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“Together We Thrive” CIRCUIT RIDER PROFILES
Before starting work on the "Together We Thrive" grant, I was the Library Director at the Emily Williston Memorial Library in Easthampton for almost 10 years. My love for small libraries began when I was a bookmobile and delivery driver for the Western Massachusetts Regional Library System, and I am thrilled to be working at WMRLS once again! We have assembled a great team of circuit riders and I firmly believe that this grant will have a big impact on the smallest of libraries and their patrons.
I am a recent, enthusiastic transplant to Western Massachusetts. I am currently pursuing my MLS from Simmons (via Mt. Holyoke) while working as a Cataloging Assistant in the Technical Services Department of the Jones Library in Amherst. Previously I have held library positions at the Providence Public Library, Brandeis University and the University of Georgia among others. My other pursuits include a substantial involvement in local music and the arts, record collecting and small press publishing. I am a resident of Orange where I live with Amy, a painter, letterpress printer, and book artist and our daughter, Naomi.
My name is Alison Cole, but most people know me as AJ. My library career started last summer when I took the Library Director position at the West Stockbridge Public Library. I was fortunate enough to be part of the library's move to its new space in the Town Hall last fall. It required lots of planning and hard work, but the new library is bright, colorful, and very comfortable. I've also started taking the Basic Library Techniques courses and have been constantly learning new things since day one. My background is in human services, physical therapy, and engineering technology. All of those areas have helped me in library work. In my spare time, I do volunteer work with my therapy dog, Owen (pictured with me). In 2004, we developed a READ® (Reading Education Assistance Dog) program at the Richmond Library to help kids learn to love reading.
I recently moved to Massachusetts from central New Jersey, where I worked for the Cranbury Public Library, serving a population of 3,000. Because of the small size of the library, I was involved with many aspects of library work, including circulation, collection development and weeding, reference, inter-library loans, displays; and ordering, processing, cataloging, and repairing all media. I also volunteered (and trained new volunteers) at my hometown library in Hopewell, NJ, which has a population of 2,000. Prior to discovering my love of library work, I had a career in the investment business in New York City and London. I have a B.A. in French from Douglass College, the women’s division of Rutgers – The State University of New Jersey and an M.B.A. from New York University Graduate School of Business. I live in Amherst with my husband Richard, and I have 2 adult step-children, Rebecca and Nathaniel. I’m delighted to be living in western Massachusetts and participating in the Thrive project.
I moved to the Valley close to 30 years ago, and attended Simmons for my library degree. I've worked at Hampshire College Library in the technical services department and as children's librarian at Holyoke Public Library. For over 20 years I've been the Adult Services Librarian at the Jones Library in Amherst. My main areas of responsibility are programming, grant writing, reference service, readers advisory and collection development for the adult circulating collections. I also supervise the English as a Second Language center - a program I began with several grants. I love public library work and am an enthusiastic proponent of the importance and serious fun of weeding. I'm curious as to what will happen to circulating library materials in the not so distant future but am certain that whatever the format, libraries will always have a important role to play in community life.
Outside of my work, I'm a gardener, environmental activist and hiker. I love to work with start up organizations and was a founding board member of Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture (CISA, buy local food!) and the Green River Doula Network. I have a 24 year old daughter, currently living in California. My partner and I designed and built our own house and live in beautiful Conway.
I have been at Amherst College for 23 years. I spent 9 years in Archives and Special Collections, 11 years in the remote storage depository, and have been in Serials since 2003. In the 1960s, work included two years in the Reference Department at UMass, Amherst, and two years as Head Librarian of the Palmer Public Library. During the 70s and early 80s, while my daughters were young, I worked at various part time jobs, some of which were in the UMass library. Probably the most varied and interesting work was in Archives and Special Collections, due to the unique nature of the collections, the international researchers who used them, and the variety of tasks. Two projects were the highlights of my career: (1) handling and copying, for preservation, the Emily Dickinson papers owned by Amherst College; and (2) arranging and describing a collection of 19th century papers (primarily letters) written by the family of Amherst graduate, Daniel Bliss, founder of Syrian Protestant College (now American University of Beirut), and discovering that this Bliss family was another branch of my grandmother’s family.
My name is Carol Scheier, and I have worked in public libraries since 1990, after receiving my MLS at Queens College. Early in my career, which began in Long island, New York, I was a Children's Librarian and very much enjoyed working with children and families, developing an innovative program called Babies and Books. Following our move to Massachusetts in 2002 and immersion in community volunteer work, I became Branch Supervisor at Springfield City Library, then moved on to serve as Library Director in the small town of Hampden, where we reopened the building, brought a new CWMARS system into action, added new technology and revamped a collection of approximately 26,000 items. Currently, I run a home-based business and am honored to be a member of the Together We Thrive Team.
Libraries have always been my home away from home. Whenever I moved to a new city, the first thing I would do is take a walk around and locate the public library and the post office. I love that public libraries have become so much more than places to get something to read. Where I live, the library is also the closest thing we have to a community center. I have been a school librarian since 1997, working for ten years in elementary and now in middle school. My favorite thing is connecting the right patron with the right materials and making his or her day. Before I became a librarian, I was an archeologist. I came to western Massachusetts to attend Hampshire College. This is a wonderful place and I feel so glad to have landed here. I'm excited to see more of western MA through being part of the Thrive Circuit Rider project.
Originally trained as an elementary school media specialist, I began working as a public librarian in 1999 when I began my current job as the branch librarian of the North Amherst Library, a part of the Jones Library system. My responsibilities include ordering and deselecting all of the print and non-print materials for both the adult and children’s collections at the branch. Managing a small and busy library space has allowed me to focus on the importance of collection maintenance to maintain a vibrant, useful collection. Part of my job includes working at the reference department at the Jones Library. I am also a representative on the CWMARS circulation committee which gives me an opportunity to share information and work to develop strategies to improve the functionality of the resource sharing system. I enjoy being part of a cooperative effort among libraries, to share skills, materials and information. I see the Thrive project as a great chance to build on this effort and I am excited to be a part of it.
I began working as a librarian in California after receiving my MLIS from U.C. Berkeley in 1991. In Alameda county I worked both in the branch libraries and with the Jails department serving inmates using the library's bookmobile which unfortunately I didn't get to drive. I moved to NYC in 1993 where I spent 13 years at NYPL working as a reference librarian in different departments and branches.
My overall objective in the library profession is to connect people to information and technology. I also hope to bring a fresh perspective to librarianship with both my user-centered focus and technological background. Currently I am a MLS candidate through Simmons College at Mt. Holyoke. I plan to complete my degree this summer, 2008. During my past employment I worked in retail
(mostly bookstores) then transitioned into online sales. I jumped into my MLS program two feet first and luckily found it to be a perfect fit. Though I am new to the library field, I have had a few rich experiences over the course of my program. I worked at Greenfield Community College Library and provided reference services to the GCC community. The position gave me the opportunity to teach information literacy courses. Some classes required instruction tailored to specific course work while others covered the broader topic of accessing information in the library or remotely. I have also enjoyed volunteering at the Hadley Library, a public library, where I experience all aspects of maintaining a library; weeding, patron services, computer maintenance, copy cataloging, etc. In either type of library, academic or public, I found a combination of customer service skills and technological know-how go hand-in-hand. For more information about this LSTA grant project, contact:
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Becky (Plimpton) Marconi,"Together We Thrive" Project Coordinator