Librarians Confront New Uncertainties Over Training and Jobs – Chronicle.com
Check it out! David and I are quoted in the “New Competencies” section.
research
Subject: [Cas] Congratulations to Elizabeth Edwards
————— Forwarded message —————
From: Caroline Haythornthwaite
Date: Fri, Mar 6, 2009 at 5:47 PM
Subject: [Cas] Congratulations to Elizabeth Edwards
To: cas, itsupport_staff, all_faculty, phd
Congratulations to Elizabeth Edwards on successfully completing and defending her CAS project, “Examining the Preparation for Reference-Based Instruction Among Academic Librarians”. Committee members were Caroline Haythornthwaite (chair), Linda Smith, and Melissa Wong.
Raise a glass of (green) beer!
/Caroline
Saturday this and that (work related)
You know what is kind of lonely? The reference desk on a stormy Saturday in May. I’ve had 7 questions since noon.
I’m feeling better about work these days – there are still definitely moments when I feel frustrated, overwhelmed, and totally unqualified, but there have been many others where I feel like I can contribute to the conversation in a significant way. We continue to hire bright, sharp, forward-thinking individuals, and that gives me hope for substantive changes in the near future. Three individuals with whom I work closely are leaving in the near future or have left already, and that makes things hard – but I’m hopeful that we’ll hire fantastic people to replace them, and that the new folks will bring interesting perspectives and good ideas to add to the fray.
Right now we’re hard at work wrapping up our Facebook study, which was accepted for the RUSA Reference Renaissance conference in August. I’m hoping that we’ll be able to build on this study in interesting ways, although we’re already moving on to the next project, with a third in the wings for fall. I’m taking advantage of my six hours on the desk to wrap up this lit review, and get started on the next one. Hooray for self-directed research that directly informs practice.
wednesday things ‘n’ things
things that are making me exceedingly happy include, but are not limited to:
- the salad i just had at kopi – chunky chicken salad, some kind of interesting vinaigrette, toasted french bread, yum
- suggested poster art for an imaginary snakes on a plane sequel
- tom jones being knighted
- being past the halfway point in the term
- tomorrow morning’s exercise adventure with sonya
- 24!! how many more people will jack choke?!
- being in a good relationship. really good. with a bonus fuzzy cat.
things that are making me exceedingly stressed out include, but are not limited to:
- spain in just over a month! !!!!! !!!!! !!!!! !!!!!
- being past the halfway point in the term
- realizing, after i sent out the email, that i neglected to include the EFFING CONSENT FORM in my research survey. it’s out there – i just didn’t link to it – and i hope i haven’t fucked myself.
- being 20c short when checking out, and having my card declined because of unavailable funds.
- needing to prepare for a two hour lecture (or something) in two weeks
- the future.
On an unrelated-to-the-above note, this article came across my Bloglines this evening – it address what should and should not be blogged about, which is something I’m trying to deal with retrospectively. There are a lot of things I talked about 3-4 years ago that simply don’t need to be public. That’s all I’m going to say about that. The most important part of the post, I think, was this advice:
In choosing how much to divulge, consider:
- Will this hurt your family and friends?
- Will this put your job in jeopardy?
- Most importantly: Is such a disclosure really interesting anyway?
I think the last is the most interesting and salient point, and one I’m going to have to think through as well.
doing the math
What a week! In the last six days I have:
- self diagnosed an ear infection, had my diagnosis confirmed, and been put on antibiotics
- self diagnosed the beginning of another infection, got medication, and headed it off at the pass by eating a lot of yogurt
- had some sort of food poisoning and the associated excruciating abdominal cramping
- PMS (enough said)
All these things have added up to very much wanting my mom here to give me soup and crackers and 7up stirred with a fork so the bubbles are gone. On the other hand, I’ve felt very grown up in that every time I’ve figured out what was wrong and what I needed to do to fix it. Three cheers for being in touch with my body!
On a series of very good notes, the following things have happened:
- All the professors that I contacted gave me permission to conduct my study.
- After some back-and-forth, the IRB approved my study.
- I drank Guinness with a table full of friends on St Patrick’s day.
- I made carrot cake!
- I have a kitten-cat staying with me for 10 days.
- My pilgrim’s passport arrived today.
- I received a fantastic email regarding a plan that may rescue my financial future.
latterdaybohemian 