Joe O’Brien MI’22, an Adult Services and Acquisitions Librarian at the Livingston Public Library,  has been named a 2025 Mover and Shaker in the Community Builders category by Library Journal.

The Movers and Shaker’s Award, according to the journal, is awarded to “up-and-coming individuals from around the world who are innovative, creative, fighting against censorship, and helping improve their library and community.”

In their role at the Livingston Public Library, O’Brien creates content for social media (including these fun, engaging videos), produces L-Town Radio, the Livingston Public Library’s monthly podcast featuring interviews with notable community members, publishes zines about people and events from town history, books concerts by local musicians, and provides reference services and research assistance to patrons.

This is not the first time O’Brien has earned a prestigious award for their innovative work. Since they began their career at the Livingston Public Library as a Youth Services Library Assistant, O’Brien has been awarded the New Jersey Library Association’s Public Relations Award (in 2024) for a podcast they created promoting the Livingston Public Library’s “English Language Learners” program, and the New Jersey Library Association’s Innovative Program Award (in 2021) for a series of “Pride Month” story time videos they created, which encouraged kids to embrace what makes them different.  

The Movers and Shaker’s Award, according to the journal, is awarded to “up-and-coming individuals from around the world who are innovative, creative, fighting against censorship, and helping improve their library and community.”

Explaining how they still apply the knowledge they gained in the Master of Information program to their work, O’Brien said, “Whether I'm helping a patron in a reference query or conducting my own research, mentally going through the broad strokes of Carol Kuhlthau's model of the Information Search Process is usually very helpful. Additionally, all that I learned about community engagement from Nancy Kranich's class on the subject undoubtedly had a big impact on the ‘community building’ that resulted in my ‘Movers and Shakers’ selection.

Read our Q&A with O’Brien to learn how they build community through the library, how they view the differences between their work in youth and adult services, the Master of Information faculty members who impacted them the most, and why they were drawn to a career in librarianship.

SC&I: What do you enjoy the most about building community through your work?
JO’B: What I enjoy most about my work is interviewing people from the Livingston community for the library's podcast. Hearing about the lives and experiences of our neighbors is a great way to develop empathy, strengthen bonds, and foster pride in the community. On one level, it's great because I get to make connections with people that I might not have otherwise. Even better is when a patron or co-worker tells me how much they liked listening to a particular interviewee, and they end up making a connection with that person too.

 SC&I: You began your career at the library as a Youth Services Library Assistant, and currently you are the Adult Services & Acquisitions Librarian. How are those roles different, and what is enjoyable and challenging about both?
JO’B: In youth services, I focused a lot on encouraging literacy, curiosity, and creativity, while being part of the adult services team is more often about facilitating more specific, day-to-day information needs. (A very broad generalization, of course; there are plenty of exceptions either way.) It can be challenging not to take things personally when patrons are disrespectful, or even hostile, when you're just trying to help them as best you can. But that's definitely outweighed by the enjoyment that comes with helping all the kind folks who are genuinely grateful for your work.  

SC&I: What drew you to the field of Library and Information Science and Rutgers?
JO’B: Before I started working in the library, I lived in New York City bouncing around various artistic and media-related fields, like music, journalism, publishing, and theater. But I could never quite establish a satisfying career in any of those fields. Then eight years ago I moved to New Jersey and the first job I got there was a library assistant position in Livingston. Eventually I learned that I could apply my previous work experiences to a public library setting– booking concerts, producing podcasts, printing zines, and hosting storytimes. 

So by the end of 2019, I decided to make a career for myself as a librarian and pursue my MI degree. Rutgers was the first school I applied to, because in addition to having a great reputation for its MLIS program, it offered enough asynchronous virtual classes that would allow me the flexibility to study while also working full-time and raising my newborn child. 

SC&I: How has earning your MI degree impacted your career?
JO’B: Beyond getting a nice bump in my salary, it gave me a lot more confidence in my work. I'm a lot more eager to take initiative and try new things at work, armed with the knowledge and insights I gained at Rutgers. Plus, it's helped me cope with things a lot better. Sometimes when I feel overwhelmed, I remind myself that I got my master’s degree while simultaneously dealing with the stresses of a pandemic, a full-time job, and caring for an infant – and then suddenly whatever problems I'm facing don't seem quite as bad anymore.

"Beyond getting a nice bump in my salary, it gave me a lot more confidence in my work. I'm a lot more eager to take initiative and try new things at work, armed with the knowledge and insights I gained at Rutgers."

SC&I: Did any MI classes or faculty members influence or inspire you?
JO’B: There was a time when I wasn't sure I was management material, but Lilia Pavlovsky's Management Principles inspired me to think otherwise.

Emily Drabinski's scholarly yet down-to-earth approach to teaching has been a profound influence on how I navigate the hall of mirrors that is "Information Literacy" in the 2020s. 

Joyce Valenza's endearing enthusiasm made Search and the Information Landscape a delightful and rewarding adventure, where every assignment was like solving an exciting new puzzle. 

I was so appreciative of Marc Aronson's passion for literature, and his incisive feedback about my work in his Young Adult Literacy course that a couple semesters later, I enrolled in his Children's Reading and Literacy course too. 

Last but not least, I'm forever grateful to the late Ross Todd, who taught my Human Information Behavior class during my first semester. I was extremely intimidated taking graduate-level courses after being out of school for over 15 years and struggled a lot through my first couple months at Rutgers. If not for Professor Todd's sympathetic guidance and knack for making the academic accessible, I would've had a much harder time sticking it out. 

SC&I: Do you have any advice for students thinking about or currently enrolled in SC&I’s MI program?
JO’B: If you're able to get any kind of job in a library while you're in school, take it. It can be tough juggling work and grad school, but being able to apply those academic lessons in a real-world setting in real time was invaluable for me.

Learn more about the Master of Information on the Rutgers School of Communication and Information website. 

Photo: Courtesy of Joe O'Brien.