PhD Student Orientation Committee

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We have created a committee of PhD students to try and make sure that new PhD students are given a good introduction to the school, and are provided with the information they need to get familiarized with the program, the school, the university, and the region.

Check out the PhD Student Orientation Guide

1 Purpose of the Committee
2 Duties of the Committee
3 Some Common Concerns and Questions
4 People
5 Related Links

[edit] Purpose of the Committee

The purpose of the New Student Orientation Committee is primarily to serve as people new students can talk to to find out more about how the program works, and people to which they can feel comfortable going to in order to ask questions. In the process, we also hope to create resources that are useful for new students and make sure that new students have access to them. This is important because there is a lot of tacit knowledge in the department which has not been captured anywhere, and as people leave, some of that knowledge gets lost.

We want to make sure that no new student inadvertantly gets left out of the loop, but at the same time we don't want to be stupidly formal or invasive in people's lives. Therefore, we plan on making sure that each new student has at least one person who is their designated information source, that they can feel free to talk to, and ask any questions they have, and who can check with them maybe once or twice in the first semester to make sure everything's going alright. We hope to pair people who share similar research interests or social interests or family situations so that there is some common ground for interaction. At the same time, if a student doesn't need the help, they shouldn't feel any pressure to participate. It is optional, and created for their own benefit.

[edit] Duties of the Committee

This year (Fall 2005) we kept being informed of duties we were unaware that we had. So here is an incomplete list of the duties we have stumbled accross so far:

Organize the New PhD Student Orientation
Organize an informal welcome dinner potluck that is off campus and just for PhD students
Setup a tour of the LIS Library run by Sue Searing
- In 2005 the tour was setup for after the first few weeks of classes, but not later, so the students had an opportunity to get used to the school, and had some need for the library, yet got an introduction to it before the need was acute.
Gather the new students' names, research interests, and advisor's names and post it to the PhD List.
- In 2004 a paper copy of this information was put in the Doc Study.

[edit] Some Common Concerns and Questions

This section is not for things which can be answered well in a wiki, but is for the type of concerns new students often have which we know about and are able to address (some of us at least).

What am I doing here?
- I'm in Illinois, in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by corn, away from all my friends, quit my job, and I'm here to go to Library School. What am I doing here?

How do I make sure I get paid? Do I have health insurance?

How do I make sure I can get credit for non-GSLIS classes?

Any mysterious administrative business that could end up screwing you over if you don't know about it.

[edit] People

All new students are encouraged to approach any members of the committee to ask them questions. If we cannot answer your questions, we'll figure out how they can be answered.