’t that common. Say thank you, even
if the result wasn’t what you hoped for. It really will go a
long ways.
A couple of final things that might help you feel better:
You’re basically asking people for money just for being
yourself. The default answer here for almost everyone
except an awards committee is going to be no. Imagine
asking someone on the street to give you cash because you
want to study youth services. They’d look at you like you
were crazy. The scholarships and awards are very
generous things, and no one is entitled to them. If you get
one, be thankful. If you didn’t, remember that no one
owed it to you.
Second, and this is really mercenary sounding, if you are a
good loser it might help with the next award. Act like an
ass now, and that’s a reason not to give you an award next
time. Act like a person who understands and appreciates it
anyway, that’s a reason to give you an award.
And if that’s not cynical enough for you, next time I’m
going to talk about picking classes.
Picking Classes
This is another largely individual matter, and prone to
changing with circumstances, so take this advice with
large grains of salt. Best case it will give you some ideas
and maybe a place to start.
Look at your graduation requirements. If there are
required courses, take them or you don’t graduate. Pretty
simple. Usually these are intro courses that serve as
prerequisites for later courses as well, so if you want the
advanced courses it’s a good idea to get the prerequisites
done early.
Otherwise, there’s only one way I can figure out to make a
course selection that’s not based on personal preference.
First off, make a current c.v. (curriculum vitae, basically a
super resume that lists all your qualifications, education,
student orgs, volunteer activities, and experience). It’ll
probably be light at this point, especially if you’re fresh
out of undergrad, but don’t worry about that.
Now find some job ads for positions you want, the more
the better. I would say at least five, ten is probably plenty.
Then you need to look at the required and preferred
qualifications for all those job ads, and pick out the ones
that appear over and over. If every job ad for this type of
position has a certain qualification, that should definitely
make your list. If one out of ten has it, you can probably
leave it off your list. You now have a big list of what you
need to have on a c.v. or resume to be qualified for those
jobs. Look back at the c.v. you made, cross the
qualifications you already have off the job list, and what
you have left is a list of things you need to do in grad
school to get that job.
Look through the course catalog, and see what courses
will help you fulfill those requirements. You can probably
see past syllabi in the student office, or talk to the
professors teaching those classes if you’re not sure. Make
a list of the classes, and you’ve at least got the beginnings
of an idea of what to take. If you can’t find a class and it’s
a critical job requirement look at courses outside the
department, or even at a community college if there’s one
local, or set up an independent study.
You probably won’t be able to cover every single job
requirement just with classes. Some requirements you’ll
satisfy with job experience, some with volunteer or
student org activities, some with other things. But this
should give you some idea of what courses will help you
get the job you want.
This is pretty pragmatic, I realize. And I’ll admit that it’s a
good idea to occasionally step outside your comfort zone
and take a course you normally wouldn’t take. One of the
best history courses I ever took was well outside what I
usually studied. And sometimes the odd course pays off if
there happens to be a job that requires knowledge of some
obscure subject and you just happen to have taken a
course in it. I’m basically just trying to provide a way to
generate a rough list starting out.
And then there’s the question everyone has, and no one
can answer. So what professors should I take?
So Which Professors Should I Take?
This is one of those questions you probably won’t know
the answer to until it’s too late.
Basically, take a professor whose teaching style matches
your learning style, is passionate about the things you are
passionate about, and will teach you things that will help
you get a job. That’s probably not much help, but if the
department has a meeting where professors talk about
their research or experience that’s a good opportunity to
find out what interests them and at least get a first
impression.
The obvious answer is to ask other students which
professors are good, but there are some problems with that
strategy. The other students might have different learning
styles than you, and that will make their advice less
useful. If you don’t know the other student they might just
be lazy, and tell you not to take a professor you would
learn a lot from just because the class is more work than
another.
The other big problem with asking other students who to
take is that professors are human, with outside lives. A
professor who everyone raves about can have a bad
semester and everyone in the class for that one semester
might end up hating them. If a professor has a sick kid or
spouse, a death in the family, tenure review, financial
problems, or any of a hundred other things that can throw
them off their game in the classroom. Some professors can
just set this all aside, walk into the classroom, and bring
their A-game while their personal lives crash down around
their ears, but a lot of people can’t. And even the greatest
professor in the department can get bad reviews from
people that were in a class while they were dealing with
outside circumstances.
It happens.
The one caveat is that if you ask a bunch of people who
are at different points in the program, and everyone says a
certain instructor is horrible and give concrete examples
of why (they don’t provide clear instructions on
assignments, they cancel class at the last minute a lot, they
just aren’t interested in the subject matter), you might look
for alternatives. If you’re local you can always try sitting
in the hall outside a lecture and listening in, if that’s an
option. There are some sites that allow students to
evaluate professors, I think these are about as much
credible as bathroom wall graffiti, personally.
There are bad professors. There are great professors. Most
will fall somewhere between Captain Bligh and Robin
Williams in Dead Poets Society. Ultimately, it shouldn’t
be a problem for you because you’ll do most of your
learning on your own now. So don’t worry about it too
much.
I’ve had professors I liked as people, and professors I
respected as instructors and scholars. Ideally, you’ll get
both in the same package, but if I had to chose I’d go with
“respect” before “like.” I learn a lot more from those
professors, and most people will tell you which professors
they like personally when you ask who you should take. I
prefer my professors to teach me a lot, and I have people I
like for outside of class time.
The best advice I can offer is to try to take classes that will
help you get a job or that at least interest you, and even if
you don’t like the professor you’ll get something of value
out of the class. The rest you just have to deal with, like a
boss you don’t particularly like.
So should you take online or meat space courses?
Online Courses in Library Graduate
School
Online courses are easier to fit into your schedule, but
take more time. You’ll probably be expected to post things
to a message board type area each week, and read and
react to what your classmates are posting. I would suggest
doing this posting early if you are in such a class,
otherwise it gets harder to find something original to say.
If you are doing online courses because you are a distance
student, being off campus can have some disadvantages.
Access to libraries and resources for research relies on
your internet connection, and must be done over the web.
A lot of stuff is online, but if you need to actually go in
and look at a book for something, you might have a
problem. A lot of student groups tend to be campus based,
and although they’re usually welcoming to distance
students, some of the things they do require you to be
physically present. You’ll want to consider local
placements for practicums, internships, or student work,
since the office probably doesn’t have a list of contacts for
your particular local area. Not all courses may be offered
online.
The main advantages are you don’t have to move, you can
listen to lectures on your own schedule (a few distance
courses have live lectures but most seem to be pre-
recorded), and some programs charge in-state tuition for
online courses even if you reside out of state. It may also
fit better with your learning style if you prefer to read and
ponder before replying to lectures or questions.
Online instruction is big in libraries right now, so at least
one online course would probably be a good idea for any
student, even those living on or near campus so you can
say you have experience with remote instruction.
Most online course management systems can be set to
keep track of the links a user clicks, so your professor may
very well be able to check and see if you’ve done the
readings or listened to the lectures. Or at least if you’ve
clicked the links. Keep that in mind if you’re taking a
course online because you want to ignore it as much as
possible.
A lot of universities are pushing online courses since
(according to my understanding) they’re relatively
profitable compared to on-site classes. You don’t have to
pay for the infrastructure of a classroom, parking lots, or
heating, cooling, maintaining, and cleaning a building.
Apparently IT is relatively cheap compared to these
layouts.
Speaking of IT, you’ll probably need a reasonably modern
operating system and web browser to access most online
content. Exact requirements will vary, check before you
decide to do online courses.
If you’re not sure about online learning, you could always
try a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course). These are
web-based courses which usually don’t have an
assessment component (you’re not getting graded on your
work) and you do not get credit for, but you can take for
free. Just drop free mooc courses in your favorite search
engine, and find something that interests you.
Even classes taking place in a physical classroom will
probably have some sort of online course management
software for getting readings, downloading assignments,
and uploading homework, so you will get some exposure
to online education resources. If you really enjoy the
message boards and interacting with classmates online,
these courses might suit you well.
Either way, you’re going to have to write papers.
Writing Papers
This isn’t about how to do research, or grammar or
punctuation. These are my thoughts on the mechanical
process of writing a paper. It’s the system I use, because it
helps me keep track and fulfill the technical requirements
of the paper assignment. Actually doing research well
should be something you covered in undergrad, and if you
didn’t there are entire books written on the subject.
I’ll even recommend one: The Craft of Research by Booth
But that’s about research, and I’m talking about the actual
process of writing a paper. First, make a new folder for the
paper on your PC, and create a blank word processor
document in it. Copy the instructions for the assignment
onto the word processor document. If your professor gave
you an electronic copy of the instructions, just use copy
and paste. If the assignment was on paper, transcribe it. It
doesn’t have to be word for word, but you need to know
what the requirements of the paper are. If the professor
gave some standardized instructions in the syllabus for all
papers, you’ll need to copy those as well.
The point is you now have a checklist at the top of your
paper of what you need to do to satisfy the instructions. As
you finish each item, strikethrough it (usually in the menu
under format/character/strikethrough or some similar
command) so you know it is done. Don’t delete it, you’ll
still want this checklist later.
Next, pick a topic. People will usually tell you to write
about something that interests you, or write about
something you want to write about. That’s kind of true,
but kind of not true. You need to write the paper you can
write, at this time. That means you have sixteen weeks, if
you know what you’re doing day one and have until the
last day of the semester to finish. You need to pick a topic
you can do in that amount of time.
I usually figure out a topic I can do, and then decide if it
interests me. If it does, I’ll write about it, but the key
requirement is that I can do it in a semester. Keep it
limited, look around in recent journals for ideas for what
is being published and relevant in the field, and ask your
professor if the topic is suitable. Look at assigned readings
in class for unanswered questions or things that could be
clarified. For one thing, you’re reading those articles
anyway, and for another your professor thinks the topic is
important enough to assign readings on.
Once you have an approved topic, start gathering sources.
Find what you can, look in the footnotes and
bibliographies for further sources, and keep checking until
you have enough sources. This is basically the research
phase.
Once you have enough sources you’re going to write the
body, or middle, of your paper. Not the beginning
(introduction) and not the end (conclusion), you need to
write the body first. This probably doesn’t make much
sense, but what you’re actually doing is compiling
evidence to make an argument. If you can simultaneously
hold information from two dozen sources and their
evidence in your head and analyze them, you probably
don’t need this blog.
So take the first article, and summarize it. If there’s an
abstract, you can drop that whole into the paper, just make
sure you have a system to know what’s a quotation. This
is a good point to start citations, because you don’t want
to go anywhere near plagiarism. In general, I err on the
side of over-citing. I figure I might lose a few points for
improper citations, but could fail an entire course for
plagiarism. Anyway, once you have all your sources
summarized start grouping them by the arguments they
make, the type of sources they use, or how they relate to
your topic.
Once you have the body of your paper written read
through it, and see what conclusions you can draw. Unless
you’re doing original research, by which I mean creating
tests and gathering data, you’re just looking at what other
people have done and seeing what conclusions you can
draw from their work.
Once that’s done, you can write your introduction and
conclusion. If you had done these before you assembled
your evidence, you might have been wrong, and people
usually don’t like to change things once they’ve written
them down. What you’ve done instead is compiled the
evidence, organized it, and then discussed what the
evidence indicated.
Your personal feelings on the matter are irrelevant here.
You are discussing what the evidence shows, not what you
feel.
This is important because you’re trying to answer a
question, not prove a statement. “How effective are
summer reading programs in creating lifelong library
patrons?” is an example of a question. If instead you set
out to show that “Summer reading programs create
lifelong library patrons because I was in a summer reading
program and loved it and think they should get more
funding,” you have a huge problem. Namely, you don’t
know if they do or not for most people. If all the evidence
shows they don’t, you’re kind of screwed.
So you gather your evidence, then draw your conclusions.
Write the body of your paper, and then write the
introduction and conclusion.
Once you’re done you should have a paper which has
three sections. The first is the introduction, or “This is
what I’m going to tell you.” It’s a summary of your paper,
and it should tell your audience what question you were
trying to answer, a summary of what evidence you found,
and what answer you found. This isn’t a mystery novel,
don’t surprise your audience by hiding the answer until
the end. If your audience knows your question, what
evidence you found to answer it, and what your answer is
they’ll be able to follow your argument much more easily.
The introduction should also include a thesis statement,
which is basically the purpose of the paper. You can create
a thesis statement by turning the question you tried to
answer into a declaration (and you can do this now that
you know what the evidence says). Don’t be subtle here,
you want all points possible for this so hit people over the
head with it. “This paper will demonstrate that...” is a big
neon sign that this is the thesis statement. Ideally, drop it
in as soon as you can (first page is good, first paragraph
and in the abstract is probably better) so your audience
knows why you wrote the paper as soon as possible.
The second part of your paper is the body, or the “This is
me telling you what I said I was going to tell you in the
introduction.” This is where you present your evidence
(articles or monographs), and explain how these articles
are relevant to your argument. It’s not enough to present a
long list of articles and sources, you need to explain how
these articles interact with your thesis, if they prove or
disprove your thesis, and how they interact with each
other. This is a good place to address any methodological
flaws in the research you’re citing as well.
Finally, the conclusion, or the “What I just told you”
section. It’s basically a summary, and very similar to the
introduction. You’re reminding people of the central
argument (thesis) of the paper, the evidence you’ve
presented, and what the paper shows. Throw in some
suggestions for further research, and you’re good to go.
Ending the paper can be hard, especially if you feel like it
just trails off. One strategy is try to write a good
introduction explaining why your paper is important or at
least relevant, and then copy and paste it on the end.
You’ll need to revise and reword this (it shouldn’t be word
for word copy) but ideally it will remind you and your
audience why your paper’s findings are significant.
If all this seems a little repetitive, it is. Your basic formula
is “This is what I’m going to tell you,” “Tell them,” “This
is what I just told you.” You’re driving in a circle here,
and ending up the exact same place you started because
you’re making an argument. If you want someone to
remember something, tell them three times.
Admittedly, this is a lousy formula for fiction writing, but
you’re trying to inform people not entertain them. Watch a
weather forecast on television some time, and look at the
formula they use. The weatherperson does that huge map
thing, which shows the national weather and cold fronts
and winds. Then they go to the weekly forecast which
breaks it down by day, and gives specific temperature
ranges for a specific area, and discuss how the stuff in that
giant weather map is making all this happen. And then
they sum up with how horribly your weekend plans are
ruined.
“This is what I’m going to tell you,” “Tell them,” and
“This is what I just told you.” Your argument is likely to
be a lot longer, but it’s the same basic formula.
Do not put the words, “The End” on the last page. Just
don’t.
Now it’s down to editing. Make sure your footnotes are
properly formatted, your transitional sentences transition,
run spell check, proofread, check your bibliography, and
so on. If you need help with this your university probably
has a writing center that can look things over and give you
advice. Take this stuff seriously, it usually affects your
grade and they’re pretty much easy points. Don’t get
knocked down a grade because of poor spelling, not
formatting footnotes properly, or forgetting a bibliography.
For a lot of professors, this is as much about showing you
understand how to write a paper as saying something
original or even interesting.
Now, finally, go back up to the top of the paper, and
hopefully you’ve gotten each item from the instructions
with a big strikethrough line on it by now. Look at them,
make sure they’re really satisfied, and delete them as you
check. If there’s a portion of the instructions you can’t
strikethrough, you’re not done yet. Do that, and then give
it another final read and hand it in.
This won’t teach you how to write well, but hopefully it
will help you satisfy the technical requirements of the
paper and not lose points because you forgot the word
count or used the wrong citation format.
This also might seem very anal retentive for some people.
I follow this process because I basically look at writing
papers as a job. Set up the procedure, follow it, and go on
to other things. The more standardized it is the easier time
I have getting started, and the less likely I am to forget
something.
And if you think this is anal retentive, I even have a
discussion on handing in papers.
Handing in Papers
This is probably the single best suggestion I can offer
anyone. It’s short, it’s simple, it has probably saved my
butt more than once.
On your desktop, make a folder called Attachments.
When you are done with an assignment and have to
upload it to course management software or print it, copy
it from whatever folder you have it in, and paste it in the
Attachments folder. Don’t move it, you want to keep an
original copy elsewhere. Open it, look at it, make sure it is
the final version of your assignment.
Now go the course management software, and upload it
from the Attachments folder, and only from the
Attachments folder. Or print from the Attachments folder,
and only from the Attachments folder.
I know this sounds like a waste of time, but it helps you
make certain you know which version of a paper you are
handing in to your professor. If you have ten versions of a
paper, and number ten is the final version, but you upload
or print number nine, your grade is going to suffer. If you
click on the wrong line in a folder and send
grocery_list.rtf instead of grad_app.rtf, you might have
just sunk yourself.
I used this system, and still use it for resumes and job
applications. Nothing gets sent out or printed unless it’s in
that folder. It’s not a fool-proof system, but it’s at least
idiot resistant.
As far as file formats go, if you’re printing hard copy it
doesn’t really matter. If you’re uploading, I like to upload
a doc or docx and pdf format of the file, assuming you can
upload multiple files. If your professor has a specific file
format in the instructions or the syllabus, that trumps
everything. Use that format. If they don’t and one of you
is using a twelve year old copy of word, you might have
some formatting problems between the two programs. If
no file format is specified, the pdf will at least show them
that it’s a software compatibility problem.
Don’t use weird file formats. I love LibreOffice, but I
would never upload a file in odt format unless the
professor specifically requested that format.
So just stick to common file formats (doc and even rtf
should be safe, pdf as a backup if possible), and use that
Attachments folder.
It’ll save you some frustration, and you’ll probably get
plenty of that from group projects.
Group Projects
I think it’s fair to say that group projects are the bane of
many a library school student’s existence. Not because
there’s anything inherently bad about working in groups,
but mainly because of scheduling. Trying to synchronize
the schedules of 4-6 people between classes, work, and all
their other commitments can be a nightmare. And for
some reason a lot of library programs love group projects.
It’s a running joke among certain faculty.
There are a lot of reasons given for having so many group
projects. Some are, in my opinion, bad reasons and some
are merely mediocre reasons.
I’ve always found the idea that they’re necessary to
prepare people for the workplace to be slightly suspect.
Pretty much every profession that requires a graduate
degree is going to have to work with other people, and I
don’t know of any other programs that require nearly as
many group projects. These people in other programs
seem to do just fine in the work force without having a
group project in every class. This is actually the real
problem, not that group projects are assigned, but that
there are way too many of them.
They also limit your opportunities for individual
accomplishments. Like it or not, it’s a much bigger hassle
to get six people to continue a project and turn it into a
conference presentation or published article than one
person. It’s just extra logistics. And at the end of the day,
no one is going to hire your project group. They’re going
to hire you. If you don’t have something you can sell
yourself with, you’re not going to get the job.
I’ve also heard library schools like group projects because
they sometimes attract people who are, as they say,
lacking the social skills. This forces these people to
interact with their classmates and learn some basic social
skills. I guess the other students get experience working
with people who don’t do well in group projects, which is
in all fairness probably a valuable job skill.
The only other reason I’ve heard is that people would
sometimes use professors as references, and one of the
questions they would get asked is if the person works well
with others. Again, I guess, but if you’re using a professor
who needs to rely on student evaluations of your group
work as a reference, you’re doing it wrong, and I don’t
think that a professor saying your group didn’t complain
about you is going to get you that job.
And at the end of the day, some people do some amazing
things with group projects. The Library as Incubator
Project and Sound of the Archives are both very cool
group projects, but they were also created by people
outside of class, not a group of people put together by a
professor to undertake an assigned project.
Having said all of that, you’re basically stuck with group
projects. You can (probably shouldn’t, but can) raise all
these arguments with your professor, and you’re not going
to win. If you want to mention this in an exit interview for
your program (assuming your program has one), feel free
and maybe it will make things better for someone else
down the road. I’m only telling you this so that you can
look at group projects, recognize them for what they are,
and get what you can out of them with a minimal amount
of fuss.
Learn to use google docs, so you can work on things with
other people without having to email copies of files back
and forth. Try to get everyone to agree on a project,
hopefully one that everyone is interested in doing. Accept
that your way is not the only way to get things done, and
as long as the instructions for the assignment are being
ticked off be happy with the progress. Don’t do all the
work. Do your fair share of the work. Don’t wait until the
last minute to do things, there are other people waiting to
get this handed in as well. Having a project manager, team
leader, or whatever you want to call it can be useful, but
don’t take advantage of that person.
Otherwise, it’s pretty much being a grown up, and not
freaking out.
Which will probably happen, by the way.
Freaking Out
That’s the technical term for the point in graduate school
where you seriously regret your decision and suspect that
you’re not at all qualified and everyone knows you’re just
a big fraud. The thing is, it’s normal, and I’d even go so
far as to say expected for most people. I won’t say it
happens to everyone, but it happens to a lot of people.
LIS programs aren’t the most difficult or rigorous
graduate programs out there, but they should still be
challenging. You’re going to be learning new things, and
if there isn’t some point where you feel like you’re not
getting it, I don’t think you’re getting your money’s worth.
My first semester I had a class where I left every night
feeling like the biggest dummy on the planet, because it
was a tough course and the professor really knew his stuff.
But that also meant I was learning a lot. If you show up to
class every night and leave after two hours of just having
things confirmed or feeling like you’ve had the obvious
pointed out to you... it kind of begs the question of what
you’re doing there in the first place.
So at some point expect to have an assignment that is just
miserable and soul-crushing, or to say something in class
and have someone correctly point out that you’re flat-out
wrong, or get a paper back that you didn’t do as well on as
you thought you did. It happens to pretty much everyone.
It’s usually a brief or temporary thing, and if it is just do
whatever you need to do to get over it. Take a shower, pet
a puppy, find an all you can eat Mexican buffet and fill the
void in your soul with tacos. Maybe not all at once. Talk it
over with a friend or significant other. Clean your
bathroom. Jump on your bed and yell and flail. Whatever.
If it’s really serious or ongoing, you can talk to your
academic advisor or your campus mental health services
people. No one wants to see you fail out, and I seriously
doubt you’ll come up with a problem they haven’t heard
before. They’re there to help, and fixing things before they
become serious problems is better for everyone.
I’m not qualified to give mental health advice, and I’m
mainly writing this just to let you know that moments of
doubt are common. You’re doing something challenging,
and if you were an undergrad academic rock star you’re
going to take a few more hits to the ego than you’re used
to taking. Use support networks if you need to, don’t
panic, and work your way through.
But what if you really screw something up?
Really Screwing Something Up
So what if you miss a deadline, or your computer crashes
and you don’t have something backed up, or you
scheduled your vacation the week a major assignment is
due?
Well, hopefully it wasn’t something you could have
avoided, but in any case I have two principles here for
you:
1. Tell the truth and you probably won’t get in more
trouble than you deserve.
2. If you’re asking for help getting out of a jam, make it as
easy as possible for the person you’re asking the favor
from to help you, and don’t make it look like you’re being
rewarded for screwing up.
The first one is really pretty simple. If you forgot a
deadline, or put something in your calendar wrong, or
screwed up in some other way, just tell the truth, tell them
what you’re doing to make sure it doesn’t happen again,
and tell them what you’re doing to make it right. Make it
clear you’re not asking for any favors at this stage. If they
offer a favor, feel free to take them up on it, but part of
being responsible is accepting consequences.
“Hey, I totally let things get away from me this past week,
and didn’t realize how many things were due. I’m sorry,
I’m working ahead now on some projects so I’ll have
more of a buffer, and I’ll have that assignment for you
tomorrow. I understand there will be late penalties on the
grade, and totally understand.”
There you go. You screwed up, you’re doing something to
make sure it doesn’t happen again, you know what the
consequences are and you’re not complaining. Aside from
actually getting it right the first time, I don’t know what
more anyone could ask.
But what if you really do need that favor, for whatever
reason?
First, accept that you might not get it, and you’ll survive.
But stack the deck as much in your favor as possible.
Do this by already having alternatives or solutions ready
for the person you’re inconveniencing. If you just say, “I
can’t do this at the time or the way I’m supposed to, how
can I do it differently?” you’ve just dumped a problem in
someone’s lap. You’re still going to be dumping a problem
in someone’s lap, but if you give them solutions at the
same time, it helps.
Offer two or three solutions to the problem that
inconvenience the person as little as possible. If you need
to reschedule a meeting, offer to come by during office
hours, or some other time they’re already on campus.
Don’t make them make a special trip just because you
need to reschedule something. If you can’t take an exam
on time, offer to take it with another section of the same
class (earlier, if possible), or make a special trip to campus
to fit their schedule. You’re the one asking for a favor,
make it as easy and painless as possible for the other party
and you’re a lot more likely to get that request granted.
There’s another reason to offer solutions as well. They
might not be ideal, but if you offer solutions you can make
sure that whatever alternative your professor selects isn’t
worse than the original problem. The last thing you want
is to have someone do you a favor that makes things even
worse.
Generally, try not to get into these situations in the first
place though.
And avoid incompletes if at all possible.
INCOMPLETES BAD! TREE PRETTY!
Most situations in grad school are pretty individualistic,
but incompletes are almost always bad news. Basically
this occurs when you have a major paper or project, and
you don’t have it done by the time course grades go in for
the semester. Your professor has given you an extension,
but they have to put something in the grade box so they
mark down an incomplete for the course.
And your life can now be screwed up in so many ways.
First, you still have to finish the project. And that’s going
to be work on top of the regular work next semester. If
you didn’t have the time to get it done when it was due,
what are the chances you’ll have time next semester when
new courses start and you have to finish those as well?
Even if you can get it done, that incomplete counts as a
zero until it’s resolved. Which doesn’t sound like a big
deal, but if you need a certain GPA or number of credits
for financial aid, you might not have it anymore (oh yes,
financial aid can and has been withheld from people
because of incompletes lowering their GPA). If you need a
certain GPA to stay in a program, you’ve got that working
against you as well.
Depending on the instructor, incompletes might take a hit
on grading as well (they are, by definition, late). If you
can hand in a project now and get an 80% on it, your
grade will still be higher than if you hand in a project a
month later that gets a 95% raw score, but looses 30% for
being late. And if you hand it in now it’s over and done
with.
Also, never, ever assume that not handing something in
will get you an incomplete. You need to talk to your
professor, or that assignment will probably get a zero.
Incompletes are something that might happen, if you have
a good reason and whatever other requirements the
professor needs, not automatic.
In certain circumstances, incompletes might be necessary
or they might even have helped people. But they’ve
always seemed like a bad idea to me.
So how can you make sure you make your deadlines, and
don’t need an incomplete?
How to Meet Deadlines
Well, the obvious answer to making deadlines is to know
when your stuff is due and get it done on time. There are
plenty of tools to help you track your schedule, from
custom software to google calendar to an old fashioned
paper pocket calendar. Having a primary and a backup
isn’t a bad idea, in case you lose one or net access.
Copying all the stuff off the syllabus for each class is a
good start.
Otherwise, I tried to work about a week ahead on stuff.
That was a good compromise for me between not being
rushed to get things done last minute, and actually
remembering what I had read or done so I could discuss it
in class. This is easier to do for some classes than others,
but it should be workable. It gives you a nice buffer of up
to thirteen days or so if you need it (you’re one week
ahead, and have one week to do whatever is due the next
week), which should cover most emergencies. If you have
to take more than thirteen days off of class for something,
it’s probably so major that graduate school is no longer
your primary concern.
Please note that’s work a week ahead, not turn things in a
week ahead of time. I tried to turn things in about twenty-
four to forty-eight hours ahead of time for stuff handed in
electronically (in case of system or ISP outages), and the
day it was due for paper assignments. Go ahead and print
paper assignments or put a copy of the final assignment in
the attachments folder when they’re done, just wait to turn
them in. The reason being, if you hand something in a
week ahead of time and there are errors, you clearly had
time to fix them and didn’t. Which can make you look like
a schmuck.
Otherwise, learn to skim articles rather than reading and
trying to commit every word to memory, accept that you’ll
miss out on some fun things, and just make yourself do
stuff.
Oh, and don’t take grades more seriously than you should.
How Much Should I Worry About Grades?
Some people are absolutely determined to wring every
possible point they can out of an assignment. And they
shouldn’t be. They want good grades, but that’s not the
point of the assignment. And it can get them a lot of extra
work, for very little reward.
The assignment is there to teach you something, and the
grade is there to provide you with feedback on how well
you learned that something. Then you get an overall grade
at the end of the class, and a lot of people focus on that
way too much, especially for minor assignments that
aren’t worth many points.
I’m not going to convince people not to worry about their
final grades (and you should, to a point), but at least look
at the math and realize how little difference a few points
on a minor assignment can make in that final grade.
Hypothetically you have an assignment that’s worth 5% of
your final grade. That means every percentage point on
this minor assignment is worth 0.05 of the 100 percentage
points of your final grade. That decimal point is not a
mistake. Every 20 points on this assignment is one point
on your final grade. The math breaks down as follows:
100% on the assignment is 5.0% towards your final grade.
90% on the assignment is 4.5% towards your final grade.
80% on the assignment is 4.0% towards your final grade.
And so on. What I’m trying to get across is that a 20%
difference in the grade on this assignment only translates
to a 1% difference in your final grade. That’s not much.
Beating your brains out to get an extra five percent on this
assignment (or arguing with your professor over five extra
points) will only get you an extra 0.25 percent on your
final grade. That’s one fourth of one percentage point.
You could get a solid F (50%) on this assignment, and
only lose 2.5% on your final grade. Now that’s significant,
and could drop you a letter grade, but that’s also really
screwing up the assignment. You should take small
assignments seriously, because they do add up and you
still need to know this stuff. And you’ll look like a jerk if
you blow them off. The problem is with the people
arguing over two and three points on an assignment worth
not very much of their final grade. They don’t seem to
understand the amount of effort versus the amount of
reward here.
So why am I going on and on about this?
It’s because this is all related to budgeting your time,
setting priorities, and getting things done. If you have a
class with three assignments, one worth 5% of your grade,
one worth 30%, and one worth 50% (we’ll assume the
other 15% is attendance and participation for stats
purists), and you are spending equal time on all three
assignments you are wasting a lot of time on one
assignment worth 5%, hopefully spending the right
amount of time on the one in the middle worth 30%, and
spending way too little time on the third assignment worth
50%.
When your professor set those percentages, they were
telling you something. The 5% assignment is important
enough to go over in class and grade, but not that big a
deal in the grand scheme of things. Don’t lose any sleep
over it. The 30% is pretty important, and you should
devote some significant time to it. The 50% assignment
reflects a major component of the subject, and is
something you should know well before you consider
yourself proficient in the subject matter of the course.
And you should devote your time accordingly. It’s just a
rough guide, and you should always do even the small
assignments and try to do well on them. Just try to
remember that you have a limited amount of time, a
certain amount of assignments, and some are more
important than others. You need to budget your time
accordingly.
Because there’s plenty to do outside of class, like student
orgs.
Student Organizations
Student organizations are really good opportunities, but
can be difficult to balance. They can give you experience
you can’t get anywhere else, but they can also eat your
time if you’re not careful. They also tend to be
organizations which are pretty relevant to what people are
interested in, if for no other reason than they’ve survived.
When you have an all volunteer organization that turns
over its entire membership every two years, simply being
around awhile is pretty impressive.
So they’re usually organizations centered around things
people are interested in, and this can lead to people trying
to be a member in every student organization. That’s not
necessarily a bad thing, but it’ll eat up a lot of time. From
a purely pragmatic perspective I would suggest being
really active and trying to be an officer in one
organization, or being pretty active in two student
organizations. After that the experience you get will
probably become kind of redundant.
What you’re going to get are opportunities to do some
applied things relevant to the group such as fundraising,
networking, leadership opportunities, plus whatever else
comes down the line. Some student orgs are associated
with national organizations, some aren’t. I don’t think
there’s much difference in the experience either way.
Being an officer looks nice on a c.v., but isn’t as important
as what you do. If you want to do something just suggest
doing it at a meeting and put yourself in charge. You’ll
still get the experience, it’ll still be your project, you just
won’t have the title or “official” duties. If enough people
think it’s a good idea and invest their time, you’re more
likely to have a successful project. If no one else invests
their time, it still might be a good idea but it’s just not the
right group of people or time.
That happens because these are volunteer organizations.
You can’t really run them from the top-down, if you or an
officer try to be an autocrat and order people around your
members will, in all likelihood, just stop showing up and
doing things. Help them work on projects they want to do,
and you’ll have a much better chance of success.
Otherwise, look back over those job ads, see if the student
org can get you any experience you can use to fulfill the
requirements, and try not to let it consume your every
waking moment.
There are other things to do that with, like trying to get
published.
Getting Published
If you can do well on your papers in grad school, you
probably stand a decent chance of getting published. It’s
hard work, but probably not as hard as you think it is, and
there are some good reasons to try to get published.
For academic librarians, if you’re tenure track you’ll
probably need to publish to get tenure, and even if you
don’t it shows you’re familiar with the process. Even for
librarians who aren’t formally required to publish, it
shows potential employers you can set long term goals
and accomplish them, you can work with others, you can
conduct research and report the findings, and that you can
write well. All things that most, if not all, employers are
interested in.
So where to start? Well, for your first paper it helps if you
work within a discipline you’re familiar with. If you come
from a humanities background, think about getting
published in humanities type journals. If your
undergraduate degree was in a social science, do
something in that vein, and so on. It’s certainly possibly to
get published in another area, but if you’re more familiar
with the kind of articles that get published, the citation
style, the format, and the field in general that will help
you get the first paper published and build some
confidence.
From there I recommend you take a class with a major
(probably 15 page minimum) paper assignment. Mention
to the professor at some point that you’d like to try to
publish, and ask them if they’d be willing to critique your
paper with that in mind when they grade it. The down side
to this approach is that if your professor does the extra
work and you never try to publish it, you look like a jerk.
So make sure you’re willing to invest some time and
effort in this before you ask others for help.
The advantage here is you have a Ph.D., or at least a
Master’s with several years experience critiquing your
paper and holding you to a certain standard. This is a huge
advantage, and I’d encourage everyone to take advantage
of it while they can.
By the end of the semester you hopefully have a paper
you’ve spent significant time on, and your professor has
looked it over and offered some suggestions that might
make it publishable. Incorporate those suggestions, and
then look around for possible journals to submit to.
The quickest way to find a journal is to look at your
footnotes and bibliography. If you have some journals that
show up quite a bit in your citations, you’re probably
doing the kind of research that they publish. Check their
submissions guidelines and see if your article looks like a
good fit.
LIS seems pretty open to publishing from people still
getting their Master’s degree, journals in other disciplines
sometimes have a policy of only publishing from Ph.D.s
(some journals will tell you this, some won’t). There are
also journals specifically for graduate student publishing.
Library Student Journal (LSJ) seems to be the big one for
library science, and in the interest of full disclosure I have
published an article in LSJ. They have different sections
for different kinds of submissions, and are open to a wide
variety of topics.
My experience with LSJ was very positive. There is a
decision to make here though: Do you publish in a journal
specifically for graduate students, or do you publish in a,
for lack of a better term, regular journal. Honestly, either
one looks good on a resume. This isn’t something a lot of
people do, and getting published in a graduate student
journal is nothing to sneeze at. The regular journal might
count towards tenure requirements if that comes up, but
that’s a ways down the road.
It mostly boils down to an honest appraisal of your work.
If it looks like the sort of thing that a regular journal
would publish, you should probably go ahead and submit
to one. If they don’t accept it, you can always try other
journals or a grad journal later. You can submit to a less
prestigious journal if you’re rejected, but once it’s
published that’s where it’s published. It’s up to you and
how much time you’re willing to spend, and how
ambitious you are.
Now that you’ve chosen an initial journal to submit your
article to, you need to make your article conform to their
submission guidelines. Be aware, you’re not sending in a
finished article at this point. You’re just sending in
something good enough to get the editor to send it out for
peer review. This is why spelling, grammar, punctuation,
and following the submission guidelines to the letter are
critical. It shows you take this seriously, and you’re not
going to need a lot of hand holding. If an editor has two
manuscripts, and one is going to require a lot of correction
and didn’t follow the submission guidelines, and one did,
I’m pretty sure I know which one is going to get rejected.
Make people’s lives as easy as possible, and they’ll be
more likely to work with you.
So follow the guidelines. Make sure the word count is
acceptable, formatting is correct, proofread carefully, and
don’t give them a reason to say, “No.”
Then you send it in, and wait... and wait... and wait...
Hopefully you’ll get some sort of email from the editor
notifying you that they received your manuscript, and
giving an approximate timeline. If not, they received the
submission and will email you when they make an initial
decision. This can take awhile. What’s happening is the
editor is reading your manuscript, and deciding whether to
send it out for peer review or not.
There are three possible answers. They reject it, in which
case you look for somewhere else to publish. They
suggest revisions before they send it out for peer review,
in which case you make the changes and send it back in.
Finally, they can accept it for peer review, in which case
they send it out anonymously to professionals or
professors in the field who look it over and critique it. For
non-research papers it is possible they’ll skip the peer
review process, in which case it might just get accepted.
When your paper is accepted for peer review, you’re back
to waiting. This can really take awhile. What’s happening
is your paper is being sent out for critique by professors
and professionals in the field (or fellow students in some
cases, such as LSJ). These people are busy with their own
stuff during the academic year, and during break they’re
on their break. They’re also almost always unpaid
volunteers, and doing this in their very scarce free time.
So these critiques are slowly making their way back to the
editor. It can take months for this to be completed, or
years in the case of some of the more prestigious journals.
When the editor has all the feedback from the peer
reviewers, they will send it to you along with any notes
they themselves might have.
At this point, you revise your article based on the
feedback. This can be a lot of work, or not very much at
all depending on the article you sent in, and the people
doing the peer review. My advice at this point is to follow
the feedback, even if you don’t necessarily agree with it.
When you have a few more publications and experience,
and some reputation in the field, then you might have
more room to argue. For now, the reviewers probably have
a lot more experience, and were chosen for their
knowledge of the subject. Probably best to follow their
lead.
So you either need to make the revisions, or at least offer
the editor a good reason you couldn’t. Getting feedback
you can’t follow does happen. Sometimes you get
contradictory feedback, and you can’t satisfy one reviewer
without ignoring the other (think “This is irrelevant, omit
it” versus “This section needs to be expanded, look at
these sources”). Sometimes they suggest you look into
something more closely, and it turns out there’s nothing
there. Just go through the feedback item by item, and
make a list of the feedback you couldn’t follow and why.
You’ll include this in a separate document when you
resubmit. Don’t forget that during the revision process you
also need to update changes in your bibliography and
footnote new material.
Keep in mind, at this point you are writing for an audience
of one: the editor. Make sure you follow their suggestions,
and when you’ve ticked off every item of feedback, send
it back along with comments on feedback you couldn’t
follow.
Now, you get to wait again. Hopefully it won’t take as
long this time. But it might.
At some point the editor sends you their second decision.
Probably either acceptance or more revisions, it’s kind of
rare to send an article out for peer review and not publish
it, provided the critiques are satisfied. If it’s more
revisions, revise and resubmit. If it’s acceptance,
congratulations but don’t break out the champagne just
yet. You’ve still got a little more to do, but the hard part is
over.
You’ll probably have to look over some galley proofs and
make any minor grammar or spelling corrections that are
necessary. This is just proofreading, and nothing you
haven’t done before. There will probably be a contract of
some sort, you’ll want to read this carefully and make sure
you’re not signing over any rights you don’t want to sign
over. That’s up to you. Depending on the publication and
article you might need to provide images or pictures, or
send in whatever charts of graphs you have in the format
they require.
After that, you’re pretty much done. Just more waiting
until it actually comes out in published form. Then you
can sit down and read your paper.
If you have a distinctive writing style, this can be a little
odd. By the time your article has gone through peer
review, editing, and everything else it might not look to
you like something you wrote. That’s okay. I look at the
articles I’ve had published and while they don’t look like
something I would instantly recognize as mine, the
contributions other people made created a stronger article.
It really is a group effort, and is part of being a member of
the LIS community.
This probably sounds like a lot of hard work, and to a
certain extent it is. But there’s a lot of waiting in between,
where you’re not doing anything with the article because
you can’t proceed without feedback. I really think most
people capable of writing an A research paper are capable
of getting published, if they put in the time and effort.
Although after you’re published there’s still one thing left
to do, and for some people it’s the hardest part.
You need to make sure people know about it, and take
credit for all the hard work.
Self-Publicizing
There are people who do awesome things. There are
people who talk about what they do. You want to be in the
narrow cross-section of people who manage to do both.
You gotta do it, because if you don’t advocate for yourself
no one else will.
You don’t have to brag here, just look at it as sharing good
news with like minded professionals. When a professor
has a book published or gets a research grant, they
definitely let people know.
As a student, there are some different ways to do this. One
of the easiest is that if your department has a student
newsletter, send in anything that you accomplish outside
of class relevant to the profession. If you have an article
published, give a conference presentation, or get a grant,
let people know.
There might be journals that have sections devoted to
members who accomplish things, and you could send
them news. Probably the easiest way is just to thank
anyone who helped you, no matter how tangentiality. If a
professor gave you the original idea or helped you on a
project, say thanks and let them know how that idea
turned out.
There are good reasons for doing this, beyond it helping
you get a job some day. When you accomplish something,
it reflects well on your program. It gives something back
to the professors and people in the program, and builds
you some political capital. It’s basically a courteous thing
to do for the people who helped you, but there are
pragmatic reasons as well.
You want to do this, because when you get a job you’re
going to be expected to promote your projects and
institution. If you’re in charge of a library program that
succeeds you will be expected to report on that success to
your superiors, to the people paying your salary, and to the
profession. It looks good for the library, and it makes it
easier to get funding, secure grants, and lets people know
there are good people working there.
So you might as well get used to it now.
This is more a frame of mind thing than anything else, so I
don’t have much more to say about it. Just remember two
things: If you did something, you have every right to be
proud of it. And the only person who will ever care more
about what you have done then yourself is your mom.
Unless she’s hiring, you need to let people know about
your accomplishments. Doing great things isn’t going to
help you get a job if no one knows about them, so you
need to talk yourself up. And a great place to do that is
conferences.
Conferences
Conferences are a lot like student organizations. They’re
great for learning, networking, and self-promotion, but
they can eat up big chunks of time.
While a student I did a conference a year, and wish I had
made it a conference a semester. They really are great
opportunities, but you’re pretty much blocking off 3-5
days, as well as spending money on hotel, food, and
travel. Check with your department, they might have
funds to help student conference travel which will defray
the costs. Most conferences charge lower admission for
students, and quite a few also offer travel grants, so check
that out.
The time is pretty much non-negotiable, but often well
spent.
If you’ve never been to a conference, here’s what
generally happens. You’re going to sit and listen to people
present papers and talk about their projects. How they do
this depends on what their background is, for the most
part. Some people read papers verbatim, others stand and
talk. There’s usually a question and answer period at the
end.
Feel free to ask questions, a room full of blank faces is
kind of terrifying when you’re up there.
Dress like a grownup. You’ll see people in jeans and t-
shirts, but these people probably already have jobs and
aren’t worried about impressing anyone. Turn off your cell
phone. You’re here to meet people and talk to them, and
staring at your twitter feed all day isn’t going to help you
do that. Be positive, it’s a small world and this isn’t the
time or place to badmouth professors, programs, or other
professionals.
You’ll need to talk to strangers. If you can’t do this
already it’s a good time to learn. It’ll help you with job
interviews, dealing with colleagues, and maybe even your
dating life. One of the best places to talk to strangers is the
chow line. There’s usually a break once or twice a day
with drinks and light snacks, and there’s always a line. Get
in line between two people you don’t know and start a
conversation.
If there are student presentations (there’s usually a poster
and paper session), send something in. It makes it more
likely you’ll get funding from your department, and you
meet a lot of people. It’s another thing that looks good on
the resume as well, and if you’ve done a class project you
might as well get as much mileage out of it as possible.
Business cards are a good idea. There are plenty of places
online that will sell you 500 business cards for $25 or so,
and they offer a variety of templates to help you design
your card. If you’re strapped for cash you can also just
design the card and have it printed out multiple times on a
single sheet of 8.5 x 11 inch card stock paper at a local
print shop. You’ll have to cut them apart yourself, but it
saves on money, and you don’t have to buy them 500 at a
time. It’s a good way to get your contact info out there,
especially if you meet someone you want to collaborate
with on a project later.
You’re investing a lot of time here, and should try to get
all you can in return.
Speaking of which, conferences make excellent blog
fodder. If there’s an official blog for the conference, you
can volunteer to blog about the sessions you attend. Make
sure you spell people’s names correctly (I learned that the
hard way), and just write about the session and what you
thought about the material. Social media is pretty big right
now, and it will get your name out there.
Speaking of social media...
Social Media
I started out planning the usual post about not putting up
drunken political rants and pictures of yourself punching a
cop on facebook, but then decided that if you need to be
told that you’re probably not reading this blog anyway.
Instead, I’d like to talk about making social media work
for you. I haven’t done many, if any, of these things so
take it with a grain of salt. They’re just some suggestions,
things I wish I had done when I was in SLIS.
First, let’s talk platforms. Different kinds of social media
do different things well. Twitter is more or less a
conversation, it’s good for immediate back and forth
posting. Blogging is good for doing what I’m doing here,
explaining things, talking at some length. Facebook is
somewhere in the middle. You’re talking more than on
twitter, and you want to be able to get comments, but
you’re less concerned about back and forth with your
audience or being able to write extensively and keep
things in a certain order.
What you can do with each is use it as a networking tool,
and a way to gain experience. Libraries and archives are
big into social media at the moment, and depending on
your job you might not be able to gain work experience
with social media, or web 2.0, or whatever they’re calling
it these days. You can use it on your time though. Some
employers might not consider it practical experience, but
it’s better than nothing.
So you can use it to check off one of those items on those
job ads. You can also use it as a networking tool.
Use it to publicize your projects and accomplishments, or
use it to create some. You’re in class, you’re reading and
learning a lot, you’re doing projects and (you might not
believe this) there are probably some people who are
genuinely interested in hearing what you have to say.
You’re learning about the most current material in the
field, you’re closer to a colleague than a student now, and
some people have nostalgic feelings about their own time
in the LIS program.
So use it. Blogs, twitter, and facebook are all free. If you
do have a little money to spend you can get your own
web-hosting and domain name for a blog or web page.
Packages vary, but it should run you around $100-$150 a
year for basic web-hosting and a registered domain name.
Then use it, create a project and make yourself some
publicity. Stick with it, get some readers, and use that
platform to subtly mention related projects, presentations,
or things you’re doing.
I recommend finding a theme and focusing on it, as
opposed to going all over the place and changing topics
every week. I talk about a lot of different stuff here, but
it’s tied together by a theme of advice for LIS students.
Set a consistent schedule for posting and stick to it, if you
can’t you’ll look like you lack follow-through.
Working ahead is always a good idea, in case something
comes up. I had about a month (12 posts at three posts a
week) of material written before I started posting. Now I
write three posts on the weekend, schedule them for the
next week, and sketch drafts or think of topics through the
week. Always spellcheck and proofread. You want to look
professional, even if this is a hobby.
And if you don’t have a project at the moment to talk
about, make one. Make some instructional videos about
using information resources and upload them, or take
some pictures of your local libraries, or just books that
you find interesting. Special collections, archives,
libraries, they’re all full of interesting things. Make them
work for you. More on that later.
The other thing you can do is make other people’s social
media work for you. Find information professionals and
follow their blogs, facebook pages, or twitter feeds.
Comment on their blogs (use your real name) and they
might recognize you when you apply for a job. At the very
least you’ll have a better chance of knowing what their
institution is doing, and being able to have a conversation
about their projects. It’s like traditional networking, but
you can do it from behind a computer, read and edit your
words before you post them, and take your time thinking
of something intelligent to say. Just say smart things, ask
questions, and have a conversation.
You probably use this stuff already, just transfer it to an
academic or job context. Keep it professional, keep it
positive, don’t mix your business and personal social
media, and think before you post.
That’s my advice. Everyone talks about social media as a
potential liability. Make it work for you instead. Talk
about your amazing projects and what you’re doing.
So how do you get ideas for projects in the first place?
How Do You Get Ideas for Projects?
Far and away the best way I know of to get ideas for
projects is to immerse yourself in the profession. Talk to
colleagues and patrons, read the literature, go to
conferences, read blogs and the news. We are, in a lot of
ways, a profession trying to take down a mountain with a
toothpick. We have some really good toothpicks, but it’s
still a really big mountain. There is a lot more work than
there are hands, and I bet most professionals have more
ideas for projects than they have time or resources to
accomplish those projects.
So have those conversations, and look for gaps in the
knowledge or services. If someone doesn’t address
something in a paper because they didn’t have time,
piggyback on their research and answer that question (and
plunder their bibliography for sources while you’re at it).
If there’s a service not being provided, figure out a way to
do it, (if it’s for an institution ask for permission), and
make it your project. Mention words like volunteer,
unpaid, and ten hours a week and you’ll probably have
more offers than you can accept. Don’t take on too big a
project here, but if you can find something limited that
will help you and others, go for it.
You can also look into turning a potential project into an
independent study, practicum, or internship for course
credit, which will give you deadlines, structure, and
advice from a Ph.D. in the field. It might not feel quite as
much like your own unique project anymore, but I’m
generally of the opinion that more viewpoints make a
project stronger.
But let’s step back a minute, because you don’t just want
to chose a random project. You want to chose a project
that is going to do you some good. At this point you can
start playing the noun-verb and pick a platform game.
Pick a noun related to your chosen field, a relevant verb,
and turn it into a question. The third part is figuring out
how you think you can answer that question.
Children – picking books – tagging. I want to be a K-5
librarian, so I’m going to look at how children (noun)
select books (verb) by asking them to tag (platform) their
selections. There are lots of laws and rules in working
with children, but we’re just in the idea stage here.
Spanish speakers – library usage – data gathering. I want
to be an outreach librarian specializing in Latino
communities, so I’m going to look at Spanish speaking
communities (noun) use of library legal resources (verb)
through interviews, census data, and usage statistics
(platform).
You get the idea. It might not be your final project either,
but it at least gets an idea started, and you can start
reading the literature and talking to people.
Even when you find an idea, you’ve still got a heck of a
lot of work left to do. You need to figure out a method,
you need to check the current research in the field, you
need to design your project and get the resources and
permission to do it. You need to make sure someone will
care, and the question is worth answering. But at the heart
of most projects is a pretty simple noun verb platform
concept.
Mongols – Keep them out – Great big wall
Person – Go to the moon – Rocket ship
And be aware, the examples I mentioned above are pretty
big projects (they’re at least the equivalent of a major
class project). If you want something a little less time
intensive, find a project you can still talk about but that
involves less research. In other words, something skill
based. Process or weed a collection, digitize some
historical photographs, organize a pamphlet collection,
volunteer for a reading program. Redesign someone’s
website for them, write a grant proposal, compile
statistics, make a presentation. These projects sort of just
exist on their own, and you’re not presenting new
information. You’re just doing a project, doing it well, and
talking about it.
There are whole books written on actually doing projects,
so next time I’m just going to hit some highlights on the
sort of projects you might find yourself involved in, and
some pitfalls to avoid.
Project Tips
Probably the big one is to milk a project for everything
you can. The traditional academic project route is to do a
project for class, use that feedback and present at a
conference, and then use that feedback to create a journal
article. Some things work better for some areas of this
process than others, but that’s the traditional get paid three
times for the same academic paper route.
For this blog, I plan to turn it into an e-book when I’m
done. Not because I think I’ll sell any copies, but because
I want to know how to create an e-book. So I’ve got
blogging experience now, I’ve made some contacts with
people who read it (my name is plastered at the end of
every post for that exact reason), and I’ll be able to say I
created an e-book. Neat.
So get everything you can out of a project, but also have
an exit strategy.
I think this is one of the bigger pitfalls for group projects
people start in LIS programs. You need to have some sort
of plan for when everyone graduates and you’re not all in
the same city anymore. Are you going to shut-down the
project, keep it up long distance, or find someone else to
hand it off to? All three are viable strategies, but it’s
something to think about.
As far as this project goes, I made a list of things I wanted
to talk about (added a few and lost a few along the way),
and when it’s done I’ll leave the blog up and monitor it for
comments, but it’s done. I’ve said what I want to say, and
I’ll move on to something else. Unless something is going
to be your life’s work and you can see yourself doing it
ten years from now, you need to know how you’re going
to end it.
You need to do this because of the time issue. I can knock
out three posts on a Saturday morning, but eventually I’m
going to want my Saturday mornings for different things.
Other projects or the ground will thaw and I’ll want to go
hiking or ride a bike or something. I do have some project
ideas I’m not working on because they would never end.
Those are projects usually undertaken by institutions, or
large groups of people. Institutions can keep allocating
resources to the project after you’ve gone on to other
things, and large groups of people can (sometimes) lighten
the load. Large groups of people can also dramatically
expand the amount of work you do on a project, so be
careful.
So know what you’re getting into. Do a private trial run
and figure out how much time and other resources a
project will take, and ask yourself if you’re willing to
make that commitment. There are a ton of blogs out there
that got started and only have three posts because no one
realized that it would take time to maintain them and write
updates.
If you’re not willing to make that commitment, look for
another project. There are plenty out there, so don’t waste
time setting up one that doesn’t matter to you. Generally, I
would suggest starting small. It’s easier to scale up if you
find you have more time or resources, harder to scale
back.
Finally, absolutely positively I am deadly serious follow
ethical and institution guidelines if you are doing this as
part of an institution. It might seem ridiculous, but if
you’re putting this project out there you’re never sure how
people are going to interact with it, and you need to follow
those guidelines. For one thing it keeps you from drawing
your school or workplace into a mess if something goes
wrong, and for another it can keep you from wrecking
your professional career before it even gets started. Those
guidelines are there for a reason, and while no one likes
filling out paperwork or reading manuals, they can save
you a ton of grief down the road.
It’s a good idea to be aware of ethical guidelines anyway,
just because it helps you act, well, ethically. Making sure
you can satisfy that criteria can help you look at your
project critically, as an outsider might. That’s usually
helpful.
So figure out how much time and resources you can
allocate, have an exit strategy, milk that project for
everything you can, follow institutional guidelines, and be
sure to act ethically.
And then you can put it on your e-portfolio.
E-Portfolios
E-Portfolios are just an online resumes or curriculum vitae
(c.v.). There’s nothing mysterious about them. You can
either do an independent webpage, or just put a resume up
on linkedin and you’ll have a basic e-resume. They can do
some things paper can’t, like offer people the ability to
download a writing sample or allow you to use fancier
graphics than you would on a paper resume; however, at
its heart the e-portfolio is a resume with a URL.
I’m probably in the minority on the usefulness of e-
resumes, and I could certainly be wrong. I see e-portfolios
as a useful way to organize your information and set up a
c.v., but I’m skeptical about their usefulness in an actual
job search. A lot of professors in my program liked them
though, and their usefulness will vary depending on what
kind of job you’re applying for.
The more bureaucratic the institution the job you’re
applying for is, the less likely people will be to look at
your e-portfolio during your job search. Hiring
committees tend to have pretty strict rules to make sure
their decisions are impartial, and googling people is
usually against those rules. One position I applied for had
to write up the entire search process and submit it to three
committees to make certain they had followed the proper
procedures. Granted this was a state university, and
smaller or more independent institutions will probably not
have as much oversight, but they still have guidelines.
The reason that institution went through three committees
to make sure they followed procedures is (at least
partially) because they are prohibited by law from hiring
or not hiring based on certain criteria. If they google
someone and find a picture, they might see that the
candidate is older, of a certain gender, religion, or race,
disabled, or from another protected category. If they don’t
hire that person and get sued, they might have to prove in
a court of law that they didn’t use that criteria in their
decision to not hire that individual. Good luck proving
you didn’t think something. I’m not a lawyer, and I don’t
know if that suit would be winnable or not, but it’s
something people worry about. I personally think it’s kind
of unlikely, but if human resources or legal are worried
about that kind of thing, “No googling applicants” might
be a rule the committee has to follow.
For awhile there were a couple of third-party firms that
specialized in searching social media, taking out
information that hiring committees couldn’t use in their
decisions, and passing along what was left to the hiring
institution. I don’t know if they ever got much business or
not, but they were out there. And some hiring committee
members do just google applicants anyway.
So there is a chance someone will see your e-portfolio.
Personally, I take the position that if it’s on my e-portfolio,
and it’s relevant to the job, it’ll be on my application
anyway. The e-portfolio just shows I can make a basic
static web page, which is good, but I’ve never had anyone
mention my e-portfolio in an interview.
As I said, they’re handy for keeping an up to date c.v.
where it can be easily accessed and demonstrating basic
web skills. If you’re asking for a reference from someone
it can be more convenient to send them a link to your c.v.
than a file attachment. And people might see it online
before you’ve even applied for a job at their institution
and remember you.
Ultimately, I don’t see how it can hurt you, but I don’t
think that it’s a magic bullet when it comes down to
getting a job either.
So when should you start applying for jobs, anyway?
Making the Job Search Less Stressful
Take any advice I have to give on applying for jobs
cautiously. I suspect this is also very individual, so if
something doesn’t work for you or the job you’re applying
for, don’t do it.
First, you need to find the job vacancies. There are a
couple of great resources out there that aggregate job
postings. I Need a Library Job and Archives Gig (archivist
here) are two of my favorites. If you’re tech-heavy Code 4
Lib Jobs has some great opportunities. Look around and
see what people in your area use, and subscribe to it.
Check outside libraries as well. Set up notifications for the
big job-hunting sites, and be open to working with private
industry. Look at some jobs and see what terms people use
to describe what you do, and refine your searches and
notifications. Make notifications as automatic as possible
through email alerts or RSS feeds. If you have to, create a
separate (but still professional sounding) email address
just for the job search.
Oh, and if you don’t have a professional sounding email,
get one. Don’t use your student email because that will
probably be canceled after you graduate.
The next big step for me was organizing the jobs I found. I
set up a folder called jobs, and then saved the emails, RSS
notifications, and any jobs I was interested in to that
folder as a pdf file. Name them something that makes
sense, and you don’t have to worry about a bunch of
bookmarks to sort through later.
After that, I looked at each job and created a folder. The
name of that folder was the date three days prior to the
deadline application for that job. So if the deadline
application was August 15, 2012, the folder would be
08/12/12. Move the pdf file for the job into the folder,
arrange the folders by name, and you have a nice
chronological list of deadlines for applications.
Then I set up an applied_for folder, and a rejected folder
within the jobs folder. Pretty self-evident what these are
for, and I try to keep them both pretty full.
As far as applying for jobs, it’s basically the same process
you used to apply to grad school. You’ll probably need a
cover letter, c.v. or resume, and three references,
preferably professional. Write the cover letter as a formal
business letter. If you don’t have a name to send the
application to, start off with Dear selection committee: or
Dear hiring committee:. My closing is always Sincerely.
There is the occasional news story of someone doing a
wacky cover letter or resume and getting hired. My
opinion is that these are news stories because everyone is
surprised that they worked. Personally, I avoid those
tactics. They might work, but that’s not the way to bet.
Cover letters in general are rough for me. I’ve written a
lot, and still have a hard time with doing them well. I’d
suggest reading this post by Attempting Elegance for what
I think is some really good advice. Basically, what you’re
trying to do is use your cover letter to relate your c.v. to
the position you’re applying for.
Your c.v. should be tailored to that job, but your cover
letter explains why the experience and projects on your
c.v. make you a great candidate for the position. Keep it
formal, don’t go over two pages. Some people say one
page, but I mostly apply to academic type institutions. I
figure people at academic institutions are used to reading
longer narratives, so as long as I’m saying things relevant
to the position I go up to two pages. Just make sure you
cover all the necessary qualifications and as many of the
preferred as possible.
If you read the post on how to write a paper, I use the
same system here. Copy and paste in the qualifications,
and cross them off as they are addressed. Don’t stop
writing until you’ve explained how you satisfy every
single one. Write the middle first, and then summarize at
the beginning and end. You should be good at writing
papers by now, and this is just another paper titled “Why I
am the Best Candidate for This Job.”
It can be really difficult to establish any kind of narrative
flow in a cover letter, but there should be one overall
theme tying the job together. That can help you at least get
started. Tie everything back into the position or the
institution, and it should read pretty well.
If you’re at all specialized, there will probably be certain
broad categories of experience you address over and over
again in different job applications. What you can do is
save a generic paragraph describing your experience in
those areas, and then use that in multiple job applications.
You’ll still need to explain how your experience relates to
the current position, but it can save you some time.
When I’m done with the letter I save (or export depending
on your word processor) as a pdf so I’m sure they’ll
display properly no matter what system someone is using.
After you’ve gotten your cover letter you do your c.v. I
keep a master c.v. with everything I’ve ever done on it,
and then delete any items that aren’t relevant to the
current job. “Save as” and you’re good to go.
Listing relevant coursework on your c.v. can also be a
good tactic, but make sure it’s relevant. No one wants to
read through every single class you ever took if it’s not
relevant to the position. The other thing you need to do is
explain why that experience is relevant.
Say you have a job that specifies experience with
contentDM, and you took a digital library class. Don’t just
put “Digital Libraries Class 3 credit hours” down, mention
that for that class you created an original digital library
with 16 unique objects including selection of material,
scanning, creation of preservation and display copies,
upload to the contentDM platform, and assignment of
modified Dublin Core metadata. Generally, identify major
projects for the class that relate to the position, and if
necessary add a brief explanation (one sentence) of the
course topic if it’s not evident from the title.
Generally, I would say address any qualification you can
with job experience, then volunteer experience, and then
classroom experience. Those last two might be reversed
depending on the circumstances. And I do count
practicum or internship courses as job experience (you
just got paid in credit hours rather than money). I think
most employers do as well, just make sure you explain
what you did for that practicum or internship.
The key here, and this goes for any application whether it
be for a job, or a scholarship, or admission to graduate
school, is to let people see what they want to see. If they
want to see a metadata librarian, you need to figure out
what it is about you that fulfills that criteria, and let them
see it front and center. Every experience and class you
have had that relates to being a metadata librarian as
defined by that job posting needs to be on display. You
can’t make them say yes, but you can make it very
difficult for them to say no. Right now you need to make
sure you end up in the phone interview pile and not the
reject pile.
Finally, and again this is critical for any writing, know
when to stop. Answer the questions clearly and concisely,
and then stop talking. Every word in that application
should be telling the committee why you will rock that
job. If it’s not, it doesn’t belong. Take it out.
We’ve talked about selecting references before, and most
of that is still true. For me the only difference between
grad school and job applications is I lean heavily towards
professional references for a job, and I’m sending out a lot
more applications. I started out asking every time I used
someone as a reference, and then just asked people if I
could use them in general. When I had a phone interview I
sent them a polite email saying I’d had a phone interview,
they might get a reference contact, and gave a brief
description of the position. I also usually attached the
position description in case they wanted to look at. It
worked out well, but always take the wishes of your
references into account.
That’s my general plan. It covers about 90% of my
applications. Bear in mind, these applications are for
government and academic or cultural heritage institutions.
Private industry might have very different rules, and I
suggest you do some checking about applying for those
jobs on your own.
There are also some unusual cases, which I’ll describe
next post.
Unusual Job Hunt Circumstances
Every job application is unique, but most of them follow a
basic format. Send us a c.v., cover letter, three references,
and maybe answer some demographic data that won’t
effect your application. This post is about the unusual stuff
I’ve run into over the course of my search, or heard about
from others.
One job didn’t require a cover letter. They just had three
questions you answered. I’m not sure why they did it that
way, but that was their system. Some positions will give
you specific things to address in your cover letter as well.
The federal government has their own system, and doesn’t
seem to ever require a cover letter. You upload your c.v.
and sometimes answer questions about your experience,
but I’ve never had to write an actual cover letter for a job
application with the federal government. These jobs also
go up and are closed quickly (1-2 weeks seems standard) a
lot of the time, so if you see one you want note the closing
date. Finally, veterans get preferential hiring for federal
jobs they are qualified for, so be aware of that when
applying.
Some applications will ask for your desired salary. This is
a horrible question to ask someone because there’s no
good answer. If you ask for too high a salary, your
application is out. If you supply a figure that’s not too
high, you’ve set the upper limit for any salary negotiations
right there. They’re not going to exceed it, even if they
have the extra money for the position. You’re being asked
to price yourself out of the market, or give them an upper
limit for your financial compensation before you’ve even
been offered the job.
There are a couple of ways to deal with this question.
Look around and see what the job typically pays, and if
you’re okay with that salary just put that salary down. The
other option is to supply a range, and stress that you view
salary as part of your total compensation package and
would need to discuss other benefits before you could
supply a firm figure. This is usually how I answer this
question, but I’ve never gotten an interview for a position
with this question so it might not be working well.
The final way to deal with this question is to ask for a
high salary and probably disqualify yourself. Figure out
what you think the salary should be, and add $25,000 or
so dollars a year to it depending on the cost of living
where it’s located and the typical salary for that position.
You probably won’t get the job, but you might have made
everyone else look like a bargain. And if you do get the
job, you’ve got some extra cash. I wouldn’t do this for a
job I really wanted, but if you’re on the fence you might
let them make it worth your while if they want to hire you.
Another annoying scenario is the one where you have to
copy your entire c.v. into a form, and sometimes still
upload the c.v. itself. It’s a hassle, but if you want the job,
you have to jump through the hoops. My advice is the first
time you do it create a separate document with all that
information listed without any bullet points or formatting,
so you can just copy and paste it into a form the next time
you run across this situation.
My suspicion is that the places that use forms run the
applications through human resources, who then send the
qualified applicants on to the hiring committee. In cases
like this, I recommend you make sure when you fill out
that form that every single job requirement is spelled out
as it is in the ad.
If the job posting says “Experience with XML” and you
put down “Experience with MODS, METS, PREMIS,
EAD, TEI and ability to quickly learn other schemas and
DTDs,” you didn’t say “experience with XML.” The
hiring committee will probably know that those are XML,
and understand them if they’re in your cover letter or on
your c.v. Human resources personnel, assuming they even
read the application and don’t just do a keyword search
for “experience with XML,” might not. Feel free to
elaborate, but I always made sure those key phrases
showed up somewhere.
Always write to your audience, as best as you can
determine it, and never, ever, give them a reason to say no.
Every word counts and if you have to omit something, do
so, but the goal is to never put down something that will
give them a reason to reject you.
What you can do, which is slightly different, is try to
minimize the impact of any experience you don’t have. If
the job listing requires experience with SQL and you only
know Excel, you can describe your experience working
with relational databases and how you believe that will
transfer to work with SQL. It’s not ideal, but probably
better than nothing.
Those are the unusual circumstances I have run into, none
of them are really bad (except maybe the expected salary
question), but they were a little bit of surprise.
So next post, what do you do after you’ve graduated but
while you’re trying to get that full time job?
What to do After Graduation but Before
you have a Job
Well, that’s really up to you, so I’m just going to tell you
what I did and why. It might work for you, it might not.
Your call.
Looking back, what I mostly lost after graduation was
structure. In school you have people setting deadlines for
you, giving you lists of readings and projects, and
generally making sure you did a certain amount of stuff
over a certain period of time.
When I graduated I had a backlog of projects and readings
I wanted to do while I was in graduate school, but I was
busy with assignments. Without that structure, I tried to do
a lot of things a little bit at a time. Because I wasn’t
focusing on any of them, I did them all kind of poorly and
didn’t get much done.
Full disclosure: I also took about two weeks off of
thinking and just watched television, read for fun, and
drooled a lot.
After those two weeks I fiddled with various projects and
didn’t complete them, I read a lot of blogs and journal
articles but didn’t really think about them, things like that.
What I ended up doing was choosing two projects to focus
on (this blog and a photo cataloging project at work that I
got side-tracked on and am now doing as a volunteer) and
finish them before starting anything new. That gave me
about 20 hours a week of working on projects as a
volunteer or on my own time (I only work 20 hours a
week at the job), which worked out pretty well.
I’m making good progress on the photo cataloging, this
blog is winding down, and I’m not continuously
sidetracking myself. I have ideas for my next project or
projects, but I’m not letting them distract me from getting
these things done. When these things are done, I’ll look at
what I want to start next and get going.
As far as professional reading, I added some structure
there as well. I deleted some blogs that I felt were
redundant or I wasn’t getting much out of from my rss
feed, and set aside Monday night as journal reading night.
I limited myself to four journals, and because they’re
quarterly I can work through back issues as well. Or I can
take a week to read articles on a topic I’m interested in.
Archivaria, The Public Historian, Journal of Archival
Organization, and American Archivist if you’re interested.
Depending on your personality, all this external work
might be totally unnecessary. It seems to be working well
for me though. It keeps me focused, and it keeps me doing
things while giving me free time to socialize.
I am fortunate that I was able to keep working part-time at
the job I had as a graduate student, which also helps keep
me engaged. I do think that remaining professionally
engaged is important. It shows you have a definite interest
in the profession, and helps keep you sharp for job
interviews.
The temptation for me was to just keep taking classes. I
like being in class, and there were plenty of courses I
would have liked to have taken but didn’t have time for
while I was in SLIS. And learning some javascript or ruby
probably would have helped me on the job market. I
didn’t do this for a couple of reasons. One, it does cost
money even if you do it through a community college.
The other reason is, I felt like I shouldn’t need someone to
tell me to learn things at this point. If nothing else, grad
school should give you the intellectual tools to learn
quickly, and there are a lot of free online courses and
tutorials available. I felt like I should be able to use these
to teach myself what I needed to know, without the
structure of a formal course. Your mileage may vary, and
investing in your education is almost always a good idea,
but put some thought into how you do it.
The big advantage to a formal course is, obviously, that
you get a letter grade at the end saying you did it. I could
have taken a course in blogging and wordpress, but I
decided I’d rather just have a blog to show I could do it
and not have to pay the tuition and fees. It works for me,
but your mileage may vary.
Beyond that, I don’t know what to tell you. If you’re
really interested in the profession, you’ll find a way to
stay active. Even if you end up living somewhere without
easy access to a library or historical society (I don’t know
where that would be, but for the sake of argument maybe
you’re in a rural area and don’t have reliable
transportation), you can volunteer time with professional
organizations and work on committees or projects over the
internet. Or even find an online transcription project or
something else you’re interested in to work on. The
internet has made volunteering a lot easier.
Speaking of which, next up: Volunteering versus Jobs. The
pros and cons of each.
Volunteer vs. Work Experience
First of all, I think that any experience is good experience.
And I haven’t spent as much time volunteering as some
people because I had a really good job that let me try
different things. What volunteering I have done is more
oriented towards student groups than volunteering for
work-like functions.
So I lean towards job experience myself, but both
volunteering and jobs have their strengths and drawbacks.
Jobs obviously come with pay, and you’ll have a direct
supervisor evaluating your work. That comes in real
handy for references. The downside is you don’t have
much freedom in choosing hours or projects. In a very real
sense, your time is not your own. On the other hand, this
can show that you’re responsible better than a volunteer
position without a set schedule.
When you volunteer, you can pretty much choose your
project and largely set your own hours. There are
limitations of course. You have to find someone to let you
volunteer at their institution, but most people are pretty
agreeable when you offer them free labor.
You do need to bear in mind that when you volunteer you
are still taking on an obligation or responsibility.
Especially if you need training, they’re diverting resources
to provide that training. Show up once and skip out, and
you’re going to look like a jerk.
I think it’s generally best to offer a certain amount of
hours per week, and a certain number of total hours. Be up
front about this. For example, if you’re volunteering to
catalog some pamphlets, say “I would like to learn to
catalog pamphlets. I can give you 6 hours a week for the
semester, which will be about ninety hours total. I might
miss finals week.”
That way everyone knows what everyone else’s agenda is,
and can make an informed decision. It keeps you from
taking on a volunteer project that never ends, and allows
your contact to find a project that will most benefit from
the amount of labor you’re willing to give.
This applies to individual projects more than group
volunteer projects, and probably the simplest way to
volunteer is just to join a group. You’ve got an in with the
institution, the other volunteers will probably train you (or
at least help), and you get some additional free
networking. You might also pick up some leadership
experience if you stick around long enough.
Personally, I used volunteer experience to get what I
couldn’t get through work. I sat on a grant review
committee to get grant writing and committee experience,
and volunteered to be an officer in the Society of
American Archivists Student Chapter to get leadership
experience. Lately, I volunteered to come in to work
during my off hours because I wanted more cataloging
and visual materials experience.
It was a project I started awhile ago as part of my job and
never got to finish, so there was quite a bit done already. I
want to finish it, and I checked with my supervisor and he
was all for it. By the way, I’m careful to delineate between
when I’m on the clock and volunteering, and I get my
work hours in before I worry about my volunteer project.
Volunteering can take a lot of forms, and I think it looks
pretty good whether it’s directly related to library science
or not. Librarians, archivists, heritage professionals, these
are all service professions. Showing you like helping
people is generally going to be perceived as a positive
thing.
Just find a project that will give you experience you aren’t
getting at your regular job, treat it seriously, and know
when to end it.
Speaking of which, next post will be the last substantive
post. I’ve pretty much said all I have to say, and this is just
a book about getting through grad school. We’ve actually
gone a little past that point in one or two posts, and I just
have a few more miscellaneous thoughts that don’t
warrant an entire post by themselves.
So next time, miscellaneous and wrap-up.
Miscellaneous
These are just some miscellaneous thoughts, minor things
that don’t warrant an entire post on their own.
- If you’re worried about what to call your professor, just
use the same name they introduce themselves with first
day of class. When in doubt, go for more formal, you can
always go to a less familiar form of address from there if
they correct you.
- Read your syllabus. Twice. All of it. Highlight important
things. These are your directions for succeeding in the
class. Know these directions and follow them.
- You can get some textbooks through Inter-Library Loan
or your institutions equivalent. Just make sure you have
the right edition, and be prepared to buy it if it doesn’t
arrive for some reason.
- It probably doesn’t matter, but I once heard about a study
that said prisoners received harsher sentences from judges
right before they left for lunch than prisoners sentenced
after the judge got back from lunch. If you have a favor to
ask someone, or an important meeting you want to go
well, consider scheduling it for after someone gets back
from lunch. Then hope they don’t skip lunch.
- All you’re paying for in graduate school is for someone
to teach you a skill, and then assess how well you learned
it. Grades, feedback, papers, projects, all they are is a way
to learn a skill and determine how well you have mastered
it. Along the way, you’ll be socialized as a member of the
profession. It’s kind of like getting a trade card in a lot of
ways.
- If the SLIS department doesn’t offer a course you want,
you can always take one outside of the department. Just
double check the graduation requirements and make sure
you won’t be short on credits.
- If you can, go to the graduation ceremony. It shows you
appreciate what the department has done for you.
- Be careful when updating programs in the middle of a
project. At the very least save a copy of the paper or
project, make a backup, exit the program, and then update.
Look everything over and make sure it still displays the
file correctly. Most programs play nicely with files from
previous versions, but some don’t.
That’s all I have. A brief administrative note, and then this
book is over...
Wrap-up
This is a book about getting into, getting through, and
getting what you can out of library graduate school. Most
of it is drawn from my experience in a library and
information studies graduate program, some of it from a
history graduate program, and the rest from conversations
with fellow students, colleagues, and instructors.
It is based heavily (read: almost word for word) on a blog
with ran from December 5th, 2012, through February
18th, 2013. I still receive email notifications for
comments, and if you have any questions please feel free
to ask.
That blog is located at http://www.surviving-slis.com/
It is no longer regularly updated, as I pretty much said
everything I had to say. Since the blog ended I have found
a full time job. Life is good.
I hope you found something in here useful, and thank you
for reading.
-Eric Willey
