Winter Quarter

On Saturday, I submitted my final project for winter quarter, made a Long Island iced tea, and went on a shopping spree at Amazon.com. Now it's spring break, and after going on the Space Needle today(!) I am going to read a lot of books and watch a lot of movies. and sleep.

One of the things I learned this quarter is that I lack the organization and motivation to do well in online classes--three of my four classes were online. Yikes. Next quarter only one of three of my classes will be online. Much better.

One of my classes was an introduction to databases using Microsoft Access. I followed the exercises in the book using controlled data--data entry essentially--but that is not the same as learning how to really make/use a database. Not that the lecturer cared--I received credit for the class before I even submitted my final project.

Cataloging is an elective course in our program, though I think of it more as a core class. Cataloging is an essential skill for librarians. Do you know what's difficult--learning cataloging online in ten weeks. Half of our class failed the second assignment (thankfully not me), but I think it's good to fail an assignment every now and then (like I did last year)--it builds character. In my experience, physical description and subject cataloging are arts of sorts, but they make sense. However, I have no idea how to Cutter a number--but nobody assigns numbers anymore. It was a hard class, and I'm glad it's over, but I'm also glad I took it.

I took Government Publications because Meagan was taking it, and there weren't really any other classes that sounded good. Then Meagan dropped the class. Excellent. Especially since it required a lot of work, and I just wanted it to be a filler class. The weekly assignments weren't too bad, but the final project was more involved. First we did a poster session--it was like science fair!--giving the spiel on our projects. Mine was about film censorship and the government--mostly told through Supreme Court cases. In 1915 the Mutual decision legitimized the prior restraint imposed on films by local and state censoring boards. In 1951 the so-called Miracle Case reversed the Mutual decision and prior restraint (mostly). Then I had to write a rather long paper about it all. Blerg. My mantra in that class was "Credit, No Credit" and I got credit.

Then there was Portfolio--it was my culminating experience in lieu of a thesis, research, or capstone project. It's new, and they're still working out the kinks which means the whole thing was a bit of a mess. At the end of eight weeks, I submitted my final draft, and did not receive credit. So I had two more works to revise it. This time I did receive credit, but the professors still had quite a few suggestions. Here is what I have so far.

At this point, I have completed all my core course, cataloging, and my culminating experience. Hooray. So for spring quarter, I am taking Nancy Pearl's reader's advisory course (awesome sauce!), the history of recorded information (a promising humanities-style class), and information tech systems (a promising practical management course). I have the highest hopes that it will be a fairly easy and enjoyable end to grad school, which is good because now I need to start looking for a job. Not excited. But for now, there is spring break. Now if we could just get some spring weather.