ICT Policy Course
One of the more notoriously difficult classes at the Syracuse iSchool is IST618, Telecommunications and Information Policy. As a LIS-School Media student, it is the only class I’ve had with both library and non-library iSchool students since our boot camp residency that began my degree program. I found it extremely interesting to discuss ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) policy issues with the IM (Information Management) and TNM (Telecommunications and Network Management) students as well as the LIS students. I must admit that I didn’t even know what ICT stood for before I took this class, but it is possible that they don’t know what a MARC record is, so perhaps we’re even.
Regardless of our different programs, we found common ground in the often controversial ICT issues. The professor, Raed Sharif, was teaching this course from his home in South Africa (and I believe, at one point, Finland), so he encouraged us to consider international perspectives when choosing discussion topics. Since I had classmates from Hong Kong, Germany, and Ghana, to name a few, this was fascinating and very much pushed the envelope of my learning. I looked forward to the class discussions every evening.
Some of the topics we covered included broadband access and affordability, freedom of speech, Internet privacy and security, Internet governance, net neutrality, intellectual property rights, and lobbying organizations, among many others. Professor Sharif was a perfect example of what an SU professor should be – challenging, engaged, and fair. He allowed us to choose our research topics within an assignment framework, which allowed each of us to explore topics of personal and professional interest, key when trying to address the learning requirements of a diverse group of students.
I had been nervous about taking this course, since I was a science major in my undergrad, and “policy” to me conjured up images of legalese and sandpaper-dry lectures, but I enjoyed this course much more than I thought I would, and I learned a lot about policy issues that will certainly be relevant to my library career.
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Posted by Rebecca Buerkett, Syracuse MLIS distance student, rlbuerke@syr.edu.