First Entry

I am very much pumped up about my first meeting with Dr. Lewis tomorrow! I think one of the things that is missing from librarianship in general is the actual training and guiding of new professionals. I am confident from what I am seeing so far in this PhD program at the University of South Carolina that I will not encounter this same problem in my endeavors to become a scholar and a doctoral degree holder. Between the foundations provided in SLIS 801 and SLIS 804, and this opportunity to shadow and work closely with Dr. Lewis, I believe I am going to receive some wonderful insights on what it is like to be a library school faculty member, and what value a library school faculty member holds for the student, the institution, and the profession as a whole.

So, my first entry here is largely just to put on record that I have indeed scheduled my initial meeting with Dr. Lewis, and I am looking forward to it. I also think - based on initial email correspondences - that Dr. Lewis is the perfect match for me. She appears to have had some of the same initial thoughts upon entering a PhD program that I am having, and her path to actually getting the degree had some roadblocks in it that she had to overcome (and I am a king of stumbling upon self-imposed roadblocks). The fact that she is a very recent degree earner is also encouraging, because she likely is still sympathetic to the experiences of the student and can probably offer pointers that some other faculty members may have long forgotten.

Obviously more to come!