EDITOR'S NOTE
A Mission
by Donovan Griffin
The structure of a mission (or of a duty, quest, or guideline) can be comforting, in a certain way. When we know what the requirements of success are—and maybe even have a clue about how to meet them—tackling a tough job simply becomes a series of doable, perhaps even menial, tasks.
This month, we have a few stories for you about missions—sometimes clear cut, sometimes not. Corilee Christou outlines the next few steps that the new Librarian of Congress, Carla Hayden, might take, in “A Big To-Do List for the New Librarian of Congress.” And George Pike delves into the tale of a recently departed library cataloger at the University of New Hampshire, who left a large financial gift to his former place of employment without strict instructions on how it should be used—and the uproar that followed—in “Being Charitable: Librarian’s $4 Million Bequest Presents Cautionary Tale.”
Gwen Gregory’s review of Metaliteracy in Practice explains the fundamentals of the concept for those would-be practitioners out there—catch it on page 20. And Thomas Pack shares his knowledge about a useful little corner of the web that might help explain a difficult concept or two in “Thousands of Classes at Skillshare” on page 31.
I hope my guidelines on this issue were clear enough, but if they weren’t, better read from cover to cover, just in case.
— Donovan Griffin |
