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thewayneIt's one of my two last library classes to complete my degree. It's only an Associates in Library Science, which when coupled with $4.10, will get me a kid's meal at Burger King.
One of the community colleges associated with NMSU offered the Library Science series online. I came across a free ebook titled So You Want To Be A Librarian, and it really appealed to me on a philosophical and ethical level. And since my wife works for the uni, I get six hours a semester for free, so it's only been lab fees and books out of pocket. But I'll only end up with an Associates: the school offers nothing higher, and after next year, they offer nothing at all - the program has been cancelled. But I just need this class and my capstone, which I'm also taking. That, and a communications class which I'll take over the summer, and I'm done.
I'm working at my local uni, and rather than doing general library stuff (which I'm hoping to do some of), I'm doing a scanning project. They bought a high-end scanner that does de-curling, OCR, all sorts of stuff, to scan their archives, starting with the college's annual reports to the university president. Fairly straightforward task. The tricky bit comes in with coding it in RDA format! So I'm coding a database to hold the records, now I just have to teach myself RDA. I've never done anything except descriptive cataloging, while I'm familiar with MARC, I've never actually worked with it. At least I don't have to unlearn anything or eliminate any bad habits.
I'm not going to pursue an MLA, I just don't think it's worth the effort and expense at my age. My hope in completing this coursework was in hopes that at some point it might help leverage my IT skills into a job at a library. Time will tell. At least I learned a lot of interesting stuff, and I do like learning stuff.
One of the community colleges associated with NMSU offered the Library Science series online. I came across a free ebook titled So You Want To Be A Librarian, and it really appealed to me on a philosophical and ethical level. And since my wife works for the uni, I get six hours a semester for free, so it's only been lab fees and books out of pocket. But I'll only end up with an Associates: the school offers nothing higher, and after next year, they offer nothing at all - the program has been cancelled. But I just need this class and my capstone, which I'm also taking. That, and a communications class which I'll take over the summer, and I'm done.
I'm working at my local uni, and rather than doing general library stuff (which I'm hoping to do some of), I'm doing a scanning project. They bought a high-end scanner that does de-curling, OCR, all sorts of stuff, to scan their archives, starting with the college's annual reports to the university president. Fairly straightforward task. The tricky bit comes in with coding it in RDA format! So I'm coding a database to hold the records, now I just have to teach myself RDA. I've never done anything except descriptive cataloging, while I'm familiar with MARC, I've never actually worked with it. At least I don't have to unlearn anything or eliminate any bad habits.
I'm not going to pursue an MLA, I just don't think it's worth the effort and expense at my age. My hope in completing this coursework was in hopes that at some point it might help leverage my IT skills into a job at a library. Time will tell. At least I learned a lot of interesting stuff, and I do like learning stuff.
no subject
Date: 2019-02-13 03:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-02-13 03:54 pm (UTC)It's definitely an interesting contrast between the two. I wish I could find a concise list of field codes and what belongs in them, instead I'm finding examples and trying to piece things together. The library director did an actual facepalm when I told her yesterday that all I'd done was descriptive cataloging in class, I don't think she fully appreciated that all I'm working on was an Assoc and it was all online - there's only so much that the class could offer!