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Welcome to my digication portfolio. This capstone portfolio highlights projects that I completed for the Master's  in Library Science (MLS) at Emporia State University (ESU). I hope you enjoy reviewing my work. 

 

My name is Taylor Keister and I work at the University of Kansas (KU). I am currently the Evening and Weekend Supervisor at Watson Library, though I have held a number of different positions at KU since I moved to Kansas in 2013.

 

In 2012, I completed my undergraduate studies in Russian, German, and history at University of Montana. After graduation I spent the summer living and studying in Kazan, Russia. During that time I volunteered at the Museum of Soviet Life. I consider this experience to be my first real taste of library since I helped curate displays of old Soviet children's books. After returning from Russia, I enrolled in graduate school at KU in 2013. I graduated with my Master's in Slavic Languages & Literatures in 2015, and completed one year of PhD coursework. During this time I began working with the Slavic librarian at Watson Library and soon found that I really liked working in libraries, so I enrolled in the School of Library and Information Management (SLIM) program at ESU in Spring 2017.

 

I am always looking for ways to use my language skills at the library, and in summer 2017 I was selected to serve as a Junior Fellow at the Library of Congress. I assisted Russian area specialists by cataloging the pre-1865 pamphlet collection in the European Division's backlog. Many of these items were collected over 100 year ago so I also had to verify which items were part of the Yudin Collection–a collection of 80,000 volumes purchased by the Library of Congress in 1906 from Siberian winemaker, distiller, and bibliophile Genadii Yudin. At the end of my fellowship, I selected a few of my favorite items to display for the annual Junior Fellows Showcase. Now, with the end of my MLS program in sight, I am eager to continue my career as a librarian and am interested in pursuing a career as a area-studies librarian, specializing in Russia, Eastern Europe, and Eurasia.

 

When I am not working, I enjoy reading Russian literature, skiing in Montana and Alaska, camping, and traveling the world. 

DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.