Week 1: Orientation/The First Month

Where do I begin? Probably at the beginning would be best.

I applied to this internship as it seemed to provide the most opportunity for me to try different areas of academic librarianship, while still being manageable with my time. I started my internship with CSULB on August 22, 2024, one month before classes started at UW. I chose an outfit that was the perfect combination of professional, classy, and youthful. Theoretically, this would be such an easy month for me as my time would be less stretched without classes as all I'd have to worry about is going to my other job.

Well, that wasn't the case.

My first few hours were both physically and mentally overwhelming. My first day included an orientation, five flights of stairs in heels, going down an absurdly large hill in heels, observing my first bibliographic lecture, and then walking up the previously mentioned absurdly large hill in heels. The unrealistic expectation of showing up and wowing everyone immediately plus the imposter syndrome quickly settled in as I tried to navigate a campus with a student population twelve times larger than my alma mater.

It took longer for me to adjust than I would like to admit as I felt so out of my element, especially since my other job was at a public library primarily focusing on children's programming and outreach. However, as I have adjusted my own expectations and goals regarding this experience I feel much more confident in my own skills and abilities.

Within the past month before UW classes started, I've observed 10 bibliographic lectures from 9 different librarians, started making plans for 2 workshops, taught 2 of my own lectures (one more successful than the other), and spent over 30 hours at the reference desk answering student questions and working with the co-op chat. I've also spent some time in the university archives, which inspired one of my workshop topics. While this doesn't fully encapsulate everything that happened to me in the last month, it is a good start. I'm excited to what else I can do and learn in this semester.