Dear colleague:

I'm writing to share information with you about the British Studies Program offered by The University of Southern Mississippi and consortium partners, and to ask for your help in providing information about LIS 580/587: British Libraries & Information Centers to students who may be interested. If appropriate, would you please pass along to your student listserv? 

This June students will once again have the opportunity to study library & information science/archival studies in London through a four-week course offered by the British Studies Program.  For details on the course and on our program point your browser to http://www.usm.edu/bsp.

The program is offered June 26 - July 27, 2014. The course carries six hours of graduate credit from The University of Southern Mississippi, a fully-accredited institution of higher learning, and the School of Library & Information Science, a program accredited by the American Library Association. Credit is transferable; we recommend you check with your home institution regarding its policies for credit transfer.

The course focuses on historic repositories in Britain, covering the history and scope of specific collections as well as their organization and preservation. Our classrooms are the libraries, archives, and museums of London and Edinburgh. We won't be hearing from boring lecturers; rather, we'll be on-site, hearing directly from British librarians, archivists, and curators who give us a guided behind-the-scenes tour, share their expertise, and show us examples from their collections.  

Students from all areas of librarianship and archival studies will benefit from the course – public librarianship, academic librarianship, youth services, adult services, school librarianship, archival studies, library history, history of the book, and international librarianship.  In addition to the sites we will visit together as a class, students are expected to visit additional sites related to their particular area of interest and to gather information for a scholarly research paper, which will be due a few weeks after we return to the states.

The course is taught by Dr. Teresa S. Welsh [[log in to unmask]], Associate Professor, Southern Miss School of Library & Information Science. Learn more about the course at http://www.usm.edu/library-information-science/british-studies.

The British Studies Program stays in central London at King's College in one of their dormitories. The rooms are small, but everyone gets a private room with mini-fridge and private bath. Everyone has access to a shared kitchen and the dorm has a large courtyard which serves as a social center of the program. Participants quickly make friends with the other students from across the country.

The dorm is on Stamford Street, approximately a hundred yards from Waterloo Station. The central location puts you just a few minutes' walk from Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, and the theater district.  Most people walk when they're headed to central London because it's so close.

The cost for the program is $7,599 for graduate students. This price includes tuition, air travel, housing, and academic travel (day trips to Oxford Bodleian Library and to Stratford-upon-Avon), including a four-day trip outside London to Edinburgh.  The deadline to apply is April 21, 2014. Qualified students can usually get financial aid just as if this were a course you were taking in the U.S.  You apply through your local financial aid office.  The International Programs office at Southern Miss is more than happy to provide you with information and assistance regarding financial aid and credit transfer.

Feel free to contact us with any further questions regarding this course of the program in general.  For more information about the program visit our website:

http://www.usm.edu/bsp

Hope to see you in London!
 
Dr. Dave Davies
Director, British Studies Program
International Programs
601-266-4344
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