Over the course in my time at GSLIS I’ve worked on a variety of projects and with a wide range of faculty. The journey has been a wonderfully diverse, challenging and exciting experience. My interests lie mainly in social and community informatics, and are necessarily oriented by my background in sociology, which I find relates to nearly everything I encounter. My identity is distinctly that of a social scientist, yet I often get along well with engineers because I conceptualize social problems as solvable (and feel it is imperative we do) and like to create and play with tools that can aid us in tasks that produce discernable, measurable social goods.

During 2009-2010 I helped to teach in the Informatics Minor, TA-ing the class “Social Aspects of Information Technology.” I occasionally lectured but most of my time was spent doing lesson planning and instruction for two weekly sections of 20-25 students. I have been blessed with a great deal of freedom and most of the curriculum is of my own design! I hope to continue teaching this sort of class in the future.

For the 2008-2009 academic year I worked with the Community Informatics Initiative as a research assistant under an IMLS grant. Much of my work related to evaluation of the CI program but also included curricular support, technologies development and running the community informatics club.

Research Projects
Click on a project for details.

• São Tomé Map Project – Fall 2009 through Spring 2010
• Pairienet2: Technology Training Reborn – Fall 2008 through Spring 2009
• The Rantoul Public Library: History and Storytelling in [Stop] Motion – Fall 2008 through Spring 2009
• Community Engagement, the mini documentary – Fall 2008
• Community Informatics Multimedia Archive (CIMA) – Summer 2008
• eBlack Illinois: African American communities and library resources in Illinois – Spring & Summer 2008