I want to spend some time writing about my impressions of Harvard as this is the first time I've had the opportunity to spend significant time here. I find it full of juxtapositions or extremes. First, there is so much privilege here. Students of means, intelligence, entitlement and the same could be said for the faculty. I stood in line in front of two professors who were talking to one another, without regard for the ever lengthening line behind them, as if everyone else except them was an afterthought. Juxtapose that with one of the most caring, kind, well respected librarians who is a living example of a caring administrator. Then there are the library collections that are unparalleled in North America. Some of Harvard's libraries are pretty much the same as they've always been -- but then there are some, like the library at the Harvard Law School that are being transformed by their new leaders into something that will serve the students of the 21st century and beyond.
There are the students -- young, brilliant, many of whom are legacies --- their parents, and grandparents went to Harvard, but there are also students like the intern assigned to us who is a first generation Harvard grad. He grew up in Texas in the suburbs of Dallas as one of three children who knew that he wanted to come here and study government and health policy. What a tremendous example this young man is setting for his younger siblings and how proud his Texas-educated parents must feel of him. In contrast there are the people who live on the street -- under bridges, in the squares, and in the parks, looking for food, and not having shelter. I wonder what this world looks like through their eyes.
Then there are features that I love -- the huge number of bookstores full of all kinds of literature. As I walk down the street, I hear French, German, Spanish, Chinese -- a tremendous array of languages from all over the world.
If one is looking for a transformative environment, Harvard can definitely be that place. You just have to open up your soul.
One of the things that we've been working on with the "google guys" we're working with is to make sure that attribution is accorded to Penn State when we digitize a book. I was looking for books that we've scanned in Google Book Search this morning and realized that I was approaching the task in the wrong way...I needed to start with things I know we've scanned and work from that angle. And then my mind started to wander....
My Uncle Wayne was a professor at Dartmouth for about 40 years. He taught in the Amos Tuck Business School. Both he and my Aunt Jean have always been tremendous supporters of me through the years. I'm not sure I would have gone to grad school without their encouragement. Wayne was a prolific writer. He wrote many books on business and agriculture, including books on Cargill, John Deere, the Molly Maguires, and the trucking industry. As I was looking in GBS for things published by him, I ran across "Oral History Interview with Wayne Broehl."
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"Dr. Broehl discusses his teaching career beginning in 1954 at the Amos Tuck School of Business Administration and his role advising Dartmouth College and its trustees on the college's investment policies."
Discovery is one of the best things about GBS. I would never have known about this recording or some of the other many things that he wrote if not for GBS. I'm going to see if Dartmouth will lend it through ILL now. What a wonderful discovery. |
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First the scouts. Julia is a member of Venture Scouts Crew # 31. I always want to say troop becuase eerily coincidentally, I was the leader of Girl Scout Troup #31 in another state back when I was 31 years old (hence the troop name). Because the number of kids going to Philmont has changed over time, the crew was faced with needing someone to take Wilderness training before they leave town on Wednesday (just found out about this). So tomorrow Julie and I are off to Virginia so she can get trained. Meanwhile, while she's tied up this weekend, I'll chair my ALA committee from the hotel. Okay, we can roll with the punches here. But we also found out today that though we've paid for the rafting trip, all of the kids need to make sure they swim in front of the crew leader before they get on the plane Wednesday. Okay, we'll follow the process.
Okay, what are the takeaways from this? One...I am, and have been for years, and now it's been reinforced, how important project and process planning is. It keeps you sane and away from last minute challenges...or at least it allows you to plan for the what ifs. So, this is just a warning to all those who work for me...I'm going to be insistent about project planning over the course of the next year. Another take away is that sometimes you have to step up, even when you don't want to. You have to do things that are for the good of the whole. It's called teamwork and it's important.
Now let's move onto the IRB. I'm working on an article with three colleagues from other ARL (Association for Research Libraries) that was invited by the editor of a guest issue of the Journal of Library Adminstration. We're writing about the ARL Research Library Leadership Fellows program and we're going to survey the first two cohorts of fellows. Well, because we're going to survey them and write about it, we need to go through the Office of Research Protection. These guys are great, perform an important function, but it's been a challenge to 1) have everyone take the IRB training (if the school doesn't offer it, they need to take Penn State's); 2) go through their IRB and get all the documentation from these folks and their three schools with their own procedures all into our own IRB. I am a firm believer in the necessity of this process and again, what are the takeaways? First, things take time. As good as our IRB is, they need some lead time, especially when it's summer and they moved into a new office this week. Second, colleagues that work quickly are wonderful All three of my colleagues at the other institutions and my administrative assistant did exactly what they needed to do within three days of being notified. They're amazing. And finally...if you ever are doing a survey, even if it's very simple and are going to write about it, put going through IRB as one of the first steps in your project plan.
So, all in all the week was a bit frustrating, but a great learning experience. As I chanted on all my hikes this week, "What won't kill me, makes me stronger."
A bit closer to home, Ed O'Neill discussed the OhioLINK Collection Analysis that OCLC has done. They are still working on it, but this type of collective collection analysis is so crucial to determining what types of materials we should be buying and what types of materials we shouldn't. I couldn't help but compare some of their collection use statistics to some of the one's that Bob, Tina, Lynn and I have gathered (article almost, almost finished and out the door) and how many other studies are out there yet to be done.
Dennis Massie and Constance Malpas talked about the Journals Preservation Project that we've been a partner in for the past nine months or so. and finally John Wilkin ended with an overview of HathiTrust.
I'll talk more about some of the ideas that I've come away with later...off to dinner with friends from Columbia and Minnesota now, but suffice it to say that I think we have the talent and the energy to move through these tough economic times creatively and with enthusiasm for the new service possibilities that are ahead in libraries.
The Thinking Beyond Copyright session was really full and Merrilee Profitt and Ricky Erway posed the question, "Is clearing permisions or doing orphan works investigations a worthy investment for a research library?" Clearly Michigan thinks it is since they've been a leader in this effort. We also discussed how this is all about managing risk and how important that process is.
The afternoon concluded with a look at "Cool new Tools". One was the Crosswalk Web Service that translates data from one metadata schema to another (our own Kevin Clair has been a part of this program). We also looked at Classify, an experiemental web classification service. It was posed that it would be great if you could use this for not only classification numbers but for subject headings too.
Finally, in the evening, I took the subway out to Cambridge and had dinner with my old and dear friend Rebecca Graham, Associate Librarian of Harvard College for Preservation, Digitization, and Administrative Services. We had a thoroughly delightful dinner and it was a great way to end the day.
It's been awhile since I've created a blog entry but we write about something that we feel strongly about, that disturbs us, or that perhaps that can be useful to others...that they learn from our mistakes. It is the latter reason that I blog about this.
I was reading the New York Times online as I do most mornings....in my easy chair with my coffee, on my laptop. As I was reading, my golden retriever bumped my coffee cup and coffee sloshed onto my keyboard. I wiped it up quickly and didn't notice any immediate problems, thank heavens. As time went on, however, my enter key stopped working. So Monday morning I put in a help desk ticket, explained my spill, and figured this was going to cost me a few hundred dollars to repair.
While yes, this was an accident, this could have been prevented by me being more careful. Second the repair costs more than money -- it costs time. It costs the time of the folks who provide desktop support. My negligence costs them time that they could be doing other, more useful things.
What will I do in the future? Not have any drink near computing equipment. Take the time to be more thoughtful with equipment that my employer provides me. Laptops are great -- but they are more fragile. I know I've learned my lesson -- I hope this will help you learn too.
One of the best things in life are treasures. Treasures can come in many forms -- people, an excellent program, something that is particularly meaningful. I've been thinking a lot about treasures lately because this summer was a summer full of treasures for me. In both my worklife and in my personal life, I seem to have found an abundance of treasures.
In my worklife, one of the best treasures of the summer was the visit by six ARL Library Leadership Fellows. The ARL Leadership Fellows Program was started by several very forward thinking ARL Directors who wanted to help the next generation of library leaders gain an insight into what it means to be a Director of a very large research library. Those of us who talked with them learned a lot from the participants who were here at Penn State.
Another treasure of this summer was the time we got to spend together as a family. Being a close family and having members 600 miles away makes each time we're together a time to treasure. Besides wonderful family time, there was also the Dude Ranch vacation at the Bar Lazy J with my friend Laura and the spa weekend in Chicago with my daughter Sarah.
Finally, we're in the process of moving my father from independent to assisted living and one of the things that was in his apartment was a box of all sorts of notecards. Buried in the notecards was one he'd handpainted for my mother on one of their anniversaries. It's a bit eerie that I found it today because today would have been their 62nd anniversary. It says (and he wrote the text too) "Through all our happiness and joy, and even through our sorrows, You've always been the wife I love and will be for all tomorrows." This card is a treasured find indeed.
I highly recommend vacations. They are cathartic, rejuvenating and fun. My dear friend of 25 years and I went to a dude ranch in Colorado and we journaled our adventures. Feel free to read... or just browse ;-)
Vacation Day 1 – Road Trip
Friday at 11 I began my road trip to Chicago. Nice day, uneventful. Drove over the Chicago Skyway for the first time. The trip went very fast until I reached the northwestern part of Chicago on I-90. Traffic stopped dead at about Kimball and didn’t loosen up until I was past O’Hare. I love driving across country by myself listening to country and western music (“Don’t Blink”) is my current favorite. Got to Lauri’s about 7:30 where Joe had snacks ready. Their house is lovely with a huge atrium in the middle, big rooms on 5 acres out in Barrington Hills, a very, very nice suburb of Chicago. The neighborhood has polo fields. Need I say more? We had a fun evening of talking about our jobs and down logistics for the morning.
Vacation Day 2 – We’re off
We left the house about ten in the morning very well provisioned for our trip. After having a lovely lunch at the Greek Isles restaurant, Joe dropped us at the train station. We hoped it wasn’t an indicator of things to come when a woman started screaming at us for scratching her van with our Dodge Durango doors (which we didn’t do, by the way.) I decided that I’d bet money on Joe and Greg if they were in a shouting match. We didn’t see that woman again; hopefully she got on a different train. We were led to our sleeper car. If you do train travel, getting a sleeper is definitely the way to go. We sat and polished off a bottle of wine while playing gin rummy and watching the towns of Illinois and Iowa go by. As we got closer to the Mississippi, we could see the devastation that the flooded waters brought to this area. Houses, garages, crops, all under water. We had dinner of trout and Cornish hens in the middle of Iowa and sat with a very nice couple from New Jersey who were taking the train from New York to San Francisco. We modified our gin rummy rules and continued to play through the evening. About 10pm we got ready for bed, called the porter to turn down our beds, and attempted to sleep. Despite this being a relatively luxurious way to travel, the beds were really hard and the horn was constant through the night. I think I rested more than slept and it was a relief to see the sun come up.
Vacation Day 3 – Granby
We awoke about 6 Mountain Time to the sun coming up on the prairies of Nebraska. Out the window of the train, we saw cattle and more cattle, and big circular fields of corn. The irrigation systems rotate around in the circle. We passed places such as the Yuma Feed Lot. Cow (probably not the right term) after cow were lying in the mud, waiting to be someone’s dinner. I’ll have to Google it when I get back. Our big stop of the morning was in Denver – we were about 1.5 hours behind schedule due to track repairs. Out of Denver, we snaked through the mountains, ultimately going through 24 tunnels on our way to Granby. We saw mountain climbers repelling down the side of the cliff in the mountains between Denver and Winter Park. When we got to Granby, Sue Suskin was there from the Bar Lazy J to greet us (along with her 5 year old granddaughter who is staying with her for a month.) Sue and her husband Dale came up here from Miami several years ago after vacationing several times at the ranch. They decided they liked it so much that they wanted to work here.
A lovely lunch was waiting for us consisting of bacon and salmon quesadillas and fruit. It was marvelous and way too filling – Lauri and I each only ate half. We spent the afternoon unpacking, and lounging and reading in the chairs overlooking the Colorado River. Lauri doesn’t get cell phone connectivity here but I do (yeah Verizon) so we walked up the hill to the tiny (50 people?) town of Parshall. At the top of the hill, T Mobile would work. We met Miss Dorothy, owner of the store and the liquor store. She’s 84 years old and has owned the store for 28 years. She sits and watches TV and helps the occasional person that wanders by. Since it’s only 1000 feet or so off US40, I imagine she gets a fair number of wanderers.
Dinner was tremendous. We sat with a couple, Angela and Martin, from England, a man named Mike from near White Plains, NY and “Moose” one of the wranglers. The discussion devolved into politics which I kept out of because this is my vacation and I don’t want to get into political arguments. If Lauri and I can be best friends and be on the opposite ends of the political spectrum, why can’t everyone else? After which (that was again wonderful -- Eddy the chef is our favorite guy), we met our horses. Lauri’s horse is Gillie and mine is Cow Girl. I saw the helper steps and was relieved. Tomorrow is our first horse ride!
Vacation Day 4 – July 28, 2008 We become friends with our horses
Well I lost day 4 so I’ll try and reconstruct. We had a great day yesterday. We spent the morning in orientation and I got to know Cowgirl. After orientation, we had lunch and then we had trotting class. It was a really good class where we learned how to trot and give the horse the commands they expect. We would have taken a ride after class but it started to pour. Lauri and I read our books on the porch and watched the rain. Then we each took showers before the cocktail party. It was fun talking with the owners, Jerry and Cheri. After cocktails, we had swordfish or steak (I had fish, Lauri had steak) and then we took a walk up to Parshall. I called Sarah and heard about her trip to Florida and Lauri called Joe. We headed to bed about 9:30 because we were pooped.
Vacation Day 5 – July 29, 2008 PAIN
I got up really early today – wanted to watch the sun come up but it was overcast. We had a great breakfast and then went out riding with Cheri to finish up our lesson from yesterday. It was a lovely ride. We learned that the yellow flowers are yarrow and the blue are lupine. Angela’s horse wanted to eat all the time so in the afternoon, it had a muzzle on. After a two hour ride, we came back and had bbq beef for lunch. After lunch, we had a loping lesson. I had a hard time with that (Lauri is a natural athlete and did well. My back started to spasm, so I decided enough was enough, got down, and went and sat in the hot tub and took a couple of pain killers. It felt better at dinner (elk bucco, like osso bucco) and everyone wanted to hear about my back. It seems that there are two anesthesiologists, two sports medicine physicians, an ophthalmologist, an optician, a nephrologist, and a cardiologist here this week. So if my kidneys shut down and I have a heart attack, we’re in great shape. After dinner, we each bought a piece of jewelry, and then came back to the room because we’re pooped. Tomorrow is an all day ride.
Vacation Day 6 – July 30, 2008 WE ARE
The day started for me about 5am; for Lauri, a bit later. I walked up to the lodge, got a cup of coffee, and watched the sun get higher in the sky as I knit. Lauri, Angela and Martin and Mike joined me about 7:30 as today was our all day ride. Everyone including children (about 40 people) headed out for a breakfast ride. We went about three miles and stopped for breakfast. We were all hungry and the crew met us with pancakes, scrambled eggs, hash browns, and sausage. And, very importantly, a portapotty. Most everyone took a ride back, but Lauri, Angela, Martin and I went with Cheri, one of the owners, on an all day 14 mile ride. We went up into the Rockies on a trail that afforded us beautiful views of the mountains and of foliage. We saw groves of aspen and wildflowers such as Giant Angelica, Fireweed, Rosy Pussytoes, and Aster. We saw a lot more, but some of their names escape me now. We stopped about 2pm and had a bite to eat. Eddy, the chef, sent us with sandwiches, cheetos (or fritos), cookies, and Gatorade. I’ve never had Gatorade and I was thrilled to have it today. I was really afraid that I couldn’t mount the horse, but each time we stopped, we found logs that gave me just enough of a boost. After lunch, we road about what seemed like another 2.5 hours (Cheri kept saying, it’s just another 10 minutes!) I rode in back of Cherie because my horse seemed to like that position best and I kept asking her question after question. Thankfully, she used to teach high school PE and sex education so she’s used to a lot of questions. Finally, at the end, Scott met us with the pickup, the horse trailer, and a round of beers. We drove back to the ranch and all of us were pooped. After showers and phone calls, we had a wonderful hamburger bbq with cole slaw that was nice and spicy, and blueberry cobbler. Unfortunately we dawdled and the ice cream ran out. All of us were less talkative tonight. Oh, I forgot to mention the pain killers and gin….definitely glad we brought both of those. Tomorrow we’re supposed to have another all day ride. I’ll see how my back is doing.
Finally, Beth, the children’s program counselor graduated from Penn State in 2003. Since she had on her Penn State t-shirt tonight and I had on my Penn State sweatshirt, I yelled out, “We are” and she knew exactly what to do.
Vacation Day 7 July 31 2008 – And then there were cows
My back felt better today. Perhaps it was because I dreamt about riding my horse. We had a great breakfast of blueberry pancakes, egg, and bacon and then headed out on another all day ride. It was so different than yesterday. For one thing, there were eight of us. Joining Martin, Angela, Lauri and me were Angie, Steve, Telis and Leann. Angie and Steve live on a farm south of Indianapolis. Leann, Angie’s sister, and Telis live in Palm Springs, CA. We rode up through the mountains and it was really difficult to find the trail because so much logging had been done and new roads from the tractors were there and it looked different to Jerry than it usually does. We ran into a rancher who had about 400 head of cattle up on the mountain. It’s federal land but ranchers can get permits to graze their cows, recreational ranch owners get permits to ride horses through the lands, and logging companies get permits to log. We road for awhile and ran into about 150 head of cattle that were grazing. King and Queen, the dogs, decided to bark and chase the cows. Then the cows started chasing the dogs! It was pretty amusing once we knew we could get through the cows. We had lunch on the side of a hill overlooking beautiful views of Ute Mountain. We were actually in the Arapaho National Forest and in the Williams Fort section of the Rockies. After lunch, we turned around and attempted to find our way back. It really does take a skilled guide to figure out where we were and where we’d been. On the way back, Angela’s horse decided to jump over the mud puddle. She did a great job hanging on. We got back about 4:30, just in time for a nice shower and a beverage before an Italian dinner of eggplant parmesan or chicken parmesan. After dinner, I decided to do laundry. And now the sun is setting and it’s almost 9pm so time for bed. We’re having a wonderful time. I can’t believe how much more comfortable I feel with Cowgirl, my horse. Another week here and I’d feel great.
Vacation Day 8 – August 1, 2008 Work day
Today I took the day off and worked! I worked on the encyclopedia article that needs to be finished and out of my face. However, I did take a rest in the Jacuzzi. Lauri went on a moderate ride and an adventure ride, but her horse came up lame on the adventure ride so she came back. After a nice dinner of quail and tenderloin, we watched the staff show. It featured the BossMan reading a poem, the BossLady leading the human orchestra, Cinderella a la Steven Wright, a doctor skit, a Keys to the Universe rendition, and a funny or really not so funny skit with Moose impersonating a Mexican named Tabasco (the name of Mike’s horse.) Mike got a bit of ribbing and he didn’t like it. Then the kids all got awards of some sort and it was really cute. We said a fond farewell to our British friends Martin and Angela, and psyched ourselves up for the cattle drive.
Vacation Day 9 August 2, 2008 – The Cattle Drive
Today we went out to a range and for $140.00, we pushed, herded and had our horses bite cows. It was an exhausting day riding out to where the farthest cows were located and then driving them all back towards the ranch. It was amazing to me that calves can nurse while both they and their mothers walk. It was awesome….cows, calves, and three very large bulls. I learned today that girl cows have horns too – I never knew that. I’m so glad we did it but boy, am I pooped and sore. It was the hottest and the dirtiest we’ve gotten since we’ve been here. However, I was able to trot with no problem. However, the transition from trotting to loping kills my back. I took several Advil today and I imagine it would hurt even more without them.
We got back, showered for what seemed like hours to get all the dirt off. Then I did all my laundry and we had an amazing dinner of pork ribs. Tonight Lauri and I are going to the local bar to check it out. Then tomorrow, we head back to Chicago after one very special week. I can definitely cross something off my Bucket List.
Vacation Day 10 – August 3, 2008 – Chicago Bound
Woke up this morning and said goodbye to a lot of the folks here; Sisi, the very precocious 12 year old, Karen, the ophthalmologist, Leeann, Angie, and Telis, and the grandparents from Virginia whose son-in-law is named Lincoln German. This has been a wonderful trip to the Bar Lazy J. Nice people, good food, beautiful scenery and it’s been great having this time with Lauri. Close family and friends are what makes a wonderful life and I’m very blessed and thankful for my family and my friends. I’m also thankful to live in such a magnificent country. We saw views on this trip that I’ve never seen before. I’ll remember the sound of the Colorado River forever, and the sound of the train going up the hill and into the tunnel. Vacations are important, and I did exactly what I wanted on mine. I’m thankful that I was able to do it, both physically and financially. And now, it’s on to leg 2 – conference in Chicago, then down to Champaign, then off to Dwight.
Yesterday I drove from State College to Chicago. Long distance driving is second nature to me; I've been doing it for years and I love to drive, though less so now with each gas fill up. I have to say that I almost got teary driving on I-90 past the Arlington Heights Road exit. Arlington Heights was a great place to grow up. I spent the night with my friend Lauri and her husband Joe. This morning Joe is driving us downtown to the Amtrak station where we get on a train and head west to Colorado for a week at the Bar Lazy J Dude Ranch. The Bar Lazy J is quiet, quaint (not fancy or anything) and we'll spend the week riding horses, whitewater rafting, writing (need to get that article finished), and drinking gin and tonic on the porch swing along the Colorado River. This will be the first time in years that I won't have an Internet connection for more than a week.
I'm a big believer in vacations. They are rejuvenating, a chance to have fun, rewarding for your hard work during the year. All of us remember those family vacations of yore; kids squished in the family car in the back seat on the way to grandmas, or to a rented cabin. I've done my share of those vacations with my husband and our children but this year, it's all about me.
So have a good week and don't forget to take a vacation.
Those of you who know me well know that my daughter, Beth, is getting her MLS at GSLIS at the University of Illinois. Right now she is in Africa with some fellow grad students and high school students from East St. Louis and they're setting up computer labs in middle schools here in this island country of Sao Tome. It's exciting and terrifying for parents when their children are so far away. I don't know how parents stood it in times before the internet, before telephones, before planes. I suppose it was much different, but I can't imagine that parents feelings have changed much -- perhaps just their expectations.
However, we don't live in that age. We now live in a globally connected world and one of the very personal things that I'm grateful for is that I can talk to her, free of charge, while she's in a country that is very close to 0-0 in longitude and latitude and thousands of miles away.
This morning we chatted for almost an hour via Facebook. She happened to be at a place run by South Africans on the island that had very fast internet connections and via the Facebook chat, we could type away "talking" about what both of us were doing. I love how Facebook, and its widgits, connect people to one another all over the world. Everything about Facebook is easy and perhaps that is one of the reasons it's so appealing.
We've also had a couple of phone conversations via Yahoo Messenger. She's there and I'm driving through the Brandywine Valley near Philadelphia and we're talking about her experiences of the day.
Don't get me wrong -- we haven't spoken every day -- probably 3 times in the three weeks she's been gone, but it's great to hear her voice and to know that in an emergency, I'd be able to figure out how to contact her or how to get to her.
It's these tools that connect people to people and I hope through the ability to connect, that perhaps we'll all learn to get along a bit better and to understand one another a bit better too.
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