I knew I wanted to be a librarian when I was in the 5th grade. I didn't know how one got to be a librarian at that age because the elementary school I was attending had a small (very small) library but no librarian. It wasn't until I got to middle school (or junior high) that I met a real, honest-to-goodness librarian, Miss Katherine Bader. She was a big influence in life -- Miss Bader was a dedicated professional who put up with teenagers but yet was well liked.

When I started working on my MLS, I did so with the intention of becoming a children's librarian, until I realized that meant working with children all the time. Quickly cured of that, I changed my focus to becoming a cataloger. Again, I was lucky to be influenced by a strong cataloging professor who was as dedicated to her art as Miss Bader had been dedicated to opening up the world of reading to us. In cataloging I found an area I loved! Yes, I've heard all the jokes about catalogers, but I enjoyed it very much. My cataloging experience was in university libraries (Auburn University, University of Texas at Arlington and University of North Texas).

After being a cataloger for several years, I had an opportunity to become a trainer with a multi-state multi-library type network, the Bibliographical Center for Research (BCR). At BCR, I did many workshops and provided technical support in the areas of cataloging, resource sharing, word processing and eventually the internet (back in the early days before the web). I found that I enjoyed teaching as much as I had enjoyed cataloging! At BCR I had opportunities to become a manager and eventually assistant director for member services. Once more, I found mentors who helped guide me as I developed my management skills.

Eventually I realized that I had advanced as far as I could at BCR and begin looking around for a consortia director position. I applied for and was offered the position of Executive Director at SCLC (then MCLS) back in 2006!

To me, mentoring is a way of giving back to a profession that has been very good to me. I enjoy what I do and I like the folks in the library community. I can't imagine doing anything else!

Southern California Library Cooperative
248 E. Foothill Blvd.
Monrovia, CA 91016-5525
email: rgarza@socallibraries.org
phone: 626-359-6111