Katrina Spencer

Words for Wellness in the Times of COVID- 19 (III of III)

Katrina Spencer — 2020-05-08T08:00:00-0400

By now, we hope that you’ve been able to establish some sense of stability, if even occasionally tremulous, despite having so much of what we understand about our college and higher education experiences intensely challenged over the last two months. As we approach the close of the 2019- 2020 academic school year, this last entry in the Words for Wellness series is especially for graduating seniors. In a culture that praises us for being chipper, upbeat and optimistic, let me introduce you to an audiobook in our Overdrive collection titled How To Be Fine. Not how to be great. Not how to be excellent. Not how to be thriving. How to be fine. We’ve all had to alter and adjust our expectations for an extended period of time and we’re not certain what we’ll return to once our collective “hiatus” comes to an end. If you’re looking for ways to maintain a sense of equilibrium, How To Be Fine is chock-full of testimonies and tips, and is a critical examination of the self-help book.

What did librarians do when the library was closed?

Katrina Spencer, Carrie Macfarlane — 2020-05-05T11:48:48-0400

Many thanks to The Middlebury Campus for sharing the Middlebury College librarians’ efforts to serve our community in the story linked below. The seven librarians in the research and instruction group meet regularly to talk about how we’re connecting community members with library resources.

Words for Wellness in the Times of COVID- 19 (II of III)

Katrina Spencer — 2020-04-24T08:00:00-0400

It’s been over a month since most students have left Middlebury. A broad array of normal campus functions have shut down and classes have gone fully online. These transitions, no doubt, are massive and can certainly make us feel justifiably destabilized. So for the second entry in our Words for Wellness series (click here for the first), we offer you a title that challenges us to rethink what is most important, the audiobook Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown.