Conceptual Frameworks (or, Transitioning from Engineer to Social Scientist)

I recently experienced what I believe to be an “Aha!” moment in my research methods class. We had been moving right along in that class talking about research areas, topics, questions, etc., which all made sense to me. Then, all of the sudden, we started talking about models and conceptual frameworks. You would have thought I hit a brick wall. I felt as though I could not wrap my mind around conceptual frameworks. I thought it was so abstract that my linear, concrete, engineer mind just wasn’t capable of comprehending that concept. I thought about it, debated it with myself and others, analyzed it, read whatever I could find pertaining to it, analyzed it some more, but still felt like I was completely lost in my understanding of what it was. Then, one day, after talking to yet another of my classmates about it and then with Dr. Wang, I felt like I had a breakthrough. It felt as though the fog was beginning to lift and the conceptual framework was beginning to make sense. Now, two weeks later, I feel like I have a pretty good understanding of it.

I believe my problem was that I was over-analyzing it and viewing it as a thing more than a concept. I was seeing it as a subsection of the research proposal report like an introduction, literature review, and conclusion. But the breakthrough I had was that it is not necessarily a delineated part of the report. It’s not necessarily a ‘thing’ that you do. It develops as you research the literature and find a way for your research to fit in. It’s the model I’m building my study on, how my study relates to it, and the questions I propose to answer. It’s a framework, yes, but not a physical one. It’s a CONCEPTUAL framework. (I know, duh!)

This was huge breakthrough for me. I see it as part of my transition from being a linear thinking engineer to a not-so-linear-and-sometimes-quite-curvy-thinking social scientist. See below for what I mean.

Hack Your Program: The University of Tennessee School of Information Sciences

HLS

Disclaimer: This post contains opinions and statements that are mine and may not be representative of other students and faculty within this program.

The School of Information Sciences (SIS) at the University of Tennessee is ranked 17th in the U.S. News rankings of library science programs. The School has roots as far back as 1928 and has been accredited by the American Library Association since 1972. It is a housed within the College of Communication and Information (CCI). With twelve full time faculty members and over 200 students in the program, SIS offers a Master’s of Science in Information Science and, through CCI, a doctoral degree.

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Data Sharing: Panacea or Can of Worms?

This is a blog post I wrote over at Hack Library School Blog.

HLS

Author’s note: My interests within the LIS field are data curation and e-science librarianship. This is a hot topic that is growing every day, and skilled e-science librarians are needed to fill the gap. If you’re interested in learning more about data curation librarianship as a future career, leave a comment here, and I’ll follow up with more information.

Back in the Fall, Micah wrote a post about Open Access Week. In it he discussed open journals, open data, and the ALA Code of Ethics. Open data is what today’s post is about. An important ongoing question in the world of data curation today is how to get scientists to share their data by placing it in a data repository. There are many scientists who are unaware of the fact that their data has value to anyone but them and their research team. On the other hand, there are…

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I’m Sitting Pretty Well

I read an article called “The Last Mile: Liaison Roles in Curating Science and Engineering Research Data,” by Tracy Gabridge. It was very exciting to see the potential data liaison personas she listed:

• A subject liaison with a domain-specific education and work experience in a field such as civil engineering or chemistry.
• A subject liaison with no domain-specific expertise, but with excellent analytical and technical skills who has a passion for understanding and manipulating data.
• A researcher in the life sciences who fell into managing data for a lab because they were the only one available to do it and they find the work enjoyable.
• A newly minted Masters of Science candidate from a library and information science program with a specialization in research data curation.

The phrases and words in bold are those that I already have or will have when I graduate. So, in my opinion, I’m sitting pretty well.

Information Sciences Knowledge Mapping

As part of an Assignment for 590 – eportfolio, I’m mapping the knowledge I’ve obtained thus far in my LIS grad school career. So far, I’ve mapped the knowledge for the three core courses:

• IS 510 The Information Environment
• IS 520 Information Representation and Organization
• IS 530 Information Access and Retrieval

The following maps indicate the information I’ve learned. I’ve hit on the high points and have not delved too deeply into the details. In other words, these mind maps are not highly granular (thanks, Dr. Normore).

CurateGear Reflections

On January 6, 2012, I attended CurateGear at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. CurateGear was a one-day workshop designed to showcase the state of the art within the digital curation field. There were over twenty speakers, all experts within the digital curation field. The format of the workshop was highly interactive. First, we would listen to four short presentations on various topics then move to another room with four separate areas set up to see demonstrations of the topics and products the speakers introduced and ask them questions. Then we would have another four presentations and then another four demonstrations and question sessions. This pattern was repeated throughout the day. It was broken up well with the demonstration sessions and breaks so the day went by faster, and no one felt as through it was getting tedious — a sentiment I felt at the Repositories Workshop in Washington, DC, last November.

As a relatively new student to the fields of library and information sciences, I was hoping to learn more about the emerging field of data curation by attending CurateGear. The best way to describe the experience at this workshop is to say it was similar to drinking water from a fire hose all day long — you can drink a little, but the vast majority of the water flows by. I am sure I was able to catch a few nuggets of useful information, but much of the information the speakers spoke about was more advanced than what I could comprehend. I believe this workshop would have been better suited for my second year in graduate school. But, nonetheless, I am glad I was exposed to these topics and issues now, as they will become clearer to me as I go through the Foundations of Data Curation course and spend the summer at NCAR.

Having the foundation of the three SIS core courses before attending CurateGear was a benefit. The most useful of the three was 530, Information Access and Retrieval. Were it not for this class, I would not have even known what metadata was. This was a term used frequently by the speakers. One important issue that I picked up on was the need for accurate and thorough metadata for the data being stored. This issue is important for current and future researchers. Without it, discovery of the data will be difficult, at best. In contrast, the other side of that issue is the question of what metadata to store about different types of data. As I understand it, this is an ongoing question to which there is not a simple answer.

Another important question that will need to be answered is how to maintain and preserve the various file types for future access. This is not a simple issue, since file types and formats become obsolete quickly. There is a research center at Georgia Tech that is working on a way to identify and characterize file formats. Another speaker told about the difficulties he encountered when trying to archive the original working manuscript file for the musical Rent. The author died in 1996, and the original manuscript was written on an early 1990s model Apple Powerbook, making the archiving difficult. This made the issue clear — digital files have a short lifespan compared to hard copy materials and preserving them is and will continue to be a hot topic.

In all, I believe the trip was beneficial, if not for the introduction to the field of digital data curation, then for the contacts I was able to make. I spoke at length to the head of the Martin Journalism Library at University of Missouri. She indicated that within the next one to two years, the University of Missouri Library plans to hire a data curation specialist. This could prove to be a valuable connection. I intend to maintain contact with her and even visit on the way to or from Boulder this summer. Being on the cutting edge of a new field is exciting since it will provide for stronger long term career prospects.

Chosen as a Writer for Hack Library School!

I was chosen as a new writer/contributor for the Hack Library School blog on January 10, 2012. Click here to see the article written by founder Micah Vandegrift that started it all. I “applied” to be a writer by sending two or three examples of my writing ability and style and telling them a bit about myself. I chose to send them some samples from my Placemaking blog (I no longer write on that blog). These are the articles I sent:

1. Efficient and Unimpeded Movement of People: The Lifeblood of a Livable City
2. The Use of Sidewalks: Safety
3. A Walk Down a Perfect Street

I am very excited to be a part of this project. It’s a great group of people, all students in a library school somewhere. My first post will be on January 23, 2012, in which I introduce the University of Tennessee’s School of Information Sciences.