March 9th Meeting Minutes

Thank you to everyone who attended the brown-bag lunch meeting with Sarah McDaniel on Monday, March 9th. The discussion was very informative and I hope we have managed to entice more than a few of you to consider enrolling in the 826 LILI practicum before graduation.

The meeting lasted about an hour. Sarah began by telling us a little about her background--she got her MLS and a MA in French from UW-Milwaukee, has worked as a Bibliographer, Liaison, and Instruction Librarian, at USC and Berkley, and now is the Campus Library Information and Literacy Instruction Coordinator at UW.

Sarah gave us an introduction to the services that the Office of Library Information and Literacy Instruction performs for the university. Many hours of preparation go into any workshop or program provided by the libraries. This office also coordinates the LILI practicum for SLIS, which provides practical experience for graduate students and supports the services of the office.

The LILI practicum is 120 hours long and is offered fall and spring semesters. In the beginning of the semester, the class meets for seminars once a week and discusses common readings, practices teaching techniques, and teams up to assist in Communication Arts classes. Later in the semester, seminars meet only once a month as students get more involved in their placements. There are usually about eight placement sites each semester; at locations such as Memorial, Steenbock, Ebling, Wendt, College, and the CIMC libraries. Practicum work can be flexible and most supervisors will ask you if there is anything specific that you would like to accomplish during your time at the placement site.

Sarah finished by telling us about the work she does as chair for the ACRL Instruction Section. She encouraged everyone who is interested in academic librarianship to attend conferences and become involved in committee work as it will be important for career promotion. You will also meet other people with similar interests to you and learn about how other people do what you do at other institutions.

Sarah is willing to answer inquiries about the LILI practicum and can be reached by email at smcdaniel@library.wisc.edu.

At the end of the meeting Rachel announced that the next ALSO meeting will take place on Wednesday March 25th, from noon-1pm in the SLIS Commons. This meeting will be another brown-bag lunch discussion with two reference and instruction librarians from College Library, Pamela O'Donnell and Eliot Finkelstein.