Working with my local community has always been a constant for me. Prior to becoming enrolled in the iSchool's MLIS program, I was a presenter for the University of Washington's Committee Organizing Rape Education program, giving rape education presentations and serving on event planning committees, I was a volunteer at NARAL Pro-Choice Washington, helping out with their events and updating their database, and a member of the student club Disability Advocacy Student Alliance (DASA), working with disability issues on the UW campus. I continued working with DASA throughout my time in the MLIS program, being the president of the club during my first year. Please see the Leadership Experience section for an in-depth look at the work I performed as president and the skills that I learned from my experience with DASA. It is important to work with the people in your community, as this is realy the only way to understand how you community thinks and works and what needs they have that you can help solve. This knowledge of community life is vital if public libraries expect to fully serve the patrons that visit them.
My newest volunteer work while in library school was at Seattle Public Library's Library Equal Access Program (LEAP), where I performed my directed field work (LIS 590) throughout the summer of 2007 and continued on as a volunteer on a weekly basis for the rest of the program. As both a field worker and a volunteer, I assisted patrons with disabilities in a number of tasks, such as teaching them basic computer and keyboarding skills, assisting them with using library resources such as databases and the library catalog, working with patrons to develop their resumes and fill out such things as job applications and election ballots, guided them around the library while informing them of the various services the library could provide, and a myriad of other types of one-on-one assistance. I also helped the low-vision high school interns at LEAP learn how to research information about colleges and scholarships and what scholarship databases would be useful for them.
Tasks I performed at LEAP that directly relate to improving library services was helping the LEAP Coordinator develop and update a list of disability-related works that LEAP patrons would be interested in by researching disability titles and created a manual with information and instructions for the adaptive equipment that the LEAP lab offers (which can be found under the Technology Skills section). I also provided readers' advisory during my fieldwork, identifying and locating books that patrons were searching for and giving suggestions for other, similar books that might suit their interests.
Even on my own, I strive to serve my community in whatever ways I can. I have managed to get the UW's Disability Service Office to fix some (but unfortunately not all) of the incorrect Braille in Mary Gates Hall. I convinced the Internet Public Library to implement some changes to their Kids' Ask a Question page (namely the discontinuation of color as an indicator, the changes will appear by the end of April '08). Finally,I spent a significant amount of time at the beginning of Spring quarter '08 using my skills in HTML and CSS to assist my MLIS peers in crafting their portfolio web sites, showing them how to host a web page and troubleshooting their HTML and CSS coding. For example, on Amy Lavare's web site, I helped her host her site, showed her how to format her CSS to place a list of links near the top of the page with a different picture underneath it on each page, and showed her how to include titles and alt text for her images. On Ann Swearingen's web site, I showed her how to reformat her CSS template to insert more buttons, change and disable default images, and otherwise modify the web page to her liking while maintaining the aesthetic qualities of the CSS template. Not only did my assistance help out my peers, but I was also able to refine my CSS and web design skills
This page was last updated on Saturday, 19-Apr-2008 17:28:25 PDT.
Created and maintained by Timothy Shockley