Some pre-thinking on MLIS 1

By as late as this July, I will be an MLIS student in the US.  Although there are many stories I would like to share with those who are interested, maybe it's a good starting point to talk about some of my thoughts about the goals of MLIS degree when I made the decision regarding which iSchool to choose. 

Basically, my final choice will be made between Syracuse University and Kent State University. They are on the list because they are among the three iSchools who are willing to give me a summer admission (I need it for personal reasons).

The Information School at Syracuse is ranked much higher than KSU's, however, I think this fact doesn't mean that the iSchool at Syracuse is definitely better. During my application, one saying I have heard a lot is that, every school that is accredited by ALA is a good one. However, for me, I think ranking is still an important factor to consider.

Another advantage of Syracuse is, you can say, Professor R.D. Lankes. I love his "new librarianship" paradigm, which I think is the inevitably future direction of librarianship, and I really want to be part of it. I have also subscribed some blogs maintained by MLIS students in Syracuse, their active engagement in the virtual community and local community (fg, the recent free little library they set up in Syracuse) impresses me a lot.

Although the Information School at KSU is not as well-ranked as the one in Syracuse, and may not have such a great library innovator as Prof. Lankes, however, as a public university, the expense in KSU is much lower than in Syracuse (although the expense of Syracuse University is much lower than many other private universities). And I will be much nearer to my girlfriend who is working at Oxford, Ohio.

What a great dilemma!

But one last thing to consider for me is this: which direction to take after I graduate after two years. For someone like me who really sucks at making choices and has many interests, it's a even more difficult question.

Say if I choose KSU, because their metadata direction is so strong, it's very likely that I will choose metadata as my future direction. For this career path, I am still not very confident that I can be a good metadata librarian (even though I have been a cataloger for almost five years), even though I think it's a good idea to take this direction, because it seems that metadata is one of the most promising directions in the library world, and not to mention the fact that Prof. Marcia Zeng is one of the most charismatic characters in the Chinese library community.

In short, I believe if I choose Syracuse, there will be a broader set of possibilities to choose. But on the other hand, I am not sure, whether it's a good thing or not just to postpone the decision that I have to make, which makes the life  maybe too "comfortable".

And then, I cannot stopping thinking about the goals of MLIS. If I am right to assume that the most significant goal of MLIS degree is to prepare up potential professional librarians, then maybe choosing Syracuse is a better idea, because I can be exposed to a more comprehensive future possibilities and courses. I hope I am right this time.

P.S. I hope I am not as a "people who are unable to decide" as Ted Mosby, but maybe I am. Sigh.

P.S.P.S. This passage was published in another place about half a year ago. And today, when I decided to move my blog to Blogspot, I decided that I should publish this passage as the starting one. Because when I will definitely be an MLIS student  in Syracuse University, the time point when I wrote this blog post is an interesting spot to start thinking about the degree.