Well technically I am not a qualified librarian yet. Currently I am a Library Assistant and Research Analyst Intern in Teagasc. I will be starting my MSc. in Information and Library Management in September. This is the part-time course in DBS.
I am a graduate from NUI Maynooth. My undergraduate is a Double Honours BSc. in Applied Mathematics and Chemistry and my Higher Diploma is in Pure Mathematics, I did both in Maynooth.
I am Dyslexic, so, I have not always liked books, until the age of ten I would do anything not to read a book. In a last attempt to get me reading my mother started reading the Harry Potter series to me. She was reading it so slowly that the story acted like a magnet and I took the book and tried to read it before I knew how. This is how I started reading and I was soon collecting my own books. Now you cannot get me to put down a book!
Over the years I was given an abundance of book vouchers and had to set up a system to find the books I wanted to read. This involved a lot of boxes, organization and lists on paper. I did not know it at the time but I had set up my own catalogue.
In my second year of college I was nominated to be the Society Librarian for Omega, the Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Anime Society. I was told all I had to do was open the locker (full of books) and let society members borrow the books, comics and manga. The only rules were I had to get everything back at the end of the year and only committee members were allowed to borrow the DVD's.
It turned out the library was in fact three lockers with books, comics, manga and DVD's thrown in with out order. The first thing I did was to round up volunteer society members and sort the 789 books, 52 comics, 10 manga and 25 DVD's into alphabetical order.
When all the sorting was finished I created word document and excel databases, set up protocols for borrowing books and returning books and organised opening times.
During my second year the society set up their annual convention Epic Con. For this I volunteered to be in charge of the reading room. The reading room was a room where convention goers could sit back, relax and read. The room was full of books, comics and manga, that I had to choose from the library to bring over for the event. I had to supplement the manga collection with some of my own extensive collection for the first few years, to the point that most of the reading room consisted of my books.
I did a CELT(Certificate in English Language Teaching) and an SNA course because I was interested in pursuing a career in teaching. This eventually lead to me teaching in China in a summer camp setting and I thoroughly enjoyed myself.
Before I went to China I got my first Library Internship. It was in Scoil Oilibhéir, Coolmine and I had to set up their library software and catalogue all the books in the school. Again I rounded up volunteers and we managed to catalogue over 10,000 books in three months. The software was operational for the following school year.
So, now I am in Teagasc as a Library Assistant and Research Analyst. For the library assistant part I classify materials using Universal Decimal Classification (UDC) system (which is fun), as well as Cataloguing and Serial Control using the Symphony Library Management system. I also work with the Repository and Document Management System, as well as ordering books and articles on Inter Library Loans, the usual everyday stuff.
For the research analyst part work in Bibliometrics, which is the study of metrics on publications (lots of fun). I have recently finished my first Bibliometric Report, which had a tight deadline but I enjoyed every minute. Currently I am compiling databases for the InCites tool linked to Web of Science used in bibliometric analysis.
I am very interested in Bibliometrics, especially the data analysis and calculations and Cataloguing, in particular Classifying material using the UDC .
In the future I look forward to learning more about classifng material, also more about Bibliometrics and Altmetrics.
