Here are some of my thoughts as a new student in the Master’s of Information Studies program at the University of Toronto:

1. Everyone is extremely nice. The professors are wonderfully approachable, as well as the staff. There isn’t really any competition going on between students, which is great. And all of this is such a relief from my undergrad. However, it also means that I don’t really engage in any interesting conversation with my classmates. I would be nice to start a Philosophy/Critical Theory reading circle just so I have some discussion at a higher level. Which leads into my second point…

2. The classes are so tedious. Apart from my joint Book History class which includes MAs and PhDs from other departments, all my classes are taught at such a slow theoretical level that I am starting to become dissatisfied. I know I have some really bright professors, I get glimpses of their insight from time to time. However, the lectures and the level of discussion in class is so elementary. I am not saying I even know anything about LIS, but I expected that as a Master’s program there would be some kind of rigor and critical debate. Maybe my expectations were too high?

3. To go along with that, my assignments are all busy work, at least right now. There are term essays which I haven’t begun to think about, but my current work seems more like a test of whatever we have learned in class + “discuss the positive/negatives” tacked on to make the work 500+ words. “Describe work using AACR2 and discuss” “Solve this organizational case study using a management principle and discuss.” I was reading Crooked Timber this morning and they were talking about Hegel, and I actually miss doing that. I know I was not good enough at it to make a living talking about Hegel, but I did get into some Philosophy Master’s which I decided against, so when these classes are so much fooling around I miss talking like that.

For instance, yesterday we discussed, briefly, classification and its relation to society for “Information and its Social Contexts.” All I wanted to do was go down and get a copy of Aristotle to study why we/the West categorize things the way we do. I know I can’t expect everyone to think like that, but shouldn’t we be challenging people?

1. TAs? It seems that all these introductory classes are too large for the teacher to mark all the work, so for the first time since second year undergrad I have a Teaching Assistant. What’s up with that? Is this the best way to judge student achievement, or would it be better to have smaller classes? My past experience with TAs is that, while well meaning, they have their own set ideas about what is good writing, as they are deep in their own style of writing, which can cloud their judgement of the content. A Russell scholar in Philosophy doesn’t really like when you use the mental tools of a Heidegger and vice versa; a Social Scientist doesn’t like when you write like a Humanities student. It is a frustratingly necessary evil.

If you haven’t realized, I am in a bit of an academic rut. I know that the work for my class is taking up only a small fraction of my time, and I should use what is left to start my own research. But the Catch-22 is that I am not really learning anything new in my classes, except for specific things like learning AACR2, so I don’t know if I can gain any new inspiration right now.

Except for Book History. It is a full year course, so it is moving a little slower. Buy maybe I need to look on it for solace. More on my thoughts of it as it develops.