Jeff Cruz is excited about the ALIA Sydney Committee in 2012!

As a returning member of the ALIA Sydney Committee, I’m excited for all the professional development and social events we’ll be putting together for 2012!

As you may know, the ALIA Sydney Blog is staffed by the Committee in addition to guest bloggers. We write about all those fascinating, pertinent and engaging intersections between libraries, information and life. We love to hear from library and information professionals of all kinds, so if you’re keen to be a guest blogger, let us know!

I thought I’d keep my first post of 2012 very simple and simply introduce myself.

My name is Jeff Cruz and I’m one of the Event Officers in our committee. I support any of the Event Coordinators in planning, organising and implementing any of our great professional development events.

In Library Land, I'm the User Education Librarian at the City of Sydney Library network. As part of the Programs Team, I’m in charge of developing, coordinating and delivering education and technology programs across 9 branches. This means I put on events, workshops and courses on anything from beginner computer courses for seniors to social media marketing workshops for small organisations to book trailer workshops for teens.

Before becoming a certified, qualified, card-carrying, ALA and ALIA-approved Librarian, I worked in international and online marketing, I taught English and Spanish (from 11 year olds to adults!) and I worked in a variety of libraries in different roles (mostly library assistant type roles). I definitely think that my previous job experiences have provided me with some key skills in my current library position—especially working with multicultural populations, having strong teaching skills and being all-around awesome at anything social media.

I only recently moved to Australia from the US (about a year ago), having lived in Arizona, Boston, Vermont and Madrid, Spain before coming to the sunshine beaches of Sydney. If this summer had been consistently drier, I would have spent a whole lot more time at the beach, running and biking. Instead, I’ve been spending a lot more time wine-tasting, trying to grow herbs and peppers on my balcony and staying connected with the US through fine American television.

Meet the rest of the ALIA Sydney Committee in the upcoming weeks, or have a look at the ALIA Sydney Facebook Page. And feel free to follow ALIA Sydney on Twitter on @AliaSyd.

Jeff Cruz

Events Officer, ALIA Sydney Committee

@jncruz

Disclaimer: All of the information and views expressed are solely my own, and do not reflect those of my employer or any member organisations.