After graduating from the University of Oregon with a Bachelor of Science degree, I worked as an office professional at the Oregon Health & Sciences University for a few years.  After relocating to Tucson, Arizona, I began working full time at the University of Arizona (UA), and taking some School of Information Resources & Library Science (SIRLS) classes.  I decided to apply to the program, and transitioned to full time student status after being accepted in the Fall of 2005.   

Library Employment Experience

While pursing my masters degree, I also gained library management experience at the College of Optical Sciences, Fred A. Hopf Library as their librarian.  I gained experience in effectively managing a special collections library.  It also taught me to think critically about library processes and customer service needs.  My Final Proposal identified and documented several repeated questions or concerns and recommended changes based on customer service needs in order to improve the usability of the library. 

After graduating from the SIRLS masters program, I was temporarily employment by the UA Science-Engineering Library as a Project Coordinator to manage a grant funded project to digitize University of Arizona theses and dissertations on Hydrology and Water Resources.  In this capacity, I gained experience managing the daily operations of a time critical project. Besides daily project management, I also gained experience in the selection of materials within the scope of the project, database development and management, supervising graduate students (including managing the hiring process), working cooperatively with other departments, stakeholders and vendors, and compliance with U.S. copyright laws, including researching and determining appropriate status of project materials.

     In June 2008, I relocated to the Burlington area of Vermont, where I am currently employed as the part-time librarian at Northwestern Medical Center's (NMC) June Wakefield Library and at the New England Culinary Institute (NECI).  At NMC I am gaining experience as a medical librarian managing acquisitions, the special collections library including patient education materials, and providing reference and literature search services.  At NECI, I am gaining academic and special collections library experience. 

Career Goals

My goal when I was admitted to the SIRLS program  was to become a medical librarian.  I became interested in Special Collections Librarianship after taking as many special collections-focused electives as possible, while fulfilling the required classes in meeting my degree requirements.

Currently, I am happy to be employed in my target career area as a Medical and Higher Education Institutions' Special Collections librarian.