LAUINGER — In a research consultation held Thursday for ANTH-001: Intro to Cultural Anthropology, Senior Research Librarian Miriam O’Neil reportedly gave students an extensive Google lesson.
Attendees said O’Neil showed near mastery of skills like typing in search words, scrolling through multiple results, and finally, selecting an article to read.
O’Neil said she was developing materials for Bing and Ask Jeeves.
“These students have a lengthy paper due at the end of the semester, so I devoted one entire class period to our brilliant research librarian,” said ANTH-001 Professor Eric Foley about the consultation. “Most people just don’t realize how helpful these librarians can be.”
Students were silent throughout the presentation because they were “most likely shocked by the new-ness of the material” reported O’Neil.
“The librarian was really excited that you can go back and change the search terms if you don’t like your initial results.” said Taylor Winn (COL ’18), a student in Foley’s class and an attendee of the library workshop. “She showed us that five times in a row.”
“I never knew Google results could load so slowly. It felt like forever,” commented Trevor Fink (COL ’18), another witness to O’Neil’s demonstration.
O’Neil, who holds two masters degrees and pulls a $75,000 annual salary, felt that the consultation was one of her best yet.
“The projector shut down in the middle of my spiel, and we had to wait five minutes for it to re-boot,” said O’Neil. “But in that extra time I got to blow my nose and explain the difference between a .com and a .org! Oh, it worked out so wonderfully.”
The librarian also mentioned being proud of her handout – a white sheet of paper that noted the URL “https://google.com/” and provided bullet pointed instructions about switching from a web to an image search.
“That handout won me the 2008 Distinguished Achievement in Research Award, which is a $10,000 cash prize given out to one Georgetown faculty member every spring,” said O’Neil.
“It’s just a simple sheet, really, but I think that’s why students appreciate it.”
O’Neil makes sure that her Google skills are up-to-date by attending an annual week-long conference for the American Library Association, usually held at the Waldorf Astoria Resort in Maui.
“Georgetown foots the bill every spring, and it doesn’t even detract from my eight weeks paid vacation,” explained O’Neil. “It’s a big trip to make for what’s essentially 45 minutes of Google instruction – but I’m not there for me. It’s all for the benefit of the students.”
ANTH-001 students agreed that, thanks to O’Neil’s presentation, they did learn something.
“I did learn that the word ‘acculturation’ has two ‘C’s. She kept spelling it wrong in the search box, and Google would auto-correct it for her,” observed Martin Cho (COL ’18).
“Now I know that if I need help with anything, I’ll probably ask my roommate Clara,” said Winn. “She at least knows how to work the sound on YouTube clips.”