Reading about your profession in a work of fiction is an interesting experience. You’re on the alert about its portrayal and possibly sensitive about its accuracy. When you are a library school student and/or working in the library field, you can be hyper aware of your livelihood’s perception.
The most difficult questions I received during the summer after I completed my English MA and before entering my MLIS program were questions like, “Huh, so why are you getting […]
I would not be exactly where I am today if it were not for the people who make up my support system. In particular, I have greatly benefitted from the […]
As we roll into the Thanksgiving holiday week in the U.S., most library students are also rolling into the last assignments for the fall semester. Since this time of year […]
This summer I had the opportunity to slightly switch gears and work at the International Area Studies Library at my university.
You know you want to be a librarian, but do you know which kind of librarian you would like to be? There are many fascinating areas of specialties in librarianship, but the ultimate divide is most often between academic librarianship and public librarianship. Why do some people choose one route […]
The end of a semester is always a whirlwind. I am especially trying to wrap my head around the fact that I have just completed my first year of graduate […]
While studying History in undergrad, I was assailed all too frequently with “So, what are you going to do with that degree?” And now, when I tell folks that I […]
A year ago I was finishing up my last days of being a speech therapist. A year ago I was leaving Chicago, my home of 10 years, only 25 miles […]
I’m going to state an obvious fact: being a good librarian means having strong interpersonal skills. I already knew this on a basic level when I decided to become a librarian. […]
This semester I decided to do something that terrifies me: I enrolled in a storytelling course. As an anxious public speaker, I challenged myself by taking a class in which […]
On Wednesday April 27th, 2016, I went to a brown bag event sponsored by my program’s American Library Association group. The brown bag was with the Director of the ALA […]
Nearly everyone who has ever worked in a library or has experience in library work has encountered the following statement: “So, you work in a library. What exactly do you […]
Less than four months into my MLIS, I have already become immersed in the library world within academia. Not only do I wish to be an academic librarian after I […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
A professor recently posed the following question to my class: are librarians required to be activists?
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 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 […]
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 […]
What draws you to librarianship? What is it about this field that makes you excited, energized, purposeful? There’s something, right? Something that makes up the beating heart of your answer […]
HLS is proud to introduce our nine new writers. With an impressive range of experience and interests, we can’t wait to hear what they have to say! Jennifer Eltringham is […]
Do you love working with kids? Is storytime your “thing?” Do you do a great Hagrid impression? If so, a career in children’s/youth librarianship might be for you! To get […]
On finally reading Revolting Librarians and Revolting Librarians Redux. What would Revolting Librarians 2015 look like?
Many library positions will involve some element of instruction or demonstrating tools or resources. It’s likely that most will, when you think beyond formal instruction sessions and start to consider […]
I’m sure many of you saw the distressing news last week: the budget resolution for 2016 released by the U.S. House Budget Committee and then passed by the House of […]
Today I’m going to scale back a little bit to talk about graduate school more generally, and some events that have been affecting my own university in particular. These last few weeks have been tough for my school, UW-Milwaukee, as the governor of Wisconsin has announced that his proposed budget […]
Every year for Black History Month, I make a special reading list—Harlem Renaissance poetry, African American children’s books, etc. But last year, I spent the whole month on one book: In […]
Connected Play is a new book about how young people interact, explore and express themselves in online communities. Our review asks, “How can cheating and pushing boundaries play a role in library activities and pedagogy?”
No matter how exhausted I am, every other Tuesday night I do something that helps reinforce and nuance what I’m learning in library school: I spend an hour or so […]
The last month or so my own institution, the University of Illinois, has received a lot of publicity due to the Salaita case. For those who are unaware of the basic facts, here is a brief summary:
A few months ago at work, at approximately 10:30 a.m., the Internet went down and service was not restored until about 4 o’clock that afternoon. Considering that I work at a public library where many of the patrons are there specifically for using the Internet and that the Internet is […]
With another fall semester looming, I wanted to take some time to advocate for a few easy-access, low-cost ways to do some self-directed learning. As exciting as our LIS classes, practicums, and internships can be it is easy to forget that our grad student status grants us access to a variety […]
Summer. A time for fresh cut grass and ice cream cones and baseball games and…books? Of course! Summer just wouldn’t be the same without summer reading programs, which are in full swing right now in libraries all across the country. In fact, twenty years ago, the National Center for Educational […]
Stories are everywhere: on our shelves, on our screens, and in our conversations. They compose the shows we stream and the ads we tolerate, the news we read and the news we share. As Jonathan Safran Foer wrote, “We live in a world made up more of story than stuff.” […]
I was excited to read recently that ALA is sponsoring a series of informational workshops with the hopes of recruiting a wider pool of students interested in library & information science. The workshops, which are an IMLS-funded partnership between the ALA Office for Diversity & Spectrum Scholarship Program and LIS graduate programs in […]
Dear hackers, Well, we did a little spring cleaning, and we are delighted to welcome you to the new and improved hacklibraryschool.com! Since the Fall of 2010, Hack Library School has grown by leaps and bounds, from Google doc to wiki to the rotating cast of bloggers you all know and […]
As future information science professionals, each of us has a responsibility to promote diversity in our profession, the collections we manage, and the services we offer our patrons. This notion is a fundamental value of the American Library Association, the Society of American Archivists, and the Special Libraries Association (among others). Hack Library School […]
Mentors come in all shapes and sizes. Some come to us through formal mentorship programs, others come to us from our workplaces or personal lives, and still others come to us through social media. But sometimes finding the right fit is a bit of a struggle. Differences in geography, culture, or […]
This semester I’m taking a class on library buildings. “Library buildings? Is that a class?” you ask? Indeed it is! Taught by Fred Schlipf, an LIS professor, library buildings consultant, and former public library director, the course is an introduction to the physical spaces that LIS institutions occupy. One of the […]
I recently traveled to Barcelona, Spain for BOBCATSSS, a library conference organized by European library science students. Upon returning I realized that many of my peers were unaware of the variety of international library conference opportunities that students can take advantage of. As LIS students, we are frequently encouraged to […]
Hello, hackers! Do you have a digital PLN? If not, this post will explain the concept and share some tips for success. I discovered the concept of the digital PLN (a web-based personal or professional learning network) through an information literacy instruction class I took in Fall 2013. One of […]
Why so serious? For aspiring librarians, attitude is all-important. Many of us eat up our days doing internships and day jobs, writing papers, presenting at conferences, and networking our hearts out on Twitter. This kind of workload makes us run the risk of stress, frustration, disillusionment—even burnout, especially if we […]
I recently received an email via my library school’s student listserv explaining that our university Provost has asked the library school and the College of Media to explore “integrating their two units.” It is very early in the exploratory process, and certainly not a sure thing yet, but it got me […]
When evaluating which courses to take, students often start with the list of undeniably library-specific courses: reference, cataloging, archives, etc. But as the profession continues to evolve it has become more and more interdisciplinary. Library students today take end up taking everything from web programming to marketing, from database design […]
I have a confession: I don’t always love library school. I know I want to be a librarian, and library school is helping me to achieve that, but the fact is, it isn’t always rainbows and smiles. Sometimes you have to take classes you don’t enjoy, do assignments that don’t […]
At the beginning of this summer I was faced with a pretty lengthy list of long-range-to-do’s, one of which was “business cards(?)” (yes, I put question marks on my to-do lists…). After seeing business cards encouraged in many Hack Library School posts, and after realizing I’d probably want some for ALA, I decided […]
I recently received an ALA Store catalog in the mail and was happily flipping through the pages, considering whether or not I should order my own supply of Love My Library buttons, when I stumbled across this t-shirt: It has pictures of endangered animals (a giant panda, a mountain gorilla, a […]
When I was applying to library school I asked some of my college librarians if anything had surprised them about their library work. More than one said their jobs involved more teaching than they anticipated, and I realized that if I was going into academic librarianship I should prepare for […]
A few months ago a co-worker introduced me to Pinterest with the disclaimer that I would waste massive amounts of time on the platform once engaged. And they were right. I’ve spent a great deal of time collecting recipes I’ll never cook, outfits I’ll never buy and ideas to repurpose […]
In this installment of Hack Library’s School’s Emerging Career Series, Caro Pinto explores the role of librarian as project manager. Caro Pinto is the Social Science & Emerging Technologies Librarian at Hampshire College where she oversees collection development, outreach, and instruction for the School of Critical Social Inquiry, works on […]
Editor Note: This is a guest post by Jarrett Drake. “The Incunabula. I’d like to see them,” said a patron in a muffled tone. “Can you repeat that?” I responded unassumingly. “The Incunabula, the Incunabula!” she exclaimed, her voice rising with each repetition. After a brief hesitation of speech that […]
Librarianship is a profession that’s all about helping people, which means we need to be able to work with them. Even if you don’t work with patrons, you’ll still have to work with coworkers that run the gamut. Cat lovers(ahem), gamers, tattooed drinkers, the sweet old lady who doesn’t know […]
so much dependsupon a red wheelbarrow glazed with rainwater beside the whitechickens. The literature fan in me can’t help but begin with William Carlos Williams’s well-known poem from his collection Spring and All (1923), if only with the flimsiest excuse of lifting the phrase “so much depends” for this post (and for the […]
Library Day in the Life, a project coordinated by Bobbi Newman (of Librarian by Day), is gearing up for Round 7! Who: Librarians and informational professionals of all stripes What: Share a day (or week) of their work When: July 25th through July 31 Where: Blogs, photos, videos, Twitter Why: […]
*note – I’ve deliberately decided to use the word ‘text’ herein because I truly believe this project must be absorbed and interacted with across its dual formats, printed book and web/digital presence. Hows that for meta? Cultural Studies, represent!! Lacon, Barthes, dying authors, and all that jazz. Let me be […]
