Thinking about library school? Wondering what it’s really like? Think that online school might be the best/easiest option for your increasingly complicated life? Let me tell you about it, since […]
HLS will be on a break this week as we adjust to new classes and a new semester, but we’ll be back next week with all new content and discussions! […]
The last fifteen months have been rough on all of us. Starting grad school during a pandemic was not easy, and a mix of personal problems and school-related issues made […]
The public library I’ve worked out has been open to the public again since June 1st. Because I started at the library during COVID, except for some limited volunteer experience […]
Summer is an interesting time in the life of a grad student. Some people have internships (mostly remote this summer), those of us who work during the school year are […]
Drum roll please! Here they are: HLS’s newest contributors. We can’t wait to hear how they will “hack” library school! Erika Whinihan Erika Whinihan is an online MLIS student at […]
This is my last post with HLS! In honor of that – and my impending graduation (wow/yikes) – I’d like to present a list of seven things that I learned […]
Are you debating what type of library field you’d like to pursue after graduation? Has it been a challenge for you to sit down and decide your options? Would you […]
Over the past 16 months as a contributing writer and community manager, I found myself in a new world of librarianship that I didn’t know existed. From my very first […]
Dear readers, when you may be reading this, I am currently two weeks away from graduating from my Master of Library and Information Science graduate program at San Jose State […]
This year, I had the privilege of being part of the Chinese American Librarians Association selection committee for the CALA Best Book Award. I’m aware that being part of book […]
Believe it or not, it’s time for my farewell post! While this isn’t the last you’ll hear from me on the blog (updated UMD Hack Your Program post, anyone? 👀 […]
After having participated in five on-campus, academic librarianship interviews, I have learned a good deal through observation and immersion in the market’s ebbs and flows. As a follow-up to “Things […]
Last September, I wrote on how the elementary school library I worked in was providing services despite distance learning. Now, at a new school site and closer to the light […]
Hey there readers! Here at Hack Library School, we pride ourselves on providing engaging, thoughtful, and useful resources for Library and Information Science students. Because we’re a blog by and for […]
So, the holiday season is always time to reflect upon the year that is coming to a close and the year that lies ahead; which I feel is especially […]
So, I’m done?! I finished my last class in Children’s and Youth Programming a few weeks ago after presenting my final group project; which was a summer reading program designed […]
In a little more than a week’s time, I will don my deliciously lemon yellow hood, (virtually) cross a stage, and know, with a heart full in equal measure of […]
While attending the University of Iowa’s School of Information Science, I have also served as a student cataloger in the UI Main Library’s cataloging department. Like most metadata and cataloging […]
It has become nearly impossible for me to take a break, and I believe most of it is because I am a person of color. When EDI is the issue […]
Coming into my first semester of library school last fall, I had almost no work experience in a library. Outside of my time interning in a government archive during undergrad, […]
Hi, Hack Library School readers! My name is Brianna Marshall and I am excited to be contributing a guest post for HLS. I was a HLS writer and managing editor […]
Hello! My name is Lauren Bauer, this is my first article for Hack Library School, and I have something I’d like to get off my chest: it’s going to take […]
Last year, I had volunteered in or had visited all of the elementary school libraries in my district. The books were shelved, the librarians were calm, and the students were […]
I have been back on campus and back in my office in my library since July 20th. That was my first day back on campus since I left work on […]
After months of masks, sheltering and social distancing, Labor Day this year just feels weird. In society’s mind, this is the unofficial end-of-summer and start of school year. Folks plan […]
This article marks the end of my MLIS program, and it will be the final article that I will write for Hack Library School as an MLIS candidate. If you […]
I have spent this week reflecting on how many times my heart has been heavy as I have witnessed yet another death of a person of color. As we continue […]
After three years, I’ll be graduating from my MLIS program this June. This is also my last post for Hack Library School. These three years were a whirlwind and ranged […]
I confess I wasn’t planning to write about COVID-19. But ruminating on how my month has transpired since my last post, I realized everything I was planning to write about […]
For those of us in the academic library world, the past few weeks have been an eye-opening experience. Like every schoolteacher in the world, our faculty had to convert their […]
Recently, LIS scholars have started exploring the potential connection between working in graduate school and burnout in librarianship. In the recently published article, “When Does Burnout Begin? The Relationship Between […]
Allison Jennings-Roche recently wrote about attending conferences outside of library land and I couldn’t agree more. In fact, just a few months ago, I was at a cross-disciplinary workshop facilitated […]
The very first classes of my first semester of library school started on the 3rd of this month; which means that, at the time of writing this, I am about […]
I am still recovering from and reflecting on my recent ALA experience in Washington, DC. A key highlight to my four-day experience was a visit to the Library of Congress […]
It’s time for my final post, and is of course obligatory here at Hack Library School, I’ll be writing about finishing school and that dreaded job hunt. As Melissa so […]
For my final post at Hack Library School, I wanted to share some bits and pieces that I’ve gleaned during the incipient few years of my library career. Before I […]
If there is one thing that the average Master in Information and Library Science candidate is familiar with, it is the constant need for balance: school, work, internships, volunteering, and that is just a baseline that does not take into account added complications such as marriage, or kids.
Disclaimer: This post represents my own perspectives and experiences. My opinions are not intended to be the opinions of any other student, faculty, or staff. Quick Overview I may be […]
Like so many others before me, I too have now come full circle from aggressively reading this site’s entire archive while deciding whether to send out my library school applications […]
I know for certain that we never lose the people we love, even to death. They continue to participate in every act, thought and decision we make. Their love leaves […]
Well Hack Library School, this is it – my final post on these hallowed pages. I’m starting a job in February at a Science Library, which is basically my dream […]
It is with a heavy heart that I must tell y’all this is my last post for Hack Library School. When I agreed to write for the site I did […]
If your classes are asynchronous, you probably have to write posts and responses about class readings. This format is not isolated to LIS programs. In a former graduate program, I […]
Hello everyone! We’d like to a take a moment to quickly introduce the new editorial team for the blog.
Way back in the day, when I was a future library school student, I was always interested in what the daily life of a MLIS student looked like. With that […]
As we say hello to another academic year, we say farewell to graduating members of the Hack Library School team. Our graduating writers have said their goodbyes already, but we […]
When I first started working as an aide in the library, I sometimes helped on the circulation desk. I remember one time when this nice lady came in to drop […]
First of all, the good news: I have a job! (Almost—waiting on the background check.) Keep an eye out on my Twitter for the official announcement. Getting to this point, […]
Chezlani Casar is currently the Program Leader for Earl’s Garage, a non-profit makerspace that encourages kids to become inventors and problem solvers. Nope, definitely not a library! As I mentioned in my farewell post last spring, my first professional position after finishing my MLISc was an unexpected contract role in […]
Last semester, as my graduation date loomed closer, I began to experience end-of-school anxiety. Not because I was anticipating the stresses of job hunting, but because I was panicked about […]
Tips for how to hack library school while being a parent from parents who’ve been there.
2020 will be a very interesting year. The United States will have another presidential election. The James Webb telescope, Hubble’s replacement, is scheduled to launch into space. And the United […]
A few times a week, I take a bus across campus to the university pool, where I swim for about thirty minutes before my job at Special Collections. Usually these […]
Hello everyone! This is my first post as a new writer for HLS, and I am very excited to be writing for y’all! I wanted this first post to act […]
Chezlani Casar is a 2017 UH Manoa and Hack Library School alumni. She is currently a “freelance librarian,” meaning that she subs in the public system when possible and spends […]
Megan Dyson is a newly qualified librarian currently job hunting after taking time out to be a full time mom. Originally from Louisiana, Megan studied violin performance at Belhaven University, earned her MMus at Leeds University and MA Information and Library Management at Northumbria University. She’s worked in school […]
Librarians for Social Justice started out as a group created by students at University of Iowa School of Library and Information Science, and quickly morphed into a community organization as […]
My semester is coming to its end, though my grad school career is not (I still have one more semester!). Still, this will be my last post on Hack Library […]
One aspect of becoming a librarian that I find particularly fascinating is learning more about specialized areas of the profession that I don’t know much about. I was fortunate enough […]
Drum roll please! Here they are: HLS’s newest contributors. We can’t wait to hear how they will “hack” library school!
An ongoing series about the juggling the challenges of library school as a parent.
Like many of you reading the first few lines of this post, I have a lot going on. In fact, you’re probably quickly deciding if it’s worth it to read […]
Today we welcome a guest post by Autumn Wetli. Autumn is a graduate student pursuing her MLIS at Wayne State University with a focus on academic librarianship. She currently works […]
Group work is common experience for library school students, and a pretty popular topic of discussion here at HLS. I managed to avoid this experience during my first year as […]
Today we welcome a guest post by Symphony Bruce. Symphony Bruce is a recent graduate of the iSchool of the University of Missouri and completed her MLIS in December of 2017. […]
Hey there readers! Here at Hack Library School, we pride ourselves on providing engaging, thoughtful, and useful resources for Library and Information Science students. The best part of this experience is […]
While I hope this doesn’t happen, at some point during your time at school you might find yourself forced to navigate department or university bureaucracy in order to get something […]
This is an interview series that will highlight the ways in which libraries and organizations serve incarcerated populations. You can read the first installment in the series, an interview with […]
You did it. You’ve typed the final sentence of your grueling final essay. You’ve breathed a sigh of relief as your applauding classmates signal the end of your last presentation. […]
I’ve been working shifts at the central reference desk at the University of Illinois Main Library for nearly a year and half now, and it’s occurred to me recently that […]
Interested in alternative MLIS careers? HLS interviews home services librarian, Christy Shannon Smirl.
There have been several posts over the years about typical library school student schedules, but there hasn’t been one in a while, so I figured it’s time for a new […]
For almost a year and half, I’ve been working at the University of Iowa Museum of Natural History, scanning glass plate slides of scientific expeditions and entering in metadata regarding […]
New or expectant parent in library school? Here’s some tips on adjusting to school as a parent.
As the academic year ramps up, we at Hack Library School are teaming up with ACRLog (the blog of the Association of College and Research Libraries) to bring you a […]
Here at Hack Library School, we consistently highlight the ways in which the LIS field innovates. We declare over and over again: libraries are not simply warehouses of books, and […]
Things are changing here at HLS! We’re excited to welcome a new Managing Editor, Consulting Editor and Community Manager this fall. Here’s what our Managing Editor has to say about […]
Have you ever seen the stacks of an archives? In most cases, they are rows and rows of standard sized archival boxes. The only indication of the exciting content within […]
You head to library school. You’ve got a plan. There’s a schedule of courses laid out before you, and within each course is the syllabus telling you what to do […]
As I embarked on my journey to library school, I was in saw of this here blog. Given my love for writing, I had yearned to write for Hack Library […]
I found Hack Library School when I was in the throes of deciding where I wanted to go to graduate school for library studies. I had applied and been accepted […]
In the summer of 2016, I quit my full-time, salaried job with benefits, packed up my belongings, and moved to Denver to begin my Master’s in Library and Information Science […]
Before I start this post, I want to tell you all how much I have enjoyed writing for Hack Library School and sharing my perspective with its readers. Often, these […]
Us librarian types, we’re all about literacy, and we all acknowledge the power of the written word. Writing helped shape civilization as we know it; of course it’s powerful. Our […]
Hello Hackers! My name is Chloe and I’m a new writer at Hack Library School. I have two bachelor’s degrees in English and Theater with a focus in creative writing. […]
This post is about the recent Diversity, Equity, Race, Access, and Identity in LIS (DERAIL) Forum held at Simmons College, in Boston, MA on March 4-5, 2017. Both authors (and […]
Drum roll please! Here they are: HLS’s twelve newest contributors. We can’t wait to hear how they will “hack” library school!
I’ve worked at a public library for almost two and a half years now, and while I overwhelmingly love my job and working with my community, I have also had […]
Aloha! I wanted to share with all of you some information about an LIS program you might not know much about. Though many people think of Hawaiʻi as a vacation […]
(Well ok, it’s actually going to be five more things but the Columbo picture wouldn’t have made sense if I’d given it that as a title). So here we are, […]
Last September, Hack Library School outlined three initiatives to work on over the next year. Since then, we’ve made some changes according to these initiatives–some expected, some not. What has come out of those […]
On November 11 and 12, Hawai’i Library Association held its annual conference in Hilo (on the “Big” Island). As a state-wide conference (in a small state), it’s obviously a much […]
As we move through our individual degree programs, it is incredibly easy to get bogged down in the details of assignments, the job-hunt, and attempting to maximize our time in […]
Libraries are like safe havens to our patrons, but what happens when they can’t get to one? We have heard of the book mobiles, and some libraries throughout the nation […]
“Oh, this smells. What if there’s mold? Am I going to get the black lung? And eew! Is that mouse poop?!”
Many of us have written about a typical day in the life of a MLIS student and in an earlier post I described how all my days went in my […]
I must confess, we weren’t entirely sure what would happen when we opened our ears to readers. Sometimes, blogging can feel a bit lackluster, a vain attempt to articulate some […]
Let’s start by acknowledging that this post isn’t going to yield any job offers—not for you and certainly not for me.
