Maura O'Toole

Maura, the Library Co-ordinator , is the visionary behind the library project at Mission Hill School. She first began in the library as the computer catalog collapsed and manged to keep the library working. This means mangaging circulation, storytimes, dealing with vendors, writing successful grants,  making purchasing decisions and processing books from purchase to shelf. She also knows how to get the best out of  generous volunteers. Maura is a life-long native of Jamaica Plain and has two children at Mission Hill.

Winifred Flint, MLS

Winifred is a professional librarian specialized in building libraries with no monies. Her original mandate was to catalog the 2000 books on the shelves that had been processed but not put in the computer catalog. Having all items in a running catalog would move the library up from a browsing library to a research library. For example, every book whose subject was spiders - fiction and non-fiction would come up on the screen. No longer would students  need to rely on a non-fiction title or the memory of the librarian. But upon arrival,she realized that given the minescule workspace that work flow would need to be defined in order to manage the movement and processing of books. This is also crucial when volunteers come in so it is very clear where and what they are doing without bumping into others. Another space maker includes removing the many  books that contain mis-information (Pluto is no longer a planet...),  are not current, or do not match the mission of the school. This effort will also require the managing of many volunteers with  different skill sets and who will be working at different times.