Radwa Ali, a 2006 graduate of High School South, is the new director of Bogata Library in Bergen County.
Ali, who began volunteering at the Plainsboro Library when she was in eighth grade, was hired in her freshman year at South. “In Plainsboro, despite my youth, I was able to take part in many areas of librarianship. That meant that even as a high-schooler, I took pride in my job and the library itself,” says Ali. “I worked at the circulation desk and learned the art of customer service, the children’s department, and the reference department. I helped with some children’s programs, took over responsibility for the music and young adult collections, and coordinated the teen volunteers.”
“Choosing to work at the Plainsboro Public Library through high school and college was instrumental to where I am now,” says Ali. “Without that opportunity, and without the amazing Jinny Baeckler’s (former director at Plainsboro) influence on my life, I doubt I would have even developed the desire to become a librarian. It was Jinny’s vision for what a library can be for its community that fueled my own beliefs.”
In the lead-up to the move to the new building, Ali was entrusted with organizing much of the finer details of that move. “Those varying experiences are what made me want to become a librarian,” says Ali. “I got to experience first-hand what it takes to run a successful library. That’s something I will always be grateful for.”
Ali received a scholarship from the News (September 8, 2006). Ali’s plans were to study political science, history, and English literature at Rutgers University. She graduated from Rutgers with both a bachelor and master degree. “By the way, Plainsboro Library is among the few that helps its own,” says Ali. “The library paid for half of my tuition at the Rutgers Graduate School of Library and Information Science. It has done this before for other staff members wishing to obtain an MLIS, and it has done it again since.”
Born in Alexandria, Egypt, she moved to Plainsboro with her family in 1995. Her parents, now retired, live in Plainsboro. Her father, Ali Ali, was a technician at Filterfresh Coffee Excellence; and her mother, Samia Gabal, is a homemaker. Her two sisters, Riham Nassar and Rania Ali, are both married with three children. Riham, who lives in Connecticut, is a senior programmer analyst with Hewitt Associates, and Rania is a registered respiratory therapist at the Winnie Palmer Hospital for Women and Babies in Florida.
In high school Ali was a member of stage crew and a member of the National Honor Society. President of the Diversity Club, she was on the committee that organized an evening with Judy Shepard, executive director of the Matthew Shepard Foundation, created after her son was murdered in an anti-gay hate crime in Laramie, Wyoming.
A volunteer with the Plainsboro Rescue Squad since she was 14, Ali obtained her EMT certification when she was 16. She was captain of the Cadet Corps of the Rescue Squad during her junior and senior years until she had to resign that post due to scheduling conflicts with a playwriting workshop at McCarter Theater.
Ali was also a staff writer, editor, and blogger for SEX, etc, a teen health magazine run by Rutgers University. All the content is written by high school teens.
“The Plainsboro library community is an incredible one,” says Ali. “The library is fortunate to have residents who value education to the degree that they do in Plainsboro, just as the community is fortunate to have a library and staff that work so hard to bring the highest quality services to them.”
“My vision for any public library is that it should be the community center. I don’t believe in a quiet library that is stale, dusty and people are ‘shushing’ one another. I am trying to liven up the library in every way possible and bring as much programming as possible.”
Bogata Library, 375 Larch Avenue, Bogota, 201-488-7185, www.bogotapubliclibrary.org. Meet the new library director in a meet and greet on Monday, April 13, at 7:30 p.m.
