There is no substitute for knowledge learned on the job, but some courses gave me the skills I needed to be ready to adapt to “real life” situations. Hours spent answering mock reference questions for lab assignments prepared me for the ever-changing barrage of the public library reference desk. A project on the Budapest Open Access Initiative for my digital libraries class led to a conference paper and presentation on Open Access in libraries, and the interest I developed in digital libraries and humanitarian development projects has grown into a thesis on Electronic Theses and Dissertations Digital Libraries.
IS 530 Information Access and Retrieval was my introduction to reference work. Although I initially thought I would be interested in acquisitions, this first-semester class turned me towards reference. The mock reference question labwork was like a puzzle, or a scavenger hunt, and was the most fun homework I'd had in a long time — even though we were only allowed to use Dialog.
IS 531 Sources and Services for Social Sciences was an extension of IS 530, and introduced me to various sources in business, education and psychology, among other social sciences. I turned to these sources over and over at the public library reference desk. In addition to the labs, I also had to create a pathfinder, which was something new for me. I learned I was sometimes too enthusiastic when I had a hard time keeping the pathfinder to two pages.
IS 535 Advanced Information Retrieval introduced me to new databases and their secrets, including CSA, Ebsco, Factiva, Gale and LexisNexis. My literature review on the Open Access movement for this course led to a conference paper.
IS 565 Electronic Publishing and Imaging (Digital Libraries) introduced me to digital libraries and their role in humanitarian development projects. My interest in electronic theses and dissertations and technology in developing countries has evolved into my current master's thesis work.
IS 540 Research Methods made me work harder and think harder than anything ever had. I thought my undergraduate professors challenged me to research and write, but IS 540 demanded more. I learned to think small, find the important questions in the big picture and organize my sometimes scattered and over-ambitious ideas.
IS 558 Library Services for Diverse Societies showed me how to see diversity in terms beyond race and gender. The dialogue among my classmates was enlightening as we examined sexuality, religion and physical disabilities and their relationship with the library. For this class, I worked with a partner to write a mock grant proposal to purchase Korean-language materials for the local public library, in order to serve the community’s large Korean immigrant population.
IS 560 Development and Management of Collections taught me the basics of collection development, including selection sources and criteria. I wrote a collection proposal for the Korean language project I worked on in IS 558.
Two other important courses were IS 520 Cataloging and Classification and IS 550 Management of Information Organizations.
Official course descriptions can be found here.
