My name is Patty Lopez. I am a Principal Librarian for the Santa Ana Public Library in Santa Ana, California. I supervise the daily operation services of the Adult, History Room and Young Adult Departments. I have proudly worked at this library for 21 years and have held various positions in different departments.

Currently I belong to the Orange County Chapter of REFORMA, an organization which promotes library and information services to Latinos and Spanish Speaking patrons. I have been the Chapter's historian for several years. As part of my involvement with REFORMA, I am also the Scholarship's Committee chair and have moderated the Career Paths for New Librarians Workshops for 2 years. I am also a META Committee member. META is a REFORMA/SJSU Mentor Program which is designed to recruit, encourage and support bilingual and /or bicultural individuals in the SJSU School of Library and Information Science.

This year I co-presented a CLA sponsored webinar titled: Best Practices for successful computer literacy workshops for adult Spanish speakers.

I am married and my husband and I have two beautiful little boys ages 3 and 5. On my time off, I love to cook, spend time with my family and take short road trips. I also like going to dinner and the movies with close friends.

I would like to attend the Institute because it would provide me with a unique opportunity to learn and develop leadership strategies from new and experienced managers. I hope to be able to explore in depth the concerns and issues that are prevalent in our libraries and how to best deal with them. Lastly, I would like to hear how other organization encourage and assist their staff in becoming future leaders and how to identify and take advantage of trends in the profession.