Greetings!  I'm the director of the Seymour Public Library District in Auburn, NY, and have been in the position since February 2007.  Previously, I was the director of the Dover Public Library in Dover, DE for five and a half years.  Before that, I managed the Young Adults' Services Department at the Allen County Public Library in Fort Wayne, IN and was the Young Adult Coordinator at the Cumberland County Public Library & Information Center in Fayetteville, NC. 

Since 2000, I've taught graduate courses for the Department of Library Science at Clarion University of PA, including young adult literature, collection development, history of children's literature, public library management, rural library services, introduction to the information profession, storytelling, the humanities, and reference. Currently I am teaching a course about multicultural services and sources for librarians and educators.     

I've served on the YALSA Board of Directors, the Selected DVDs and Videos for Young Adults Committee, the Professional Development Committee, and the Best of the Best Books for Young Adults Preconference Committee. I also served on the ALA Children's Book Council (CBC) Joint Committee and as an ALA Councilor-at-Large. 

In 1997, I attended my first ALA Annual Conference in San Francisco after being awarded the Baker & Taylor/YALSA Conference grant. Along with John P. Bradford, in 1999 I was awarded the Frances Henne/YALSA/VOYA Research and we studied state-level commitment to young adult library services. 

I'm available to present workshops to library staff on serving teens, and I've been a YALSA Serving the Underserved Trainer since 2001.  In August 2008 I was the keynote speaker at the Children and Teen Services Conference, administered by the Ohio Library Council. 

My first book, Serving Older Teens, was published in 2004.  My second book for Libraries Unlimited, Extreme Teens: Library Services to Nontraditional Young Adults, was released in 2005.   My third book, Serving Young Teens and 'Tweens was published in 2007. 

As a newlywed, I'm not planning to write more books in the near future! Rolf Mikkelson and I got married in NJ on April 6th, 2008.  We met in Dover, DE in September 2005, three days after he had a job interview at Cayuga Community College.

In Auburn, NY, I'm the Secretary of the Auburn Kiwanis Club, on the Board of Directors of the Auburn Beautification Commission, and a member of the Human Services Coalition of Cayuga County. 

I'm also a member of the Leadership Cayuga class of 2008.  Click here to learn about our group project.