By Joyce D. Cortese, Secretary to the SPL Board of Trustees
My husband and I moved our family to Sewickley in 1974 because of the quality school system at QVSD. With five children, ranging from two to eight, a good education for them was foremost. The close proximity to the airport where my husband worked had a lot to do with it, also. Little did I know at the time that the Sewickley Public Library was going to be such a wonderful addition to their educational experiences here.
A few years after we arrived, I had the pleasure of learning about the library in this lovely small town through my involvement with the school district. I was appointed to the SPL Board of Trustees as a Director by the QV School District Board and thus began my sincere love for SPL. Since my first introduction to SPL, I have enjoyed every minute of time spent working for it. I love the library and am proud of all the wonderful programs and learning experiences that have been available there these many years. Immediately, I became aware of the library staff and how caring they are about their jobs. They work very hard to provide the best possible experiences for everyone.
I joined the Friends of SPL early on and was able to offer my services as much or as little as I had time for. Many skills are needed by the Friends group. For me, being on the Friends of the Library Board meant being able to help with many projects, including much needed fund raising, which is vital to SPL. Our library could not exist as it does without the Friends of SPL. I have been able to use my secretarial/office skills from doing annual mailings to being an officer and serving as its secretary and president. I am foremost a “behind-the-scenes type”, but appreciate being able to do many jobs to support the library in any way I can. For some years I was able to take care of updating the mailing list of Friends’ supporters, and because I love to bake, helping often meant baking cookies to serve at their events. I still do that upon request.
What continues to keep me working for SPL is: the pride I feel for how our library has progressed into the 21st century; the hard-working staff who give all they can each day for patrons’ positive experiences; the expertise they share with everyone; working together to help each other when needed; sharing and seeing to fruition new ideas/suggestions for improvements; treating everyone with respect; and being as helpful as possible to make the most of their work environment. These are all the reasons I want to continue to volunteer, for as long as they’ll have me.
