May 23, 2007

My long-term goal is to become a library dean and director of a university and or college library. But for right now, I want to focus my career aspirations on providing quality reference services to First Year undergraduate students, becoming a subject librarian of Education, getting published and presenting at conferences.

The last couple of weeks I've been focusing on what a "21st Century Academic Librarian" is in relation to my work at Notre Dame and the academic library community as a whole. I have opportunities to work on projects with academic colleagues across the country,the state of Indiana, as well as my work here @ ND. In other words, Collaborative projects are where I get my energy/enthusiasm from for the work I do. Which brings me to a deep regret I am currently "marinating on" this morning. I made the mistake of discussing my concerns about colleagues with other colleagues and unfortunately its taken on a life of its own. Basically, I broke my own rule......as Florida Evans from the 70's television comedy once said, "D**m, D**m, D**m.......AnyWHO, onward and upward.......

I got a lovely card from the librarians at Purdue University. Thanks ladies...it was my absolute pleasure to be your "Hostess" that afternoon. At our deparment meeting yesterday morning, I passed the card around of your appreciation and made sure that Nigel got the card as well. I look forward to seeing most of you again at our luncheon in July for our Diversity students who will be working this summer with us....Hugs.....

A wonderful quote from a book that I reference when I speak to mentoring groups: "Social Intelligence" by Karl Albrecht(2006):
"
Authenticity is about the desire and ability to let yourself be real, not phony or contrived.....It's how you connect with other people......It's a reliance on or a belief in yourself, so you can take real authorship and ownership of your space or place."