This article, by Martha Pollack, Dean of the School of information at the University of Michigan, completes a year in which
five of the six Timelines columns have dealt with prospects for research on Information as well as aspects of its history.
This is an exciting time for many elements of HCI, including Design, the input and display device renaissance, a flowering
of domain-specific HCI–yet this period may be most remembered for its embrace of Information. —Jonathan Grudin
Reflections on the Future of
iSchools from a Dean Inspired
by Some Junior Faculty
Martha E. Pollack
University of Michigan | [e-mail]
[ 1] Stokes, D.E.
Pasteur’s Quadrant:
Basic Science
and Technological
Innovation. Washington,
D.C.: Brookings
Institution Press, 1997.

January + February 2010

interactions

In the September + October issue of interac-
tions, three junior faculty members at the
University of Washington School of Information
(iSchool)—Jacob Wobbrock, Andrew Ko, and Julie
Kientz—proposed a definition for what we study
in iSchools, one that, interestingly, omits the word
“information.” They characterized iSchools as “the
place where people and technology meet.” In their
thought-provoking article, they also provide crite-
ria for successful iSchools that include:
They must value both analysis and invention. •
They must be places where rules and policies •
are minimal.
Near the end of their article, Wobbrock, Ko,
and Kientz (hereafter, WKK) described these
as three challenges that iSchools must meet.
However, throughout earlier portions of the arti-
cle the authors suggested the criteria also help
define the field.
It is heartening to see junior faculty step back
and consider the broader picture, and there is
much in their article with which I agree. However,
I would strongly argue that, in the final analysis,
they have not provided a clear statement of our
field’s identity, and that by abandoning the idea
of information as the essential focus of our study,
they do a disservice to it.
Let me start with the three criteria listed here.
They’ve got these basically right: iSchools do need
to include both analyzers and builders, with mul-
tiple disciplinary backgrounds, and there must be
a culture in which this range of perspectives is
mutually reinforcing. Our subject matter simply
demands that, because we work at the intersec-
tion of people and technology. Rigid rules and pol-
icies are at odds with such a culture. As a dean of
an iSchool, I view it as one of my central respon-
sibilities to ensure that we have just the sort of
environment that WKK propose: One that values
and supports intellectual diversity, balances
analysis and invention, and provides appropriate
incentives for people with different backgrounds
to engage with one another around fundamental
research questions. (And yes, one that provides
needed lab space to the inventors!)