Gates Chili Middle School Career Fair

Dear Librarian,

“Thank you for coming to the Career Fair. Your job was very different from the others in many ways. You get the most books of the ones I’ve seen. You get to enlighten children’s by reading to them… “

This is how the letter starts out I received yesterday from a 6th grade Gates Chili Middle School student. Each year the school coordinates a career fair for over 1,000 middle school students. This year the event took place May 8th. Throughout the day the students spoke to participants from different careers. The students asked the participants to describe their jobs, what education they had in school, what skill sets are required for their job, etc.

I found the kids to be inquisitive and well behaved. Patricia Cipolla did a great job coordinating the fair. The library had a career table with plenty of handouts (bookmarks, program guides) to give away, and samples of career books from the library. I had two clerical staff join me (Deb Amesbury and Carol Fogarassy), and one of my pages Declan related to the kids his experiences as well.

Some of the kids admitted to being active readers, while others said up front they don’t like to read. Kids will always tell you what’s on their mind. But even for the non-readers after talking to them we found common ground on topics they found of interest and we suggested they try us out. Overall it was a great experience for both students and participants.