Hello! Here is a little about me:
I am currently in my second-to-last semester of the MLIS program and plan to graduate in December! Getting my MLIS has been a dream of mine for so many years now, and I’m excited to be so close to having it in hand. I currently teach middle school math and science, as well a film studies elective course at a K-8 charter school in Utah. I’ve been teaching for well over a decade and have taught pretty much everything from 1st to 8th grade over the years across a few different locations (Phoenix, Vegas, and now Utah). Though the classes I teach now don’t relate as much to reading, I very much enjoy seeing what my students are reading and chatting with them about books (I love middle grade and YA literature)! I think getting into a school library position would be a natural next step for me, however I think a public or academic setting would be fun as well, so I’m really open to anything. I love that this degree has so much versatility and so many options!
In my spare time, I love to go shopping, travel, visit vegan restaurants, run, hike, and last but not least: read! I also love attending fan conventions and have dabbled in a bit of cosplay in the past (pictures below). I am a huge fan of anything fantasy or sci-fi. I am currently reading a lot of YA fantasy, and am hoping to tackle the Wheel of Time series soon. My first fandom as a child was definitely Star Wars. I started getting into it around the time the special editions of the original trilogy came out, and I remember being so excited to receive the VHS box set for my birthday that year (which I now have on display in my classroom…I suppose it’s now considered a bit of an antique, which just makes me feel old to think about…). I am also a huge fan of Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, and more.
As far as animals go, I am a cat person. I don’t currently have any pets myself, but my family had several cats over the years that I enjoyed visiting even after I moved away. One was named Whizbee (after “Fizzing Whizbees” in Harry Potter), and another was named Eddie after Edward in Twilight (though we later decided Eddie Munson from Stranger Things was a cooler namesake for him).
This is me at the Brandenburg Gate in Germany in 2023. My dad was a high school German teacher, so I can speak the language a bit (although I haven’t kept up with it as well since high school, so I let him do most of the talking):
A few of the cosplays I’ve done:
My cats, Eddie and Whizbee:
