Maureen Meagher has had a successful three years working at EPL’s Pierre Moran location. She’s read to numerous kindergarten classes and shared an enthusiasm for literacy through storytimes. She even met her husband at her library.
She says Carlos, her now husband, came into Pierre Moran one day. He exceeded his allotted time on an express Internet station. She had to ask him to log off because others were waiting.
Before becoming the children’s librarian for the branch, Meagher worked part time as a clerk at EPL’s Dunlap location and was a full-time teacher in Spanish and English as a Second Language at Concord and Baugo schools. She speaks fluent Spanish.
Through that job, she became more focused on literacy and the importance of reading, especially for English learners.
“I had to cultivate my own classroom library for my students,” she says.
Most of her students were reading English at a second- or third-grade level. But the books for that reading level are written to interest younger students, not the junior-high-aged students she was teaching. So, she would track down books that bridged the gap.
After her teaching position was eliminated, she applied to an opening at the library. In her current job, she focuses on getting children excited about reading through programs and classroom visits.
“My favorite parts of my job – I love the kindergarten classroom visits and my storytimes with the preschoolers,” says Meagher.
At Pierre Moran, Meagher is known for her energy and positive spirit, something she attributes to her mother.
She gets book suggestions from her sister, Tricia, who works at the downtown library, and others. She puts her spin on them to captivate her audience.
“Making those books come alive and getting animated,” says Meagher. “Someone showed me this older book that I’d never seen before and I did it for a classroom the next day. All the kids loved it, but one classroom asked me to do it again. So, we did it together. They did the voices with me the second time.