University Librarian

• Jul 2021 - Present

My position at Crandall encompasses multiple roles. As University Librarian, I am the director of the library, which gives me responsibility for supervising the library staff and overseeing both internal and external library affairs. As a department head, I sit on President's Roundtable and on Academic Council, where I advocate for the library and strengthen relationships between the library and other departments. I am also a Senator, which gives me a voice in broader university affairs through the regular meetings of Senate. Show less

Assistant Librarian

• Feb 2019 - May 2021

As a member of a small library staff team at Redeemer, I had a wide variety of responsibilities, most of which were divided between technical services and subject librarianship. As a technical services librarian, I was responsible for a variety of library technologies including Redeemer's integrated library system (ILS), journal and ebook database subscriptions, and study room booking software. I was the liaison to the companies that provided us with these technologies, I troubleshot access and functionality problems when they arose, and I configured the software when initial setup or subsequent changes were needed. As a subject librarian, I was responsible for all collection development and information literacy instruction in eleven academic disciplines taught at Redeemer. These responsibilities included monograph selection and weeding, developing online research guides, conducting in-person and online reference interviews, and delivering lectures about library research methods and citation management. I had other miscellaneous responsibilities such as original cataloguing of unique items, supervising student work on special projects, and collecting and analyzing library statistics. One of my greatest achievements at Redeemer was nearly doubling our electronic journal holdings and more than quadrupling our ebook holdings by identifying academic and historical open access electronic collections and making them accessible through our ILS at no cost to the university. Show less

Cataloguing and Acquisitions

• Jan 2018 - Jan 2019

While covering a sick leave at Booth, I catalogued all new materials for the library as well as for the nearby Salvation Army Ethics Centre using RDA, LCSH, and LC classifications and MARC formats. I performed copy cataloguing and original cataloguing of materials including ebooks, audiovisual materials, and legacy media. I regularly edited metadata in the catalogue to improve discovery and access. I was also in charge of acquisitions at Booth. I regularly provided reference services to faculty, staff, and students in all disciplines, as well as to community patrons including a large number of new immigrants. I supervised the work of several student workers. Show less

Cataloging Librarian

• Jan 2017 - Sep 2017

I was initially hired for a three-month contract at IDRC to evaluate the open access potential of documents in IDRC's digital library (IDL), which is based in DSpace. After assessing a subset of the documents on a one-by-one basis to familiarize myself with the nature of the collection and its metadata, I moved on to perform various larger-scale analyses involving text mining and data wrangling. These analyses gave my team the information they needed to open the documents on a larger scale. My manager soon extended my contract to nine months so I could expand upon this work and contribute to other projects, mostly relating to improving the metadata in the IDL. I investigated the controlled vocabularies developed by the Confederation of Open Access Repositories (COAR), and I then wrote a proposal for how to align IDL metadata with the COAR metadata standards. I wrote a guide so my colleagues could select the appropriate document type when adding metadata to the IDL. I frequently filled in for my colleagues when they were on vacation by performing their operational tasks, such as fulfilling document delivery requests and processing interlibrary loans. I created visualizations in Visio to improve other teams' understanding of my team, such as a map of our offices and a Euler diagram of our team structure. Show less

• Aug 2016 - Dec 2016

Soon after working for the Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN) as Digital Heritage Project Analyst, I returned to CRKN in the role of Digital Services Intern. I continued to work on the Canadian National Digital Heritage Index (CNDHI), indexing more collections and giving presentations about the project. I worked on a variety of other projects. I collected journal usage data for a research project to support university librarians’ collections decisions. Collecting this data involved locating and downloading hundreds of reports and coordinating tasks with librarians working at universities across Canada. I helped prepare for and facilitate CRKN's annual general meeting by making dinner reservations for attendees, organizing people for transportation to a library tour, and designing followup surveys for the event. Show less

• Feb 2016 - Jul 2016

I was initially hired by the Canadian Research Knowledge Network to be the project analyst for the Canadian National Digital Heritage Index (CNDHI), an index of digitized Canadian heritage collections located at institutions across the country. I was involved in many aspects of conceptualizing what CNDHI was to become. I developed the metadata schema, the media type list, and the keywords. I worked with an external web development company to ensure that our design requirements were implemented as we wanted them to be, both aesthetically and functionally. I performed the user acceptance testing, through which I identified flaws in the design to report back to the external company. I received training in Drupal 8 so that I could work on the back end of CNDHI. Although it was initially believed that only approximately three hundred collections existed that could be added to CNDHI, I found and added more than eleven hundred. I wrote the FAQ page for the site, fielded questions from the public, and accepted recommendations of collections to be indexed. I developed the documentation for the site, monitored the site's web traffic, and developed a plan for the site's future. Show less

Library intern

• Jan 2015 - Aug 2015

I designed and populated a digital repository for student theses and met with deans to coordinate policy development in this area. I redesigned the main page of the library website and subsequently represented the library in the university website's move from Drupal to WordPress. I substantially expanded an online repository of faculty publications. I served as the library contact for the School of Arts and Social Sciences for four months while the university was looking for a new liaison librarian for this school; in this capacity, I completed library reports for proposed courses and developed lists of books for purchase. With a coworker, I administered a library survey to hundreds of students, tabulated and analyzed the resulting data, and generated a report relaying the findings through visualizations and paragraphical summaries. I gave presentations, led meetings, provided virtual reference, manned a reference desk and a circulation desk, and gained cataloging and collections development experience. Show less

Teaching assistant

• Sep 2012 - Dec 2013

Through the History of Science and Technology Department, I prepared and gave two or three hour-long lectures each week to engineering students, teaching them how to use the library, how to write essays at a professional level, and how to approach ethics in the workplace. I corrected all of their assignments and provided feedback on their written work. Through the History of Science and Technology Department, I prepared and gave two or three hour-long lectures each week to engineering students, teaching them how to use the library, how to write essays at a professional level, and how to approach ethics in the workplace. I corrected all of their assignments and provided feedback on their written work.

Clerk

• Sep 2011 - May 2013

I worked at the Halifax Salvation Army Centre of Hope, which includes both a men's shelter and family services. On the men's shelter side of the building, I served as a front desk clerk, thereby being the first point of contact for clientele ranging in socioeconomic status. On the family services side, I interviewed prospective volunteers, processed applications to a home heating program, maintained various Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, and compiled statistics for a 200-page demographics report. Show less

Career experience program assistant

• May 2009 - Aug 2009

For the Linguistics Department, I transcribed deteriorating audio tapes. For the Philosophy Department, I digitized legal documents and formatted citations for articles to be submitted for publication. For the Linguistics Department, I transcribed deteriorating audio tapes. For the Philosophy Department, I digitized legal documents and formatted citations for articles to be submitted for publication.