Legal Research

Beloit's latest mindset list (and one for librarians)

I always link to this list every year (I'm a little delayed this year since I was away).

Anyway, Beloit College has published the latest edition of its annual mindset list - Mindset list for the Class of 2013.
As always some of the entries are controversial but it's a nice annual reminder that every year I (and we) get a little farther way from our own first year undergrad experiences. Some things are the same. Many things aren't.

I always notice how different my two kids' experiences were. All their course catalogues are electronic only. Even course selection is only available online and at a specific exact time like 6 a.m. Getting their tax receipts could only be done online. Every registration thing depends on knowing your student ID, password, and e-mail. Wasn't like that for me. I was always immersed in just multiple copy paper forms.

Oh and the system performance of the registration systems is really awful - minutes not seconds to respond. They must have baked that into the specs so they could experience a little of the old school ways.

Oh and Blue Skunk Blog started this which is fun and interesting:

Mindset List for Librarians
By Doug Johnson

"The Beloit College Mindset List for 2013 was published recently. One of things that today's entering college students have never done (according to item #4) is "... used a card catalog to find a book."

Hmmmm, I wonder how many librarians starting their professional careers today know what it means to "file above the rod" and why one would do it?

Do we need a Mindset List for New Librarians?* Let's give this a try...

The Mindset List for Librarians Entering the Field in 2009
Librarians entering the field today...

1. Have never had to type a catalog card.
2. Have never looked something up in the Readers Guide to Periodical Literature.
3. Have never maintained a vertical file.
4. Have never attended a F2F graduate school library class.
5. Have never puchased (or rented) a 16mm film, VHS tape or LaserDisc. (Let alone a filmloop or filmstrip.)
6. Have never NOT had the Internet as a resource.
7. Have never checked out 5 1/4 floppy disks of MECC games.
8. Have never arranged for interlibrary loan of a physical book.
9. Have ever worked in a library without student workstations or a computer lab.
10. Have never sent overdue notices to parents by postal mail.

So, 10 off the top of my balding head. And yours....?"

11. I'd add they've never (thank god) used 300, 1200, o0r 2400 baud modems.
12. Suffered with pin fed printers or thermal paper.

Head over there and add some more...

Stephen

Full post as published by Stephen's Lighthouse on August 30, 2009 (boomark / email).