(See what I did there?)

Hello again everyone! I hope you enjoyed getting to know all of us through our first blog posts, and I’m excited to be back sharing a bit of my life with you! A lot has changed since I last posted- here are a few updates!

Interviews, interviews, interviews!

My spring break was anything but restful- I finally started interviewing for jobs! I guess I went a little application-crazy throughout the month of February… I got a sudden influx of interview requests on the first day of spring break, which resulted in a busy week! The interviews themselves really varied. For example:

One had a hard time limit of 25 minutes, while another allowed me to use up a whole hour! 
Some were cameras on, but most were cameras off. 
There was about a 50/50 split regarding sending interview questions in advance –  it seemed like the more senior the position was, the more likely they were to send me a document containing all of the interview questions the night before. I really appreciated when the search committees did this, as it really helped me to gather my thoughts! Although, the thrill of surprise questions was also quite fun 🙂

Overall, participating in all of these interviews was a great learning experience, and I can’t wait to (hopefully) have some offers soon!

Other recent developments

Despite spending a lot of time applying and interviewing for jobs, my life has been going full steam ahead! I’m continuing my work as a graduate assistant at the Music and Performing Arts Library (MPAL), and I feel like I have a thousand projects that I need to get done before I graduate in May. My most recent task has been holding research office hours for students in the History of Music course at the School of Music. I really enjoy having the opportunity to apply my reference and instruction skills in a one-on-one setting with students, and I also am excited to be revisiting my roots as a music student! Aside from that, I’m continuing to work on LibGuides, collection development, social media, and more! 

Oh, speaking of social media, the Libraries are holding a really fun March Madness event, and I was able to design the social media post for MPAL’s entry, “Rick Roll.” Our student assistants did such a great job creating the cart itself, so creating the social media post was a breeze! I loved being able to be a bit more casual on our social media and use the power of memes to drum up some votes. It’s always fun when the libraries on campus participate in social media campaigns together. I love how it fosters camaraderie between the libraries and shows the campus community that we are more than just buildings full of books. Speaking of, keep an eye on the University Library’s social media accounts to vote for MPAL 😉

I also started a new course last week called Accessibility in Library Resources which I am really excited about! We’re going to be spending the next eight weeks focusing on designing and evaluating library resources for accessibility. Since accessibility is such a big passion of mine, I was really excited to see that this course was being offered. I’ve liked all of the discussions we’ve had as a class so far and the readings are interesting, plus there are a lot of familiar faces in class 🙂 I’m still adjusting to having three courses to worry about, but this class is one of the few asynchronous courses offered at the iSchool, so that relieves a little bit of pressure (but I will admit that I miss only having two classes to focus on…)

And, a road trip!

Something out of the ordinary that I did recently was travel to St. Louis for a conference! I received funding from the Music Library Association to attend their conference in Salt Lake City last year, but it shifted to an online-only setting due to COVID. Instead of losing the funding, they let me hold onto it and apply it towards this year’s conference! It was really cool to see so many like-minded professionals in the same place, and I learned so many new things! There were a lot of sessions about Indigenous music, particularly about prominent Indigenous musicians and our responsibility as information professionals to critically evaluate the way that we collect Indigenous music (much of which is not intended to be documented in the first place). 

My favorite session was co-presented by Dr. Trevor Reed, a law professor and member of the Hopi Tibe, and Judith Gray, a coordinator of reference services for the American Folklife Center in the Library of Congress. Gray started the presentation by talking about the history of the collection of Indigenous performing arts materials, particularly recordings of songs and dance, and the intellectual property concerns that come with it. Dr. Reed then discussed restorative justice and open sources licensing principles, particularly pertaining to how we can use copyright laws to create agreements that allow Indigenous performing art items to circulate in ways that are consistent with Indigenous laws and practices. It was really interesting to see the juxtaposition of the two speakers and their institutions’ beliefs regarding what is right and wrong when it comes to collecting Indigenous music. It gave me a lot to think about regarding my own future as a librarian, particularly serving as a strong reminder of the huge impact that our collection development policies can have on our communities. 

I’ve been up to a lot recently, and believe it or not, this post only begins to scratch the surface of all of the events, projects, and other responsibilities that I have this semester. Grad school is absolutely bonkers, this semester especially, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. As busy as life might seem at the moment, I’m really going to miss the hustle and bustle of grad school life when I graduate!