Career Pathways with Sasha Eastwood-Bennitt – Library and Resource Manager at Manchester Street School.
In this column we interview library and information professionals – finding out how they got to where they are and any advice they have for students or new professionals.
Our latest interview subject is school librarian Sasha Eastwood-Bennitt, Library and Resource Manager at Manchester Street School.
Our latest interview subject is school librarian Sasha Eastwood-Bennitt, Library and Resource Manager at Manchester Street School.
Kia ora Sasha and thanks for sharing your career pathway with our readers. First up, can you tell us about your current role? What is your job title and what do you do day-to-day? Can you also tell us what experience you have?
Thank you for the opportunity to share my journey to a job where I get to spend my days sharing
my love of reading with others. I have been the Library and Resource Manager at Manchester Street School in the Manawatū rural town of Feilding since 2008.
I love the variety of tasks I work through every day – from buying, cataloguing, processing and showing students and staff our new books; to facilitating and organising events within our school community that promote the love of reading; and also teaching library and information literacy skills to all our 16 classes who visit our library once a week.
In 2000, I started out in the library sector as a temporary circulation assistant with the National Library School Service Centre in Palmerston North. This was a great introduction to the world of libraries. I was an integral part of a team that sent books out to teachers and students all over the central North Island.
After a restructure, I had the opportunity to become a library assistant in the Print Disabilities Service, which was another division within the National Library (housed in the same building as School Services). We sent collections of audiobooks to public libraries for their community members who didn’t fit the criteria of the Blind Foundation service.
Again, I was part of a team sharing the opportunity for others to read. We collated, issued and
posted collections out to public libraries all over the country. In 2008, I took the fundamental skills I had developed over my time at the National Library to my current role as a school librarian. In this role, I was to be sole charge and a wider skill set was required, thanks to National Library Services to Schools I attended many courses to gain further knowledge on how to run a library.
I have loved being a school librarian. Again, I am in a job where I was part of a team this time with teachers and other support staff developing lifelong readers and learners.
my love of reading with others. I have been the Library and Resource Manager at Manchester Street School in the Manawatū rural town of Feilding since 2008.
I love the variety of tasks I work through every day – from buying, cataloguing, processing and showing students and staff our new books; to facilitating and organising events within our school community that promote the love of reading; and also teaching library and information literacy skills to all our 16 classes who visit our library once a week.
In 2000, I started out in the library sector as a temporary circulation assistant with the National Library School Service Centre in Palmerston North. This was a great introduction to the world of libraries. I was an integral part of a team that sent books out to teachers and students all over the central North Island.
After a restructure, I had the opportunity to become a library assistant in the Print Disabilities Service, which was another division within the National Library (housed in the same building as School Services). We sent collections of audiobooks to public libraries for their community members who didn’t fit the criteria of the Blind Foundation service.
Again, I was part of a team sharing the opportunity for others to read. We collated, issued and
posted collections out to public libraries all over the country. In 2008, I took the fundamental skills I had developed over my time at the National Library to my current role as a school librarian. In this role, I was to be sole charge and a wider skill set was required, thanks to National Library Services to Schools I attended many courses to gain further knowledge on how to run a library.
I have loved being a school librarian. Again, I am in a job where I was part of a team this time with teachers and other support staff developing lifelong readers and learners.
Is this the career you always intended to go into?
As a keen reader from a young age, I have always loved libraries. I recall a time when I put due date slips and pockets in my books to create my own library that I would issue to my teddies and dolls. It was a love I continued to grow as I grew up so after I moved to Palmerston North as a young adult and discovered that the National Library School Service Centre had positions available I jumped at the chance to apply that kick-started my career in libraries.
What was your idea of what librarians are and what they did before you became one?
The library at my school in rural Wairarapa was housed in the school hall, which was always centre to school activities, so it seemed that books were always surrounding us. I don’t recall a librarian but as a class, we visited and issued books often. Growing up, our family were regular users of our local library in Masterton – where I discovered there were people who spent their days working with and around books. These librarians were always friendly and happy – I quickly became a fan!
If you were meeting someone who had just finished their undergraduate degree and was contemplating doing a postgraduate LIS qualification what would you say to them? What sort of personal attributes do you think you need to go into LIS work?
Do it! Join a group of professionals who are essential to building communities in all aspects of society be it in education, central or local government, or business and enterprise. Come and work in a school library where the job is different every day and where your role is to develop the life-long love of reading and learning with our tamariki. I believe that, as a librarian, you need to be open to new learning; to have awareness of the world around you and the many cultures it encompasses; be open to new perspectives; to want to develop and promote reading and gaining knowledge as a lifelong skill; to enjoy being part of a team; and to want to build community in a fair and educated society.
Have you got any librarian mentors/people who influenced you or you admire/learned from? What did they teach you?
Whenever I have been asked about mentors, or who has influenced me most in my career, Jan Watts (now retired National Library Advisor to Schools) first comes to mind. I met Jan when I started at the National Library as a circulation assistant and loved to pick her brains about her job whenever I got the chance. She was always willing to share her impressive knowledge of school libraries and children’s literature with me. Her enthusiasm and passion in this area were infectious.She encouraged me to apply for the job I currently hold and was beside me every step of the way in my early development as a school librarian. She suggested I join the SLANZA Central Committee in 2009 where I met very knowledgeable and supportive school librarians and am proud to say I am still part of this group of professionals advocating for school libraries, in 2018 I became the Central Rep on SLANZA National Executive. As a new school librarian, I asked if Manawatū offered a similar professional development opportunity as the Taranaki Children’s Book Festival. Jan was the force behind a fellow school librarian – Jenny Humphreys – and myself working with a group of educators and librarians to establish ReaLM – Reading and Literacy in Manawatū. This is a group committed to providing local relevant professional development opportunities and events to promote reading to local school students and young people, something that, after 11 years, ReaLM is still doing.
Over the last twenty years, I have been lucky to be surrounded by librarians such as my supportive colleagues at the National Library and the inspiring school librarians who I have met through network meetings, courses (including most recently the passionate members of SLANZA National Executive) throughout my time as a school librarian. All of these people have played, and continue to play, a part in my journey and I am grateful to them all.
Over the last twenty years, I have been lucky to be surrounded by librarians such as my supportive colleagues at the National Library and the inspiring school librarians who I have met through network meetings, courses (including most recently the passionate members of SLANZA National Executive) throughout my time as a school librarian. All of these people have played, and continue to play, a part in my journey and I am grateful to them all.
Ngā mihi nui Sasha, what a rewarding career so far!