Her name is Maria Emirensiana Pano, and we call her Ibu Yeni. She has been such an inspiring librarian for having been dedicating herself to be a librarian at Nggolonio Catholic School, Nagekeo district, since 2018. Even though she studied Elementary Education program at University of Flores, she took the role as a librarian which she has enjoyed ever since. “I have never thought that I would be a librarian, but look at me living my best time doing the role”, she said.

At the beginning of her journey, she faced many challenges starting from how to number the books, recording the book check-outs and returns, and classifying the books. After following some trainings from District Education Office and Rainbow Reading Gardens about child-friendly library management and discussing with her school’s principal and teachers, she finally gleaned comprehensive knowledge regarding library management. She excitedly described, “I enjoyed the process” when we visited her school’s library a few weeks ago.

“There used to be handouts and encyclopaedias in our library, which the students found difficult to understand especially the low graders. Thus, they showed little interest to read”, she continued. Now, the school has got various story books, and the ones who used to have lack of interest in visiting the school library are excited to borrow books and do various activities with their homeroom teacher or come with their own initiatives at school break time.

The excitement and activeness of these student has injected more positive energy and enthusiasm to Bu Yeni. She is willing to perform better at her role for the greater quality of her school library and students enjoy their best time there in the library. She also hopes that all homeroom teachers can collaborate actively to encourage and guide the students by conducting reading activities in the library, which will then lead to more improvement in student literacy.

Such an inspiring step that worth-following!