Naomi Slipp
GRS PhD, 2015
1) What have you been doing since you graduated from BU? Details about your current and past employment? Accomplishments you’re proud of? Challenges you’ve encountered?
2) How your time in the department shaped your professional and personal lives?
My time at BU was richly rewarding and continues to inform my professional and personal life. The projects that I started at BU form the foundation for my current research agenda, and I feel supported personally and professionally by the deeply-rooted network of BU colleagues and alums that I built while a student. Beyond this, my time at BU was defined by professional service — through various positions with GSHAAA and the nascent journal Sequitur — and museum work — through internships at Harvard Art Museums, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the BUAG, where I had the pleasure of curating the loan exhibition “Teaching the Body.”
These experiences definitely continue to inform my work today, from how I advise Museum Studies students to how I balance the service commitments and expectations for a tenured academic position. At BU, I definitely learned the many important soft skills — how to be organized, prioritize tasks, set goals, and manage my time — that are integral to my professional life as a professor.
3) Any advice that you would’ve given to your younger self?
Get as involved as you can in professional associations while still in graduate school, present on your research widely, and take advantage of service opportunities and internships. Building professional networks and sharing your academic work-in-progress early and often will pay dividends later in your career!