Meet the ABLE Designers/Trainers
Mary L. Brink
Mary L. Brink received her BA in History/Political Science from
the College of Saint Rose (Albany) in 1972 and her MLS from Rutgers University
in 1973.
She worked at the Wayne (N.J) Public Library from July 1973-October 1975
as a Children’s, Young Adult and Reference Librarian. In November 1975
Mary was appointed Children’s Consultant at the Nioga Library System
and served in various consultant positions and as Executive Director until
she retired in December 2005.
Mary has been a member of NYLA since 1976 and
was very active in the Youth Services Section serving on the Board of
the Section in various positions including President in 1982-83. She also served
on NYLA’s Legislative Committee, on the Board of the Western New York
Library Resources Council, the Regents Advisory Committee on Libraries and
as Chair of PULISDO. Mary received training through an LSTA grant in how
to facilitate the New Planning for Results process and has recently been
appointed to the Steering Committee of the New Yorkers for Better Libraries
Political Action Committee.
Mary A. Brown
Mary A. Brown retired recently from the Clinton Essex Franklin
Library System in Plattsburgh, New York, where she was the Director for
9 years. During that
time she assisted 30 small libraries with a wide variety of issues, including
financial and political matters. Prior to that, she was the director of public
libraries in Mount Vernon, North Castle, and Rye, New York.
In addition to the financial work which falls to any library director, she
served as Treasurer of the New York Library Association for 2 terms. Additionally
she has been and is currently on the boards of several non-profit community
organizations.
She believes that successful financial work supports successful libraries.
She also believes that the political work necessary to secure adequate funding
for a library is key to successful financial work. In her workshop she will
present the basics of budgeting, financial management, and accounting; followed
by discussion of individual library situations.
Mary lives in Saranac Lake, New York, where she rows an Adirondack guideboat
and is team coordinator for the local wilderness search and rescue team.
Marisa Iacobucci
Marisa received her MLS degrees from SUNY at Albany in 1987, when
non-techie pencil pushers such as she, were an acceptable subspecies in the
library world. It took becoming the director of a small non-automated
public library to make her a semi-convert.
After eight and a half fun and
challenging years of helping to draw that small library into the 20th
century, she moved to Ithaca in 2000, to fill her current position as the
Adult Services Coordinator of the Finger Lakes Library System. Her
strengths lie in her knowledge of intellectual freedom and library
management, and her empathy for all of the hard working library people
she serves out in the libraries.
Diana McFarland
As a child, Diana McFarland lived in a town with one stop light and no
library. Every other week the Frederick County Library Bookmobile came
rolling in, and for an hour or so, she would lose herself in the swirl of
stories that rolled in with it. It was librarians who secured the funding
for the bookmobile, who chose the books on its shelves, and who put the
stories in her hands. In many ways, she lives a life that librarians built.
As
an adult, Diana has served as a children’s librarian for the Cambridge
Public Library in Cambridge, MA and the Youth Services Consultant for the
Finger Lakes Library System, in Ithaca, NY. She currently works in the youth
and reference departments of the Curtis Memorial Library in Brunswick, ME.
She is also honored to give back to her profession by providing consultant
services for public librarians.
She is certified as a library media specialist and holds a degree in library
science from Simmons College.
Gerald Nichols
Jerry Nichols, Director of the Palmer Institute
for Public Library Organization and Management at Long Island University
is responsible for the development
of the Advanced Certificate Program in Public Library Administration, the
first such program in the nation.
A former Director of the Suffolk Cooperative Library System, one of the country’s
busiest public library systems, Jerry also served as the Director of the Half
Hollow Hills, Freeport and Babylon Public Libraries on Long Island.
A recipient of the New York Library Association’s Outstanding Service
to Libraries Award, Mr. Nichols was also a member of the New York State Regents’ Commission
on Library Services and has served as Chair of the Public Library System Directors’ Organization
of New York State. He is also the editor of the 2006 edition of the Handbook
for Library Trustees of New York State. Degrees: B.A. Springfield College,
Mass., M.L.S. Long Island University
As a library consultant his areas of expertise include public library management,
construction, finance and law.
Ellen Reynolds
Ellen currently serves as the Collection Management Librarian
for
Pioneer Library System and provides consultant services in the areas
of
collection management and development, adult services, youth services,
and catalog and holdings training for the system’s Integrated Library
System. Prior to joining the PLS staff in 1998 she was Central Library
Coordinator for the Geneva Free Library, the central library for PLS,
where she was responsible for overseeing the library’s ILS,
acquisitions, cataloging, adult collection development, and the
system-wide interlibrary loan service. Ellen was director of the Ontario
Public Library in Ontario, New York for 14 years prior to joining the
Geneva staff.
Patricia Stocker
Patricia Stocker knew she wanted to be a librarian at the age
of ten. Many, many years later she’s still glad she made the choice
at such a tender age. She has over twenty-five years of library experience
as a School Librarian,
Public Library Director, Library System Outreach Coordinator and as Pioneer
Library System Assistant Director. After retiring from Pioneer in late 2004
she began a library consulting business that focuses on her areas of expertise:
long range planning, project management, grants review, focus group facilitation
and topics related to library facilities. Currently she is working with eight
public libraries, five public library systems and she recently was a reviewer
for the State Library for LSTA and Adult Literacy Services grant applications.
Patty Uttaro
Patty Uttaro has worked in the Monroe County Library System in
various
positions since 1984. She has been at the Ogden Farmers' Library in
Spencerport, NY since 1996, first as a Youth Services librarian, and as
Director since 1999. She spent two years studying at St. Lawrence
University in Canton, NY, and completed her BA at SUNY Empire State
College. She received her MLS from the University at Buffalo in 1997.
Her current areas of interest in the library field all involve the
library's place in the community -- preservation and accessibility of
community history, the library's role in community economic development,
the community library as a meeting place, community advisory boards, and
the use of social software applications in community libraries.
Lisa C. Wemett
Lisa C. Wemett is the Assistant Director for Reference and Teen
Services at the Webster Public Library, a suburb of Rochester. A graduate
of the School
of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, Lisa has worked for fifteen years as both a teen specialist for
collection
development and programming as well as a member of the management team of
two large suburban libraries.
Her expertise includes staff training, grant writing, public relations, personnel
management, working with Friends of the Library, development of policies and
procedures, and strategic planning. A member of the American Library Association
and the New York Library Association, Lisa has served as President of the Youth
Services Section of NYLA and a Councilor-at-Large. She has published articles
on teen services in VOYA, Journal of Youth Services in Libraries, and School
Library Journal and has presented numerous programs and workshops within New
York State and nationally as a YALSA Serving the Underserved trainer.
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