A Summary of Spring 2023
Last Monday marked the end of the Spring semester and which also marked the last spring semester for me. I enrolled in the MLIS program in 2019 in the Spring semester. Back then I took three classes and that was my most expensive semester. For this semester I only took one class that was a 2 unit one so it didn’t start at the beginning of the semester but towards the middle and then ended last week.
The class I took was A History of U.S. Libraries. I was so happy that I took this class because it helped me jumpstart my personal research into Black Librarianship. Previously I had found a few articles on the topic but with the class assignments and two papers-one book review and the final assignment (a research paper)-I was able to dive more into the topic.
It was a bit overwhelming as there are so many aspects of the topic to learn more about. But I was happy to locate many articles and learn about those who paved the way for my fellow Black library workers. I got an A in the class. It was also perfect timing as a call for submissions was put out for the upcoming 3rd edition of the Handbook of Black Librarianship. Initially, the due date was in March but they extended the submission deadline to April and I was able to submit my paper-reformatted in MLA style with two sections removed for length and format purposes-and it was accepted for publication!
So yes I’m very excited about that. Last Fall I was part of an special studies project and our group submitted a conference paper to the Charleston Conference proceedings which will be published as well. I’m not sure when these items will be published-perhaps it’ll be later this year or in 2024, but when they’re published I’ll let ya’ll know.
One more note publishing wise, back 2013 I coauthored an article with one of the librarians at work and it was published in the Florida Libraries. Well our work was cited in chapter 17 (Science Meets Popular Science Series A Texas Tech University Libraries Initiative) of the book titled Integrating Pop Culture Into the Academic Library!
Speaking of projects, aside from the one class I also had a remote paid internship that I did for the entire semester. I staffed the chat reference service and part of the internship required me to work on a project with my supervisor and we created a Best Practices for Video Transcription and Closed Captioning guide for the library. So yes, I was kept busy this semester.
This semester was also full of zoom webinars, conferences, and sessions that I enjoyed. There were a lot so I’ll just mention a few here: Geoscience Information Society (GSIS) : Geosciences Librarianship 101, NYU Libraries Critical Pedagogy Symposium, RDAP Summit 2023 (which I wrote a blog about for the RDAP), and I also attended some sessions for the Augusta Baker Speaker Series.
So Spring 2023 was a busy and fulfilling semester for me. I’ve noticed that since Fall 2023, my semesters have been busy ones. Summer won’t disappoint as I’m taking two classes-Special Collections and Special Studies UX/UR Course focusing on Black Librarianship and Banned Book Metaverse. I look forward to sharing my Summer semester with you all so stay tuned!
Jocasta Nu's Padawan 