That technology influences information and behavior through built-in and often invisible assumptions is neither a new phenomenon nor new to dialogue among librarians. (Although we could always stand to talk about it more than we already do.) In this post, I highlight some recent contributions on algorithms and libraries in hopes of keeping it in the forefront. If we didn’t already, librarians have to care about algorithms now.
Drum roll please! Here they are: HLS’s ten newest contributors. We can’t wait to hear how they will “hack” library school!
Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
This semester I’m taking my last introductory course in UW-Madison’s program – a class called Organization of Information, or in other words, basic cataloging/metadata/resource description/organization all in one. The class […]
Editor’s note: This post is part of our series entitled Voces del Sur: Rethinking LIS from the Latin American and Caribbean Perspective, featuring writers from the blog Infotecarios. Guest bloggers will […]
Editor’s Note: In order to learn more about the candidates for President of the American Library Association, HLS asked the candidates a few questions about topics relevant to students and early […]
Editor’s Note: In order to learn more about the candidates for President of the American Library Association, HLS asked the candidates a few questions about topics relevant to students and early […]
Editor’s Note: In order to learn more about the candidates for President of the American Library Association, HLS asked the candidates a few questions about topics relevant to students and early […]
As I get started with my second semester, I thought it would be a good time to re-visit the subject of self-care and time management, particularly as a mature student. […]
Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
Reference librarian: A librarian employed in a reference department who is responsible for providing helpful information in response to questions posed by users of the library. Reference librarianship is […]
Nancy Lovas is pursuing her MLS at the University of Maryland, where she works in the University Libraries as a Research & Teaching Fellow and as a graduate assistant in […]
Places flashlight under chin. I’m going to tell y’all a story. So once there was a library student just like you, sitting at this computer that was very much like […]
There aren’t a ton of articles on this topic here at HLS, so today we’re going to talk about failure. More specifically, my failure. I’ve been serving on the display […]
The standoff between the US District Court of California and Tim Cook of Apple Inc. should concern everyone who works in our industry.
Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
Here at HLS we love reflection pieces; we have plenty written after symposiums, conferences, and after our time in library school. To build off the incredible post in honor of […]
About a year ago, I started thinking about building a professional website. It seemed like the “next” step in my professional life. If a built a website in my first […]
Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
Paul Lai, HLS alumnus, works as a manager of information resources for an online university’s writing center and as a librarian in a public library. He lives in the Twin Cities, […]
Some early lessons learned from working with Wikipedia and digitized special collections.
Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
A professor recently posed the following question to my class: are librarians required to be activists?
We’re a couple weeks out from LIS Mental Health Week (January 18-23) but in honor of the brave and supportive discussions that emerged online (see co-organizer Cecily Walker’s compendium of […]
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 […]
Now that it’s February and prospective library school students will soon start receiving admission notices and making decisions about which library school to attend, I’m going to take a step […]
Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
Today marks the end of our ACRL/HLS Collaboration, check out Dylan Burns’s post on ACRLog about “Experience and LIS education.” Thanks to everyone involved, from the readers, to the contributors, […]
Happy birthday – 15 January 2016 marked fifteen years of Wikipedia. To mark it they asked “each librarian on earth” to take part in #1Lib1Ref – adding a citation to […]
Jennifer Jarson is the Information Literacy and Assessment Librarian and Social Sciences Subject Specialist at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, PA. Her research interests include information literacy and student learning pedagogy […]
Brenna and Maura were asked to write collaboratively to explore academic interviews from both sides– job applicants and administrators. ACRLog is also featuring this post today. Brenna is a student […]
Editor’s note: This post is part of our series entitled Voces del Sur: Rethinking LIS from the Latin American and Caribbean Perspective, featuring writers from Hack Library School and from the […]
This is part of the ongoing ACRLog/HLS collaboration. Check out ACRLog for Madison Sullivan on “Librarianship Doesn’t Need Professionals” Read more about the project here! Heidi Johnson is the Social Sciences […]
At some point or another in our library careers, we serve on the front lines. Anyone who has worked directly with the public usually has several colorful stories to tell, […]
Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
This is part of the ongoing ACRLog/HLS collaboration. Check out ACRLog for Victoria Henry on “Mentorship & LIS Students” Read more about the project here! Sveta Stoytcheva is a Humanities Librarian at the […]
This is part of the ongoing ACRLog/HLS collaboration. Check out ACRLog for Emily Minehart on “Professional Development as a Student” Read more about the project here! Quetzalli Barrientos is a reference/instruction resident […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
This is part of the ongoing ACRLog/HLS collaboration. Check out ACRLog for Elizabeth Lieutenant’s post on “Practitioner Engagement in LIS Education” Read more about the project here! Callie Wiygul began […]
Right at the end of the last semester, a professor dropped a book on my desk that inspired me to take a second look at what I had come to consider little more than hackneyed buzz-term: Big Data. I’m glad I did.
The semester might be over, but HLS has something special planned for the beginning of 2016. For the next month, we are teaming up with ACRLog the blog of […]
This past week I did something crazy. Or at least something I thought I would have to be crazy to ever do again. Maybe it was the fact that I […]
It is, of course, a good and necessary thing to have a break from study if you are able to over the holiday season. We’ve had some ideas on here […]
One of the most perplexing facets of working in the professional world -for me, anyway – is figuring out how to network, especially while you’re still in school. I come from a […]
Editor’s note: This post is part of our series entitled Voces del Sur: Rethinking LIS from the Latin American and Caribbean Perspective, featuring writers from the blog Infotecarios. Guest bloggers will […]
Editor’s note: Some of our amazing HLS writers have just finished their first semester of library school! They want to give you the full story on what they learned, what […]
We haven’t featured a librarian gift guide since 2013, so I figured it was high time to give some updated ideas for great gifts for your friends, coworkers, and of […]
As the semester nears its end — like a rogue semi reaching the top of a runaway truck ramp — I’m wrapping up a slow read of The Power to Name (Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2002), Hope Olson’s feminist critique of library classification systems. It is kicking my ass.
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
Do you know what’s scary? Networking. It is just this monolith of an idea and often it evokes images of large events with sticker name tags, tiny plastic plates of […]
Often in our line of work, people above us make choices without fully comprehending what will happen next. The impact often trickles down (and usually gains momentum) and we as librarians and […]
As I’m sure our readers know…I’m a rare book person…oh you didn’t know that? You mean me talking about it constantly didn’t give it away? Starting last summer, though, my […]
You’re not alone in worrying about the future. In fact, we are not alone in our profession-wide agonizing over “the future of ___,” nor are we alone in chasing a […]
Are you passionate about making libraries user-centered? Maybe you love designing study or communal spaces based on the experiences of your users. Or you find joy in crafting library services […]
Most of us will work our way through library school. Whether it’s a graduate assistantship, a part-time gig at a public library, or an internship at an archive, we’re all […]
Editor’s note: This post is part of our series entitled Voces del Sur: Rethinking LIS from the Latin American and Caribbean Perspective, featuring writers from the blog Infotecarios. Guest bloggers will […]
Last month, my school, UW-Madison, announced that it is revamping its curriculum for new students starting next fall. For the rest of us current students, we have the choice of either […]
Everybody thinks we library types spend all our days lost in the pages of a book (in between the shushing and the date-stamping of course), and alluring as that may […]
I know what you’re thinking. “Another article about defending your library career? Didn’t someone write one of those a couple of weeks ago?” The answer? Yes. Also, “I think someone wrote […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy! Brenna In library school we hear […]
Review of a new “people’s history” of public libraries.
As I was a recipient of a last-minute scholarship, I found out that I was attending the Colorado Association of Libraries Conference about a week before it started–that’s enough to […]
Plagiarism is, by definition, an offense one person commits against another person. According to its Latin root, it is a kind of kidnapping. But can we kidnap from ourselves?
Those who are interested in this career path, have started on this career path, or are far into this career path already are familiar with some of the top responses to […]
I’m leaving on a jet plane, don’t know when I’ll be back again. Well, technically I do when I’ll be back (that’s the handy thing about a plane ticket). But […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
Twitter brought me into librarianship. I’ve written about this before, and it still holds true today. I love the community of librarians that Twitter connects me with. But, an odd […]
I have a confession to make. Sometimes I color in my coloring book while I’m in class. And you know what? I’m a better student for it.
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy! Lauren Big news for Google Books! […]
It’s hard to believe that after two years of study my library school experience is finally at an end. It’s been a frantic couple of years of juggling all my […]
Before I started my library degree, I often found myself wondering – why do I need a master’s degree to become a librarian? If the requirements and options were different, […]
Editor’s note: This post is part of our series entitled Voces del Sur: Rethinking LIS from the Latin American and Caribbean Perspective, featuring writers from the blog Infotecarios. Guest bloggers will […]
It sometimes feel like the debate over the future of libraries and librarians will never go away. Recently, volunteer-run / community led libraries in the UK have become quite an […]
I remember sitting in the dining hall as an undergraduate, participating in conversations that would go something like this: “Man, I woke up at 7:45 for my 8 AM class. […]
Last week was Banned Books Week in the library world, celebrating titles such as Sherman Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, and J.K. Rowling’s Harry […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
My library experience so far has been a battle of two passions – I love archives, and I could see myself spending the rest of my life holed up in […]
I’m procrastinating. Right now I’m supposed to be writing a post for a class discussion forum online. I’m procrastinating because, frankly, I’m over it, and I think we should do something about that.
In library school you will learn the theory behind many important library functions. Practical experience, then, becomes really important for your future career. A part-time job, for those who do […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
October, as the saying goes, is Archives Month, which gives “the archival profession an opportunity to tell – or remind – people that items that are important to them are […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
It can be easy, faced with big statements and bigger revelations, to forget that a billion small, everyday choices also play a role in environmental impacts like climate change. What place do libraries have in this landscape? What does it mean for them to be “green” or “sustainable”? A review of Greening Libraries (2012) and Focus on Educating from Sustainability: Toolkit for Academic Libraries (2014).
This post is co-written by Hailley Fargo and Brenna Murphy, students at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign recently announced that it may drop […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
In my last post I talked about subject headings and why Library of Congress Subject Headings should be used with caution. This time, I’m going to turn to the behemoth […]
I come from a family that doesn’t have work email, retirement stocks, or salaries. My parents and siblings, my “people,” are name tag and hairnet people. Clock-out for your lunch break people. With four older […]
When I started applying for library school last fall, one question nagged me: do I need to specialize in something while I’m getting my library degree? As I considered specializations […]
Editor’s note: This is the first post in our Voces del Sur series, featuring writers from the blog Infotecarios. Guest bloggers will answer questions about their experience as librarians and library […]
I am really excited to be finally starting my MLIS as it’s something I’ve wanted to do for several years, but at the same time I’m experiencing feelings of stress, […]
Greetings hackers! As I write my first post for Hack Library School, I am also beginning my first full semester at Catholic University’s MSLIS program. It’s been some time since […]
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
Raise your hand if you have a disability. While I can’t actually take a count, I can guess that at least 8% of you should have responded in the affirmative. […]
Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Nicole Gibby-Munguia. Nicole Gibby-Munguia is in her second-to-last semester in the MLIS program at Dominican University in River Forest, IL. Her interests […]
I still have two weeks until I even start classes for my MLIS degree. I’m starting to feel like Alice peering down the rabbit hole, waiting to fall. Unlike Alice, […]
Digital preservation has found its way into the mainstream of modern librarianship. Odd and awkward as it may feel to us in these early days, saving Twitter is a critically important project that can help us redefine what it means to be a librarian and reclaim some of our lost cultural significance.
Editor’s Note: Each week, we reflect on the top articles, blog posts, tweets, news, thoughts, and other tidbits we’ve found interesting or useful. Enjoy!
One of the most important things you can do for yourself while attending library school is become involved in at least one student organization, even if you really don’t want […]
My relationship with the Library of Congress starts in January, in Wisconsin, where I am beginning my second semester of library school. A beloved teacher of archival studies, who has […]
