Interviews, Success Stories

Christina Keasler …In Six

My interview with success story, Christina


Naomi: How did you find your current job?
Christina: While I mainly used INALJ for jobs out of my immediate area, I stalked the job board of RAILS (Reaching Across Illinois Library System). We’re talking literally almost every hour.

Naomi: Favorite library you have been to?
Christina: I’m no library connoisseur, but my favorite library that I’ve been to is the Addison Public Library. They are very green, from chairs made of recycled car parts, to bamboo floors, to their amazing hanging art. It’s also a big plus that the staff is extremely friendly and down to Earth.

Naomi: Favorite book?
Christina: My all-time favorite is “His Dark Materials” trilogy, followed by the Ender series and their spin-offs.

Naomi: Favorite thing about libraries/ library technology?
Christina: Personally, I think outreach is extremely important for the survival of libraries as well as the benefit of patrons. I love what technology is doing for the immediacy of library services. The better gadgets we have, the faster we can optimally serve people. Additionally, the streaming technology is a great way to compete with online retailers for the “I want it now” client.

Naomi: Any websites or feeds or blogs we should be following?
Christina: I’m going to cheat and say that I love to look for and find pictures of all the edible book art out there. It’s amazing how people interpret their favorite stories in such extraordinary ways. I am not aware of any all-encompassing blog of edible book art, but there are a lot of localized blogs featuring great pictures of inspiration.

Naomi: Best piece of job hunting advice?
Christina: The best advice has already been given: never give up. It’s so frustrating, especially when you get the denials in the mail. (Really? You couldn’t email me instead? haha) but you can’t get discouraged and you must persevere. To add a little extra that I’ve heard from a professor: don’t pigeonhole yourself with limited ideas. You have the capability of doing great things, and you might end up in a spectacular position that you never expected.

I am now an Early Literacy Librarian at Glen Ellyn Public Library in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. I have just finished the distance learning program (LEEP) from University of Illinois, and did it on one year! Now that I have it, I enjoy spending my spare time with my husband and two cats going on picnics, the drive-in, and adventures to new places – both near and far.

Naomi House

Naomi House, MLIS, is the founder and publisher of the popular webzine and jobs list INALJ.com (formerly I Need a Library Job) and former CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) of T160K.org, a crowdfunding platform focused on African patrimony, heritage and cultural projects. INALJ was founded in October 2010 with the assistance of her fellow Rutgers classmate, Elizabeth Leonard. Its social media presence has grown to include Facebook (retired in 2016), Twitter and a LinkedIn group, in addition to the interviews, articles and jobs found on INALJ. INALJ has had over 21 Million page hits and helped many, many thousands of librarians find employment! Through grassroots marketing, word of mouth and a real focus on exploring unconventional resources for job leads, INALJ grew from a subscription base of 20 friends to a website with over 500,000 visits in one month. Naomi believes that well-sourced quantity is quality in this narrow job market and INALJ reflects this with many new jobs published daily. She has also written for the 2011, 2012 and 2013 LexisNexis Government Info Pro and many other publications in the past decade. She presents whenever she can, including serving on three panels at the American Library Association's Annual Conference in Las Vegas; as breakout presenter at OCLC EMEA in Cape Town, South Africa; as a keynote speaker at the Virginia Library Association annual meeting; at the National Press Club in Washington DC; McGill University in Montreal, Canada; the University of the Emirates, Dubai, MLIS program and the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Naomi was a Reference, Marketing and Acquisitions Librarian for a contractor at a federal library outside Washington, DC, and has been living and working in Budapest, Hungary and Western New York State. She spent years running her husband’s moving labor website, fixed and sold old houses and assisted her husband cooking delicious Pakistani food. She is preparing to re-enter the workforce and is job hunting. Her husband is now the co-editor of INALJ, a true support!  She has heard of spare time but hasn’t encountered it lately. She pronounces INALJ as eye-na-elle-jay. 

Tags: