Spring 2024

Hi Everyone! My name is Marshaye and this is my second semester at Florida State University pursuing the Master of Science degree in Information Technology.

I am originally from Maryland but moved to Central Florida just a little over five years ago to start my career as a Systems Engineer in the Aerospace industry. I currently live in the Orlando area and work as a Systems Analyst with a focus in technology management and product sustainment. Prior to relocating to Florida I studied at Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland where I received my Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering.

In my spare time I love doing a little bit of everything! Some may say I have way too many hobbies and interests but, when you live in a place like Orlando there’s always something new to do or explore. I enjoy trying new restaurants, attending festivals, visiting museums, participating in community outreach, gardening, crafting and reading. I also spend a lot of time at the movies and at Disney World as I currently have a annual pass as well as a Regal Ultimate movie pass.

Out of all my interest and hobbies my favorite thing to do is to travel! I took an interest in traveling post undergrad. Since then I have traveled to 17 different countries and 4 continents. One of my travel goals is to visit all seven continents. While traveling I enjoy learning about different cultures, history and local agriculture.

When traveling, participating in a new activity or trying a new restaurant I often take tons of videos and pictures which has turned into over 20k pictures and videos in my camera roll. Because of this I decided to start turning the media that I was capturing in to TikTok videos. What started as a way to remember these experiences has turned into sharing my travels and experiences with others in hopes of encouraging them to try new things.

“We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we’re curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.”

~ Walt Disney

From this class I think I am most excited about expanding my knowledge of digital media in general and learning more about web based tools and resources for media production. I hope to be able to use what I learn to improve my media production skills. I am also interested in learning how these skills can be used to enhance my current and future professional roles.

My name is Paul Griffith, and I’m a new student in the MSI program here at FSU this semester. I currently live in Pennsylvania, so I’m studying entirely online. I’m also changing careers right now, so I’m dedicating the entirety of my time to this program. When I’m not thinking about what I’d like to do for work next, I mostly do landscaping and play music (keyboards and synthesizers kind of thing!). Just this morning, I had some snow to shovel before I got into my courses, but that’s alright because it woke me up. I think often about how we use both information and technology in the realm of nature and music. Here I am sitting in front of an entire collection of Encyclopedia Britannica, the kind they used to sell door to door in the 90’s! I love collecting books, so I thought I’d get my master’s degree in it.

Before finishing my BA in English and joining Florida State, I served for eight years as a translator in the Air Force. Sometimes the hair shocks people when I say that. I tell them I’m making my money back after having to cut it every two weeks. I’m open minded to the nature of roles I fulfill in the future, but I’m still passionate about the public sector, safety, and security. There are a lot of paths this degree could take us on, and many of them seem appealing. I’m mostly concerned with traditional librarianship, information assurance, and even special libraries, but digital media production is something very lucrative that we could market as a skill while having fun with it. I’m excited I was able to get this course in my first semester, and I’m already looking forward to LIS 5362!

This course is as interesting to me personally as it is professionally. I’ve worked with audacity before while working with music technology, both on my own and in scholastic programs. Every year I sit down with Gimp (because it’s free) and relearn the basics to create a meme. I don’t have much experience with video editing software, but I’m excited to learn a lot and get creative again. Good luck to everyone else here!

My name is Ciara and I currently live in the Orlando area, home to Walt Disney World, Universal and SeaWorld. My love for Disney is what brought me to this city in 2018 when I completed an internship with Disney at Magic Kingdom theme park in their Outdoor Foods department. It also influenced my decision to pursue a bachelor’s degree in hospitality and tourism management from the University of Central Florida.

In 2020 when the pandemic shut down the world, I was let go from my internship in the Guest Service Department at Disney and found the company I currently work for, Paylocity. Paylocity is a cutting-edge HR and payroll tech company that offers Software as a Service (To learn more click here). I spent a little over 2 years in the client service department as an account manager and team lead. In February of 2023 I transitioned to our implementation team as a team lead helping onboard our new clients.

I am currently pursuing a master’s in information technology. This is my second semester and I anticipate graduating in fall of this year. In my free time I like to hang out with my husband and our German Shepard, Athena. We enjoy going to all the theme parks that are surrounding us. I am looking forward to attending EPCOT’s International Festival of the Arts within the next month to try some new food/drinks and see all the art on display. If you’re local, I recommend checking it out here.

Hi class! My name is Kendal McDowell, and my pronouns are she/her/hers. I graduated from FSU with my BA in Art History in 2022, and I’m back to earn my MSI degree. This is only my 2nd semester in the program, so I still have plenty to learn.

I live in Tallahassee, but am originally from Lakeland, FL. Lakeland is the birthplace of Publix, and my first part-time job was bagging groceries at one of the smaller stores in town. Nowadays I work in the student services office for the FSU College of Law as a full-time program coordinator. I am obsessed with the Sanrio character Gudetama, so my desk is heavily decorated with merch of the lazy egg. I think I like this character because it’s entire personality is centered around being lazy and not caring, whereas I care too much about everything all the time.

My hobbies include playing piano, playing video games, reading, consuming useless pop culture news, and walking the different trails and parks around Tallahassee. I also volunteer at the Tallahassee Museum as a living history docent. I’m really interested in history, and I love learning about local and Florida history.

While I’m familiar with a lot of the subjects this class will be covering, that familiarity is surface-level, and I want to dive deeper into areas such as video and audio editing. I have some graphic design experience from classes I took in my undergraduate studies, but in recent years, I’ve become pretty reliant on Canva for work projects. I’m not the most creative person, but I am hardworking and eager to learn.

Hi! I’m Katherine Stanford; you may see me occasionally show up as India Stanford (the joys of going by one’s middle name). I completed my MSI degree in December 2022 and am working on towards my Specialist degree, along with two graduate certificates: one in User Services and one in Information Architecture. I hope to finish up with this degree in Fall 2025. I’m hoping to focus on digital libraries or digital strategy. I have been job shopping, mainly with the latter as my focus, so I’ve had an online resume going for the last while.

I’m originally from Georgia, but I live in Tallahassee right now. I work at FSU, in the Public Administration department, as an Academic Program Specialist and Communications Manager. I was at Georgia State University for a few years prior to this, and prior to that, I worked at Strozier Library in various departments, including (the long-defunct) User Services, Undergraduate Programs, Systems, Administration, and Special Collections. So I lived in Southwest Georgia, Tallahassee, Atlanta, and now Tallahassee again.

Something interesting about me is, as implied by the subject line, I’ve written a few books. Two were published under my maiden name, while the third was under a pseudonym. I had hoped to use the break between my master and specialist degrees to work on the next one, but work did not exactly permit for that. That might have to come at some lull at another point, should one ever present itself.

I’m working a lot with digital media in my current position, and I have used it quite a bit in my admittedly long past online. I’ve been playing around building websites and learning what can be done with computers and online for years, from the old Geocities days to learning the WYSIWYG sites to when WordPress became the new hotness. However, because everything I know is self-taught, it will be nice to have that Information Architecture certificate to put on my resume.

In the meantime, I read nonfiction (Philippa Langley’s The Princes in the Tower: Solving History’s Greatest Cold Case has my attention right now), science fiction (I started Peter Cline’s Ex-Heroes on Audible on a long car trip in December, and I’m almost through the last book now), and fantasy (while I’ve actually read all The Sandman comics and a fair number of his books, the audio dramas of Sandman as Neil Gaiman narrates them are wonderful. I could ramble about true crime, mythology, and folklore until the day ends as well, but that’s also a story for another time. You’ll probably see any one of my three cats come across the screen any time my camera is on: the two black cats are Luci and Samara, while the orange cat is Copperfield.

And that’s a bit about this struggling author. I’m looking forward to this class!

Hi everyone! My name is Natalie. I’m NY born and raised, but Florida has been my home for the last 10 years. It’s very surreal to acknowledge that so much time has passed since I have left my childhood home and embarked onto this stage in my life. I went to UCF for my undergrad and decided to call Orlando my home after graduating. I work as a Technical Writer close to downtown and I live in a sunny, cozy apartment with my partner. (My cat is a big fan of this place, as well!)

I am also a figure skater! This was a hobby I took on after graduating college. It was my childhood dream to skate, and thought that the train has left the station a long time ago. How wrong I was! So many adults learn to figure skate, and I have met an incredibly supportive group of people who are all in it together! My goal is to enter into a more competitive skating scene, rather than simply performing at my home rink. I’ve also played tennis and did MMA, all on a competitive level so I feel like this is the next step in my sport. But, at the end of the day, skating brings me so much joy!

I also really love baking with sourdough. I made a sourdough starter last year ( a very common quarantine activity) and began making endless loaves with it. I make one every week to have breakfast with, it’s really amazing! On top of that, I’ve made sourdough waffles, buscuits, bagels, and crackers. The possibilities are endless!