Greetings All.

[A work in progress - both me & this essay.]

I'm Paul Birkby and one of 2 media specialists at Penfield High School.  This is my second year here.  Prior to that I was the media specialist at Scribner Road Elementary School in Penfield for 12 years.  (I took a year's leave of absence - more about that later - and wound up here upon my return.)

My path to school librarianship has been a meandering one (Think Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken). A road map of my path is attached ( Click "Files", then choose Paul's Resume).  During my senior year at Hobart College, (No, I'm not going to tell you how long ago that was!) my father asked my about my plans, to which I responded,"I dunno."  So he suggested law school (him being a lawyer and all that). With nothing better to do, I returned to southern New Jersey and found myself enrolled at Rutgers University School of Law. I knew it was a mistake the second day, but couldn't figure how to get out of it until I had been practicing law for 8 years, when my then-wife took a job with with then newly elected County Executive of Monroe County.  I was faced with a dilemma, take another bar exam or change careers.  I chose the latter.

During my years practicing law, (I had my set up my own practice in the house), I had been volunteering in my kids' schools.  I learned pretty quickly that it was a lot more fun and fulfilling to be around kids all day than it was to be around lawyers and judges.  I knew I wanted to be in education and, considering educational my background, the quickest route was school librarianship, so it was off to UB for an MLS.  As luck would have it, as I was finishing my program, the librarian at my kids' school was retiring, so I applied and was hired. While at Scribner Road, I became involved in shared decision making, the instructional support team, among other things, and, by default, technology.  One of the accomplishments of which I am most proud was the rennovation and expansion of the library into a true media center with an attached computer lab.

Two years ago, I followed my heart to Atlanta (hence the leave of absence) and spent a year being told (never explicitly, of course) I was too old, too experienced and too expensive.  At the end of the year, I left my heart in Atlanta and moved back to Rochester. So here I am at PHS. 

I have 2 children - a daughter (26) who graduated from law school a year ago and is clerking for an appellate level judge in Boston and a son (24) who is enrolled in a joint degree program at UB that will culminate with Masters in Urban Planning and a JD.

My heart is still in Atlanta, but is working to get back here within the next year. We are planning to be married, either in Canada or here - as soon as it is legal to do so.