Education
Master of Library and Information Studies, May 2013 (in progress)
McGill University, Montreal, Quebec
Through my MLIS degree I am learning how to organize, preserve, and provide access to a variety of information in different formats. My finished coursework includes:
- GLIS 601 Information and Society: Exploring the methods through which individuals seek information, why they choose those methods, the obstacles they may encounter, and how librarians can best connect people to the information they need.
- GLIS 607 Organization of Information: How to catalogue a range of materials using MARC and AACR2.
- GLIS 609 Metadata and Access: A study of such schemas as MARC, Dublin Core, and EAD, as well as markup languages like HTML and XML.
- GLIS 611 Research Principles and Analysis: The ability to collect and analyze data about one's patron population is a valuable skills that can hugely benefit a library community. Collaborating with classmates, I learned how to develop a research question, conduct my own research, select the appropriate qualitative or quantitative methodologies, and analyze results.
- GLIS 612 History of Books and Printing: A history of printers and typography with practical emphasis on the mounting of library and museum exhibitions.
- GLIS 614 Public Libraries: What does it mean to be a public library? How can public libraries stay current and relevant? This class explores the development of the public library in North America, the need for appealing library spaces and services, and the impact of information technologies on the definition and delivery of services.
- GLIS 615 Bibliographic and Factual Sources: When a patron asks a complicated question, a librarian doesn't need to know the answer, but he or she does need to know how to find it! In this course I learned how to search databases, articles, encyclopedias, dictionaries, almanacs, biographies, and older materials for that elusive tidbit of information Google can't find.
- GLIS 617 Information System Design: To be accessible, information must be well-organized and easy to locate. In this course I co-designed a literature database using InMagic. I also learned about the qualities of various information retrieval systems, such as Dialog.
- GLIS 618 Collection Development: Providing your user community with the materials they want and need is a huge task. I learned how to assess a community to identify what kinds of materials it requires, to develop a formal policy on what will be collected, and to select resources from reviews, booklists, websites, and blogs.
- GLIS 619 Information Services and Users: In many cases, when people are first looking for information, they aren't sure how to articulate what they want. This course addressed getting to the bottom of a patron's question. It also included identifying the specific needs of your library's user population and how to provide the resources, services, and programs that address those needs.
- GLIS 620 Information Agency Management: The ability to understand how institutions operate and to work effectively with the people who are part of them are crucial skills. Topics covered in this course included organizational structure, strategic planning, human resource management, effective leadership, communication methods, and legal issues.
- GLIS 655 Language and Information: How do language and culture affect the usability of an interface? In this course we discuss machine translation systems, how to perform a query in one language and get results in another, and how different cultures organize and arrange information differently.
Master of Arts in English and Theatre Studies, August 2006
University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario
Coursework includes:
- ENGL 6010 Approaches to Research and Theory: An exploration of research skills and literary theories.
- ENGL 6201 Topics in Canadian Theatre: An investigation of how identity politics are portrayed in Toronto's theatre scene.
- ENGL 6451 Topics in African-American Literature: The construction of an African-American identity through literature.
- ENGL 6431 19th Century Literature: The intersection of race, class, and gender in mid-to-late Victorian Literature.
Bachelor of Arts with First Class Honours in English Literature, May 2005
St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, Nova Scotia
Coursework includes:
- English 350 Modern British Fiction
- English 355/356 18th Century Literature
- English 371/372 Victorian Literature
- English 368 Canadian Poetry
- English 445 Seminar in Contemporary Critical Theory: Semiotics, structuralism, deconstruction, new historicism, feminist theory.
- English 491 Research Methods
- English 498 Honours Thesis: "Proprietor of the Aura: Emplotment of the Author-Function in A.S. Byatt's Possession: A Romance."
- Sociology 100 Introduction to Sociology
- Sociology 241 Socialization
- Women's Studies 417 Social Difference: Race, ethnicity, gender, class, sex, and ability.