Constructing the MLS Portfolio

Each student should construct their personal template for their MLS Portfolio during the semester in which they take ILS 501, which should be their first semester in the MLS program. It is critical that each student realize that the MLS Portfolio is a collection of their work in the program, organized to demonstrate that they meet the ALA Core Competences. 

The basic structure or framework for the MLS Portfolio can be developed before any content is ready to be added.

The first element that can be developed is a main or home page that identifies the student and the webpage as presenting the MLS Portfolio. The portfolio will need to contain four major pieces: 1) the list of ALA Core Competences and competency statements, 2) the list of courses taken in the MLS program, 3) a resume, and a 4) reflective essay. Links for these can be created from the main or home page. A blank placeholder webpage can be created for the resume and reflective essay that will be added by the end of the student's program of study. The Core Competences are known and can be added. The courses listed in the Planned Program can be added, and changed if needed later. With this basic structure or framework developed, the student will add work completed each semester, linking it to the appropriate course and appropriate competency areas or competency statements. In this way, the portfolio is developed little by little each semester until it is complete at the end of the program of study.

Using HTML

Each MLS student should have knowledge of basic html and/or using a Web editor to construct web pages with varying size headers, paragraphs, lists, and links to other web pages. This should be included as an exercise in ILS 501. However, students can learn this from various sources:

HTML Tutorial: http://www.html.net/tutorials/html/introduction.php

HTML Tutorial: http://w3schools.com/html/

HTML Code Tutorial: http://www.htmlcodetutorial.com/

Web Publishing using the university's server

Each member of the university is provided with a Webspace. For information see: http://www.southernct.edu/oit/informationsystems/webpublishing/

Examples 2 and 4 below show portfolios constructed on the university's server.  

HTML Code you can copy

Once you understand the basics of HTML code (or tagging), you can copy code from some webpage. Go to:  http://www.southernct.edu/~brownm/Portfolio_Sample.html

If you are using Safari, under the "View" dropdown menu select "View Souce." This will bring up a window with that web page's source code. This will allow you to see how certain design elements were achieved using html tags.  

Free Web building and hosting Services

You might sign up a free web building and hosting service such as Weebly (http://www.weebly.com/), Tripod (http://www.tripod.lycos.com/), or Angelfire (http://www.angelfire.lycos.com/).

Free Web Site Copier for archiving a Web page to a CD or a local directory

To archive your Web page to a CD or a local directory, you may want to use HTTrack at http://www.httrack.com/ that is a free and easy-to-use offline browser utility. It allows you to download a Web site from the Internet to a local directory, building recursively all directories, getting HTML, images, and other files from the server to your computer.

Examples 1 and 3 below show portfolios built using a hosting service.

Examples of MLS Portfolios

 Last updated: March 9, 2013