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Home – Programs – Career Pathways – Information Organization, Description, Analysis, and Retrieval

Information Organization, Description, Analysis, and Retrieval

The MLIS program requires 43 units for graduation. Within those units, five courses are required: LIBR 203, LIBR 200, LIBR 202, LIBR 204, LIBR 285, and either LIBR 289 or LIBR 299. Beyond those five courses, a student is free to select electives reflecting individual interests and aspirations.

The Career Pathway described here is provided solely for advising purposes. No special designation appears on your transcript or diploma. All students get an MLIS degree.

Description

This career pathway focuses on:

• How information is sought, evaluated and used
• How information can best be structured and indexed to meet these needs
• The organization and description of resources and files in all formats
• What kinds of tools are needed for retrieval

Work in this area requires understanding of both existing standards for organization and description and intentionally non-standardized systems such as social tagging. Technology is an important dimension because of the variety of technologies in use today for creating and storing documents. Because the ability to retrieve documents depends upon the way they have been organized and described, a thorough understanding of search and retrieval using a variety of technologies is also important. Work in this field requires a well-balanced understanding of information agencies, management, and user perspectives as a framework for determining appropriate organization and description. A critical understanding of the social effects of decisions made at the technical level and the ethics of metadata creation is essential for this professional work.

Employment Opportunities

Students who concentrate in this field may work as:

• Catalog/Electronic Resource Librarians
• Data Management Coordinators
• Internet Catalogers
• Knowledge Management Analysts
• Metadata Librarians
• Schema Architects
• Taxonomists
• Technical Services Directors
• User Experience Architects
• Vocabulary/Information Architecture Directors

Core Theory and Knowledge

• Understand evolution of standards used for organizing and describing information
• Appreciate service environments and communities of practice for organizers of information
• Understand user perspectives, the search process, and how various files and technologies impact search strategy
• Understand issues of vocabulary, user perspectives, and information needs both inside and outside the organization
• Appreciate the evolution of technology, understand current capabilities and options, and explore new and innovative uses of technology for searching, web navigation, and resource discovery
• Maintain a broad perspective of possibilities for organizers of information through an understanding of various levels of the organization
• Understand the components of project planning and gathering input for implementing a data conversion project

Recommended Coursework

Required Courses:

• LIBR 203 Online Social Networking: Technology and Tools
• LIBR 200 Information and Society
• LIBR 202 Information Retrieval
• LIBR 204 Information Organizations and Management
• LIBR 285 Research Methods in Library and Information Science
• LIBR 289 or LIBR 299 Culminating Experience

Note: For this career path LIBR 202 is the most important course. If you are not comfortable with the material and format of LIBR 202, then this is not the career for you.

Foundation Courses:

• LIBR 240 Information Technology Tools and Applications
• LIBR 244 Online Searching
• LIBR 246 Information Technology Tools and Applications
  Sections on text/data mining; XML
• LIBR 247 Vocabulary Design
• LIBR 248 Beginning Cataloging and Classification
• LIBR 249 Advanced Cataloging and Organization of Information
• LIBR 281 Seminar in Contemporary Issues
  Section on metadata
• LIBR 282 Seminar in Library Management
  Sections on project management; using social media for competitive and company research
• LIBR 294 Professional Experience: Internships

Recommended Courses:

• LIBR 241 Library Automation Systems
• LIBR 245 Advanced Online Searching
• LIBR 287 Seminar in Information Science
  Section on virtual services

Effective leadership and management (of people and information) is critically important for all types of work environments and clients.

We recommend that students consider also selecting some courses from the Leadership and Management career path to complement or supplement core skills in other areas.

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