Nicole H. Garrett

Last year I wasn’t so good at keeping up on my blog.  So part of my New Years Resolution is to update my blog more often.   We’ll see how well I do! 

Since my last post, I’ve been busy with helping the Michigan Historical Center get more involved with social networking.  We are in the process of redesigning our Seeking Michigan site and we hope to have it all up and ready on March 1 (my b-day!).  I’ve been looking through Flickr and blogs to find groups interested in Michigan history.  I’m really excited to see where these endeavors go!

I’ve also been involved in the Michigan Archival Association (MAA) Program Committee for the 2009 Annual Meeting.  We are in the final stages of securing speakers and it’s looking to be a interesting program!

hmm what else?  The dance studio always occupies a large part of my time.  I attended another tap festival, finished two pieces, started two, while teaching four classes.  Good thing I love tap!

So all in all 2009 is looking to be a busy, eventful, and exciting year…can’t wait!

No Comments » Posted by Nicole / Tags: New Year Resolution, social media

Last night I stepped on the ice for the first time in about 12 years.  It was a pretty humorous experience.  I never fell, but I did lose my balance a few times.  I only really attempted one jump, which turned out to be when I wasn’t really moving….at all.  I skated about everyday when I was a kid, so the fact that cross overs proved a bit difficult was a bit surprising.  But skating is a bit like riding a bike; it took 20 minutes, but I got to where I could skate around comfortably forwards and fairly decently backwards.

I think it’ll take a few more times to break my skates in.  I got a few blisters on my ankles, but compared to pointe shoes, it’s not that bad.  I definetely want to go back and do it again soon! Maybe next time, I’ll attempt a spin!

No Comments » Posted by Nicole / Tags: skating

Yesterday, I met a friend from library school for lunch at a bookstore.  She is now working at a local public library as a reference librarian.  It’s so interesting to me that although we went through the same program at Wayne State, our jobs now are so different.  Her day consists of ordering books, readers advisory, planning programs, cataloging and other “library things”; my typical day is filled with  working on the reference desk (working mostly with genealogists and historical researchers), and managing digital content.

I love to read, but sometimes between my archives job, the dance studio (where I take class and teach), school, friends, and family, I don’t crack open books as much as I would like to.  Would I read more if I worked with books everyday?  The optimistic side of me would like to say yes, but in reality I doubt it.   There would still be only 24 hours in a day.

What I envy about librarians is that I would like to learn more about new books and read reviews on books about anything and everything.  I’ve found Goodreads to be a great source for that type of info.  It’s a social networking site for readers and I’ve found that I’m reading more and using the site a lot.  I really like how you can keep track of what you’ve read and would like to read, not to mention reviewing books and reading reviews of others.  If anyone is a member, please add me as a friend!  My bookshelf is available here .

No Comments » Posted by Nicole / Tags: books, libraries, reading

A few weeks ago, I attended the Motor City Tap Fest and there isn’t a word to describe it except awesome! It was such a great experience to learn from such amazing dancers and have the focus be on tap all day. I went for a day and a half this year, but next year I’lll be all four days! I hope my feet can handle it!

One of the major points of the teachers there was to learn the history of tap dancing. I have to say, I was quite embarrassed to hear kids 10 years younger than me naming off tap masters that I’d never heard of. After all, I’ve been tapping for about 20 years and now teach it! As soon as I got home, I went on YouTube and found some amazing clips:

I’d heard of the Nicholas Brothers, but only through a Vaudeville documentary. I didn’t realize they performed into adulthood and were so amazing!

After I saw this one of Peg Leg Bates, I realized I have no excuse for giving up on any difficult step!

YouTube is full of these amazing clips! It’s so nice to have somewhere to find these!

Now I’m planning a trip to Chicago to take some more master classes. Can’t wait!

No Comments » Posted by Nicole / Tags: dance, tap

I just returned home from the Michigan Archival Association (MAA) Conference held in Mackinac City, Michigan.  This my first time attending an MAA conference and my first time presenting at any professional conference.  The last time I gave a presentation was in college, so it was a little nerve wracking.  At least this time I wasn’t graded!

I attended sessions on odd reference requests and do-it-yourself exhibits.  Both were very interesting and informative.  We don’t work with the media too often at the Archives of Michigan, so it was interesting to hear from institutions that the media frequently contacts.  The do-it-yourself exhibits session was particularly well done.  The presenters explored designing descriptive panels, borrowing artifacts from museums to compliment archival material, and exporting physical exhibits to the web.  They all provided step-by-step hand outs, so I’m excited to dig a bit and play around with the concepts.

I gave my presentation on the “Thank God for Michigan” Project that I am working on at the Archives of Michigan.  People seemed very interested in the project, so my presentation must have at least kept most of the audience awake!  I write a blog about the project, available here .  I try to update it fairly often (I’m much better about that one than my blog here!).  I’ll also write more about my projects at the Archives of Michigan in a new post.

Greg Kinney from the Bentley Historical Library also spoke at my session.  He announced that DLPS (from the University of Michigan) is interested in beginning a Michigan EAD consortium with all EAD guides hosted on their servers free of charge.  The Archives of Michigan was the first institution offered this free license for the “Thank God For Michigan” Project and I’m really excited to part of this pilot project.

This was MAA 50th Anniversary and I was glad to be a part of it.  Aside from doing well on my presentation, my other goal was to become more involved in this organization.  Everyone was very friendly and I am planning on joining the program committee for next year’s conference in Marshall, Michigan.

No Comments » Posted by Nicole / Tags: conference, MAA, Mackinaw City (Mich.)

My second day started with a session on digital collections. The session mostly concerned MPLP (More Product Less Process). The project I am working on at the Archives of Michigan is testing this exact idea. I also found out about a Midwest CONTENTdm Conference that I would like to participate in next year.

Next, I learned about audio preservation in the ideal. There was an example of an audio engineer converting analog to digital and the quality was profoundly better compared to standard graduate student help. It’s too bad this option is out of the realm of possibility for most archival institutions.

The last session I attended for the day was about marketing archival resources to the “Netgen”. I was expecting a lot more from this session. One of my pet peeves is when established professionals stereotype young people with technology. Yes, people of later generations have grown up with computers, but most patrons requesting digital content are not younger than 20. In fact, they’re usually senior citizens in my experience.

Additionally, I fail to see how creating myspace and facebook pages will bring young people to archives and libraries. Personally, I see it as a waste of resources; instead, institutions should be working on creating more user oriented webpages that make searching fun and simple. Going into social networking sites also just seems absurd to me–I equate it to a librarian or archivist in 1969 setting up a booth at Woodstock. Young people should know that myspace and facebook are not places to go for research worthy information and just because they visit these sites, doesn’t mean they’ll visit a library facebook page. Neither myspace of facebook were set up to provide information for users, so why are librarians and archivists wanting to make it do something that it doesn’t do.

That’s not to say I’m against using the web. The Library of Congress’s Flickr site is a great way to use free and highly used web services to booster activity.

One good idea from this session was to work with teachers, since that’s where most students learn where to go for information. This isn’t a new idea, but it’s a much better way of marketing to students than social networking sites.

No Comments » Posted by Nicole / Tags: conference, MAC

Today was my first day of the Midwest Archival Conference Annual Meeting.  I started the day by going on a walking tour of the city of Louisville (photos coming as soon!).  From there, I visited the Frasier Museum and viewed a engaging exhibit on an excavated slave ship.  A school group happened to be there at the same time.  I overheard one kid tell a friend that “this is really cool.  I thought this would be boring, but it’s really kind of interesting.”  Hearing kids say things like that is so inspiring.  Maybe that’s cheesy of me, but I love museums that make history fun for the public.

At 1:30, I went to my first session on collection policies and met up with my friend Linnea. My job doesn’t relate to collection policies, so it wasn’t too helpful for my current job, but it was still interesting and a good review of what I learned in grad school.

The keynote speech concerned the need to put materials online to provide greater access.  Since this directly relates to my job, this was quite an interesting talk.  Jennifer Schaffner gave several examples of institutions’ digital collections, which I will be perusing.  She also offered the idea of digitizing snippets of collections to “lure” people into the archives to view the full collection.  For a repository with a small budget, this is a viable solution to creating a digital collection.  Additionally, this allows archivists to see the reaction of patrons without investing a lot of money.

In the evening, my family and I visited the Speed Art Museum.  I don’t “get” art, but I appreciate it!  The Museum had excellent displays with panels explaining themes and history for those of us who want to know more, but like being told rather than interpreting it any way we wish.  We took a guided tour where the guide explained modern art in a way that made me actually enjoy it (usually I skip anything post Impressionism).  So, one up on increasing my cultural astuteness!

No Comments » Posted by Nicole / Tags: conference, MAC

Welcome to my first blog posting!  Is it lame to have a first blog posting about writing my first blog posting?  Maybe, but it happens.

Next week, I am heading to my first professional conference and I’m really excited.  I will be attending MAC’s Annual Meeting in Louisville, KY.  I’m really looking forward to visiting Louisville and picking up some new ideas in EAD and digitization strategies.   I’d like to become more involved with professional organizations as well, so hopefully attending the meeting will help with that.

I’m also really interested in web design and management.  I’ve taken a few classes at the local community college and my next big project (besides making this site more attractive) is to learn PHP.  I really wish there were more hours in the day!  Right now, I’d consider myself a “techie wannabe”.  That is, I’m really excited about new trends in web design and tech stuff, but I don’t know as much as I want to about them and I’m not an expert by any means.  But I think the main requirement for becoming a techie is to be open to new ideas and excited about it (besides being a Mac user!), so I think I’m on the path to becoming one.
Now I just need the money for a Mac…

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