It’s been a while since I’ve been in this space and much has happened. After four back-to-back study sessions, I took Session 2 off last year to give myself and my family a little breather–so I thought! It turns out there was no time to catch my breath at all. The mandatory vaccine came into play causing the other two library staff to resign. This left me to run the place on my own while still learning the job (they were still excellent support only via text instead of boots on the ground). I moved from part-time to full-time and still could not keep up with the demands. My fantastic principal hired someone to help me who, after a day and a half, got caught up in a two-week quarantine. I survived running the Book Fair (which had been postponed twice already due to Covid-19) and library solo for the majority of the final term, although I feel like I was limping across the finish line at the end. My husband (who did all the contract tracing for our school on top of his normal load) and I were both burnt out by the summer holidays and spent a few weeks doing nothing but recovering from the school year when our family was hit hard by Covid. Five out of the six of us got it, three of us quite bad, one requiring an ambulance. This dragged into the start of the school year (as we didn’t all get it at once, but slowly went down over the course of weeks) so we started school already behind. I am so thankful for our community who cared for us throughout that time. I would not say we have fully recovered, but definitely getting there. I feel like I have found my feet in the library. I love the juggle of running it and I am excited about planning for its future. I miss the old staff but am enjoying working with, and training the two new staff. The library is my happy place.

I find myself looking forward to getting back into study. I am busier than ever, but I have found my previous units very practical and, now that I am working full time in the library, I think that ETL 503: Resourcing the Curriculum, will come at the perfect time as I am now making all the budgeting and purchasing decisions for the school! I am not sure quite what to expect from the class, but I am hoping that I will lead to consider a wise use of the budget, censorship (I work in a religious parent-controlled school where there is a wide spectrum of beliefs), the best “weeding” philosophy and what the balance of my role is in conjunction with colleagues in choosing the resources for the library.