I haven’t even left for the airport yet (and still have some socks left to pack and one errand to run to the bank before I go — why, yes, my middle name is Procrastination), but I couldn’t not join in the introductory fun.
Hi. I’m Sophie Brookover. I’m a teen librarian at the Camden County Library‘s Vogelson Regional Branch in Voorhees, NJ. (If you’re familiar with Philadelphia, Voorhees is in a county adjacent to Philly, on the New Jersey side.) I’ve been blogging here & there since mid-2000, when I was plotting my escape from a soul-sucking job in medical publishing. Most recently, I’ve been blogging about my twin obsessions: popular culture and libraries. More specifically, what librarians & libraries can do with pop culture — beyond the obvious: being aware of it — to make our services & collections better and more relevant to our users.
I’m also a co-owner (along with Christine Borne, who is also my gracious web hostess) of the NexGen Librarians listserv. If you are a NexGen librarian, or are interested in/sympathetic to the issues facing NexGen librarians, I encourage you to join!
Some areas of particular interest to me within librarianship (in addition to all things pop) include:
- professional development & continuing education
- integrating technology with our public services
- outreach
- advocacy — both for libraries & for the people we serve
- figuring out how to honor our heritage as stewards of community & cultural memory while remaining (some might say becoming) relevant to the communities we serve today
This is my first time as an ALA conference attendee (I went to the exhibits when ALA was in town back in 2002), so I’m psyched to cover as many events & meetings as possible. My one concern is stamina: having not done this before, I fear falling victim to Too Much To Do/See/Blog-itis. We’ll just have to see how it goes.
As I wrote earlier this week at Pop Goes the Library, I have a plan for the events I hope to blog. Here goes:
- Friday: Author Forum with Tom Perotta; Best Books for Young Adults straw poll.
- Saturday: YALSA all-committee meeting; YA Galley; and PLA’s Leadership Development session.
- Sunday: YALSA Publications committee meeting (I’m on this committee); and either the EBSCO Excellence in Small/Rural Library Services award committee, the HR discussion group, or Serving Young Adults in Large Urban Populations group.
- Monday: Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults; YALSA Preconference Program Planning for Annual 2005.
