The Palmer School is part of LIU's College of Information and Computer Science. It offers the MSLIS degree in Manhattan and at its other sites; it also offers a Ph.D. at its Brookville campus. The Palmer School was founded in 1959 and is one of only 57 schools nationwide to hold American Library Association accreditation. The Palmer School is based at LIU's C.W. Post campus, but has had a presence in Manhattan since 1986. We have been housed in NYU's Bobst Library on Washington Square since 1993, offering the full MSLIS program. Students may take courses in Brookville, Brentwood, or Westchester.
We have students who have just graduated, and we have students who have been out of college upwards of 30 years. Our student population runs the gamut from 20-something to 50-something plus.
They can range from about 8 to 30, with the average at around 17. Some classes have limited enrollments of 12 or so if they involve many field trips or limited equipment.
Since most of our students are working, we try to accommodate them by holding classes in the evening and sometimes on Saturdays. Most courses start at 6:30 p.m. and run until 8:20, and some start at 4:30 and go until 6:20. In the summer we offer some courses in a concentrated format that consists of a full week, or full days over a few weeks. Watch the schedule for these opportunities.
Advising is done by our professors and by Palmer administrators at all sites. The Manhattan Program Director and the Senior Academic Counselor at C.W. Post both have extensive academic advising experience and could help students who may not be in touch with the assigned faculty advisor.
The program is 36 credits. Students sometimes take three courses per semester, although two is more common. Some students, who work full time, find that one is a comfortable load but that two is possible. The only real fast track option is to take courses in the summer when they are offered over a shortened period of time, allowing for more classes to be taken. Palmer School students can take week-long courses at Rare Book School run by the University of Virginia, and taught both there and in Manhattan in January; with the addition of a final project, students receive credits for these courses toward their Palmer degrees.
36 credits (12 courses) are required for the program. Up to 6 credits may be transferred in from another graduate program, but credits will not be considered for transfer if they are part of a completed degree. If you have a Ph.D., 36 credits are still required, but some core courses might be waived depending upon your academic background.
No, our students work in all kinds of places where information is a priority, including financial institutions, health related institutions, museums, law firms, etc. The MSLIS is a practical and in-demand degree.
Yes, there are scholarships through Long Island University and through various outside sources. Many library associations give scholarships and a partial list of these organizations can be found at http://www.newyorkbooks.org/stam/scholarships.htm .
Admission is on a rolling basis, so there is no firm application deadline. You should, however, allow approximately three weeks for notification of acceptance. Students can enter the program in the fall, spring or summer terms.
We do everything we can to help graduates learn about positions that are available, and to prepare them for the working world. Our required internship sets our students apart and not only gives them experience, it starts the essential networking that so often leads to employment. Our student listserv Kiosk posts numerous job opportunities weekly, and a record of these postings is kept in a binder in the office. The C.W. Post P.E.P. office is a great resource available to all Palmer students, and finally, our faculty with extensive ties in the world of information-libraries, museums, archives, government, etc.-are the greatest resource of all. Many of our students work in libraries while they are getting their degrees and move from paraprofessional positions in those institutions into professional roles upon graduation. For this and other reasons, we strongly advise that students try to work in information-related settings while they are taking courses towards the Palmer degree.
The goal of the internship is to introduce you to the various aspects of librarianship so that you have more flexibility, more breadth of knowledge, and more to offer your workplace, be it where you are currently working, or elsewhere. As an intern, you will do work that is characterized as professional, involving more decision-making and independence than is usual in paraprofessional positions. Students sometimes find that the new work they take on as interns is more suited to them than what they were doing prior to the internship, and this kind of exposure often leads to very positive professional growth.
We have a full-time Program Director at the Palmer Manhattan office (Alice Flynn), and Dr. Deirdre Stam, the coordinator of the Rare Books concentration and a full-time Palmer professor, has an office here as well. Other faculty from our program have office space here and are frequently available for meetings and advising. The Director's office is open Mondays - Thursdays, 10:30 a.m. - 6:30 p.m. You could call (212.998.2680) or email (alice.flynn@liu.edu) ahead for an appointment. You can register right here!
The program is 36 credits. Most students take two or three courses per semester, depending upon their own time constraints. It is not recommended that students take four courses unless they are free to be full-time students only and have library experience. All of our courses are three credits, so students usually average between six and nine credits per semester. During the summer, a number of courses are offered in an intensified format, allowing students to earn as many as 12 to 15 credits. As you can see, how long the program takes is truly dependent upon each individual's particular situation.
Students seeking the School Media certification must have completed two semesters or the equivalent of a foreign language before completing the SMLS program. For other students, a foreign language is of course advisable if the student plans to work in a setting where informational materials are largely non-English.
The point of the internship is to expose students to an aspect of librarianship to which they have not yet been exposed, and to give them an opportunity to meet a range of professionals in the field. Sometimes it is difficult for students who are full time employees to carve out the time to work in a different setting. In cases like those, we might work with the student and the library to offer the student a different type of work within the same organization. Alternately, students might be able to find weekend opportunities. However structured, the ideal internship introduces students to new workplaces, new ideas, and new responsibilities.
Yes, the Bobst library does have some library science journals available to our students through either print or internet access. In addition, the C.W. Post Schwartz Library has extensive library science materials which are usually available through inter-library loan.
Yes! Almost all of Bobst's resources are available to you as a Palmer student. You are able to check out books, use reference and reserve services, and use the vast array of NYU online subscriptions and A/V collection while in Bobst itself. For home access to many databases of interest to library science students, you can use your account with LIU.
Yes, Bobst is open during the week from very early morning (usually about 7:30 a.m.) until midnight and later, depending on the time in the term. It is open long hours on the weekend as well - again from early morning until midnight. We have never heard complaints from students about limited hours of access to Bobst.
GRE's are required for anyone applying whose overall grade point average from undergraduate work is under a 3.0.
Classes are held in NYU's Bobst Library on Washington Square South, right in the heart of Greenwich Village. Our classrooms are on the 2nd floor of Bobst, in the Avery Fisher Center, or on the first lower level, level 1, next to the computer room. Students can find where a class meets by referring to http://palmer.cwpost.liu.edu/schedule.html which shows each semester's schedule and classroom assignment. The Bobst Library classrooms have been very recently renovated and are equipped with the latest technology. LIU students do not have access to other NYU buildings. Coffee and snack machines can be found on Lower Level 2!
It's true! Four 600-level courses in School Media are offered at a reduced rate to NYC-certified teachers. These courses are part of the MSLMS requirements.
FOR MORE INFORMATION ON PALMER, GO TO: http://palmer.cwpost.liu.edu/ OR email alice.flynn at liu.edu. or call 212.998.2680