Kathy Swartz is a youth librarian at the Palo Alto City Library. She is based at Children’s

Library and at Mitchell Park Library and has worked in this position for 4

years. ‘Youth librarian’ means that she works with kids – mostly babies through

elementary school. However, she’ll help any patron. Before this, she worked at

an electronic library for people with print disabilities, Bookshare, and before that, she was the school

librarian at the Stevenson Elementary School in Mountain View. Prior to becoming

a librarian, she was an electrical engineer working for IBM and Cadence Design Systems as an IC designer, programmer,

quality engineer, product manager, instructor, manufacturing manager, and

engineering manager.

She is originally from the east coast

and got her Bachelor’s Degree in Electrical Engineering from The Cooper Union for the

Advancement of Science and Art – a very small college in New York City, specializing in

Engineering, Art, and Architecture. She received a Master’s Degree in

Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland at College Park. Finally, in order to become a

librarian, she went back to school and received a Master’s Degree in Library

and Information Science from San Jose State University.