I believe that leadership is one of the most fundamental qualities as a young adult librarian. A leader is not always synonymous to being a manager or even to being an all-powerful dictating force. For me, a leader is someone who works alongside those she’s leading, as well as to motivate, listen, challenge, and most importantly, to inspire.
I strive to inspire on a daily basis. I give my 110% in everything I do whether its my schoolwork, my career, my volunteering, my book reviews and even my book club. I consistently challenge myself to learn new things to be able to pass along my new knowledge to others, whether they are my peers, friends or clients. I love to explore and experience new things to be able to bring that back into conversations with those around me, to form connections and bonds, and it allows me to have a better understanding of others.
As a Young Adult Librarian, I plan to bring all of my knowledge, both technical from the MIS program and cultural from my personal experience, to the table to be able to form bonds with my clients and bring a deeper understanding to their information needs. To be as prepared as I can be, I don’t only travel and learn new skills but I also attend multiple book conferences every year with a focus on young adult panels and authors to be as informed as possible in the genre and the demographic. Additionally, when possible, my schoolwork during my MIS program was largely focused on young adult librarianship, which gave me the opportunity to do a large amount of research on the subject in terms of information needs, behaviour, culture, and trends. I stay informed within the profession with my adhesion to multiple blogs on the subject matter, being a member of YALSA (Young Adult Library Services Association), and attending author panels and festivals (BookCon, YALLFest, etc.) as often as possible to learn about the books being published and the important themes that I can add to my arsenal for recommendations.
In addition to attending conferences and panels, I am also a book reviewer for multiple publishing houses such as Simon and Schuster, Penguin Random House, Disney Book Group and more. My book reviews are all upcoming young adult novels, and I post them on my blog and bookstagram, where I get to do a form of librarianship by recommending great reads to some followers. I often get messages for book recommendations and it fulfills my need to help others in choices of literature until I am able to do it professionally as a librarian. Another asset would be that reviewing these books prior to their publishing will give me the opportunity to have some great insight it terms of acquisition as a librarian.
Volunteer
I volunteer as often as I can as a way to learn and give back to my community. Here’s a summary:
Experiencia Dominicana is an educational projects that works with high school students, where for 10 days I lived with a Dominican family and experienced many aspects of Dominican life. As a volunteer we were exposed to slums, bateyes, the fair trade industry and unforgiving local working conditions. It was hard work, but it was also an eye opening, life altering journey rich in culture, faith, poverty and education. In a short week, as volunteers we quickly realized how much we have in Canada in terms of material wealth but how little we have in a sense of community. This experience has since motivated me to reach out to others to offer help in any shape or form it can be given.
Goodreads Librarian (2018-Present)
I volunteer as a Librarian for Goodreads for multiple reasons, such as to get cataloguing experience, but also just to be able to connect with other readers around the world and help sustain a platform that I use on a daily basis. Goodreads has allowed me not only to connect to other readers but also a platform to post my reviews and gain outreach while simultaneously allowing me to practice my cataloguing knowledge by being able to add, edit and remove book information.
Ottawa Comiccon – Registration (2018)
I volunteer to work Comiccon to not only offer support for such a big event, but also to ensure its continuity every year in our community. I love attending comiccon and its a great, safe space for kids, teens and adults alike to be able to express themselves through cosplay. Comiccon also offers panels on a variety of interesting and educational topics over the weekend and is another great hub to meet like-minded readers and share knowledge and opinions on books, graphics novels, films, etc. Working registration puts me at the front line to greet attendees and ensure their experience starts off right with a smile.
uORez Move-In Volunteer (2017/2018)
While I try to give back to our community, I also try to give back to our university. I volunteer during the residence move-in weekends at the beginning of the year to greet and help new and returning students settle into their accommodation. This has been another great way to meet new people and share interests, and learn!
Leadership
Here’s a summary of my leadership experience, which has been beneficial to my professional growth and capabilities as a leader:
Mentor – University of Ottawa (2013-2014)
As a mentor for the Mature and Transfer Students Centre, I was on the frontline to greet new students and offer guidance in terms of academic advice. I was fortunate to be able to guide students through difficult changes but also exciting opportunities by arming them with the necessary tools to ensure their success. This experience has given me the knowledge and skills that will be useful as a librarian to be able to offer the same type of services, such as workshops and the ability to assess need to be able to direct patrons to other services that could be beneficial to them.
United Way Representative – CMHC Gives Campaign (2017-2018)
Being central to this campaign as given me the opportunity to have an impact on the community by leading this company-wide fundraiser with a team. I was no stranger to fundraisers, I’ve participated to many in the past, but I had never been part of the initial planning where I had an input on initiatives and programs. This experience will be useful should I need to lead any future fundraisers for the library.
Communications Lead – Innovation Team (2017-2018)
This was another opportunity I was offered to get involved in the workplace. As part of the Innovation Committee, I was in charge of all communication to staff regarding the innovation initiatives and activities we had planned for the sector. This has provided me with great experience to fine-tune my communication skills in terms of attracting and maintaing a reader’s attention to optimize participation in our initiatives.