Cynthia Wilson has managed to do something that most of us wish for--discover ways to mix a number of her life's interests and ambitions.  Now, for example, she is in the middle of putting together a book, I Am A Librarian!, a book of photographs that will put real faces on librarians--combining her passion for photography with her current career interest, librarianship. 

Inspired by a mention of the librarian stereotype in Bust magazine, a popular feminist magazine, Cynthia decided she wanted to do something about that stereotype and look for more realistic images. "I wanted to come up with something that was affirmative," and I am a Librarian! was born. .As she describes it, she got the idea to put together a book of photos of librarians one day, went home and immediately began making it a reality. Her first step was to purchase the domain iamalibrarian ( http://www.iamalibrarian.com ). The statement "I am a librarian" resonated with her ideas about portraying librarians as they are.

To date, more than 500 librarians have expressed interest in participating in her project. She has narrowed the scope of the project to include only U.S. librarians with MLS degrees and students pursing a MLS. Cynthia is taking all of the photos herself. Her undergraduate degree is in Communications and she continued pursing photography even as she moved into librarianship. Tentatively, she plans to gather more photos at the ALA Mid-winter convention in Boston and the possibility of a cross-country tour, meeting librarians, is in the works for later in 2005. Her plan for the book is to include about 100 pictures, but she is also sending out surveys to those who want to participate and she hopes to include comments from many more librarians than those whose photos will be included. In this way, a variety of voices on the image of the librarian can be presented. This project has allowed her to combine a number of her passions, photography and librarianship as well as bringing her closer to one of her life-time goals- publishing a book.

Currently, Cynthia works for PALINET as the Member Support Coordinator. PALINET, with a central office in Philadelphia , is a cooperative membership organization that includes hundreds of organizations. The purpose of PALINET, is to "collect, preserve and provide access to the record of humankind". Most member institutions are located in Delaware , Maryland , New Jersey , Pennsylvania and West Virginia .

It was during her undergraduate degree that she had her first professional experience in libraries-she worked in the library of Beaver College . She went on to work at Temple University Library, "I love working with interlibrary loans. It is the most rewarding because people are very appreciative." Other jobs included some time at a law firm library, plus a number of internships.

While working on her MLS degree in a distance learning program at Clarion University , she held a number of internship positions. At Temple University , she was able to work on a fascinating project, Urban Archives, involving the archiving of urban photographs.

At Moore College of Art, she served as a senior library assistant and was able to gain experience in a variety of areas, including book repair, cataloging, book ordering and interlibrary loan. This past summer, as she neared the end of her degree, she participated in another internship at Washington State University , involving manuscript archives and special collections.

Cynthia feels that having knowledge of both interlibrary loans and cataloging was an advantage for her when she applied to PALINET. Also, she had served on the PALINET Preservation committee while a student, so she brought to the table some familiarity with PALINET itself.

When asked for advice for MLS students, her first response was "make sure you take all your required classes first." Secondly, she recommends that students get involved in the profession, either through a job, volunteer work or work with professional associations. She is following her own advice and is serving on the Student and Academic Relations Committee of the SLA . As far as how she found the job market during her recent job search? "Keep an open mind."