Photo Provided By Sophia Sylvester

Chesterton High School has recently added to our staff the wonderful Mrs. Cooney, and she is the administrative assistant for the library! She just started working in the library after winter break, but she’s worked at Duneland for longer–she was a substitute teacher for Duneland last fall after leaving her role as a teacher. Let’s take a moment and get to know her!

Mrs. Cooney is extremely nice; during the whole interview, she had a smile on her face and a cup of tea in her hand. Her day-to-day work at the high school, she says, “Helping kids with their dual credit, so I have been really spamming their emails, because if they don’t take these knowledge assessments for their dual credit, they don’t have the opportunity to get dual credit.” For the most part, though, she says she’s been helping out in the library with whatever is needed. She says, “I’m kind of like the front desk, just helping kids with their computers, checking books, checking out books, putting books back, creating a lot of lists for purchasing stuff.” While the best part of her job is “Working in a library is probably like the dream; it’s awesome, I mean, you’re just surrounded by books, and I’m a big reader.”

A little bit more about Mrs. Cooney about what she does when she’s outside of school is that she likes being out in nature. She loves taking walks and being outside. Some of her other hobbies include art, she loves doing crafts, “a lot of crafts.” Which, who doesn’t love a good craft? She also loves to read! Her favorite book is always changing! But for the moment, she says it’s “this very small novella series called The Monk and Robot Series. The first one is called Song for the Wild Built by Beckie Chambers. It was just a really positive utopic look at like our life with technology or like a future with technology.” One reason she really liked this book was that it had some of the same values she shares about the planet. 

As for the direction of the library, she hopes more students will read a book! “I think I just wish that more students who maybe have never read a book would take the time to just come through and find something, no matter what it is, and just sit with it. I am amazed by our collection.We just have such a great collection here, and it’s always being updated with new things, but there are a lot of old classics as well.” With that said, you can almost always come down to check out a library book! She adds, “I think sometimes in our world full of anxiety, sitting with a book brings you back down to here now. I wish more kids could find that; their here and now.” Which she is right; a book is a delightful touch to the harsh screen we use every day. 

Finally, this year, Mrs. Cooney is excited for, “Moving back into my house and kind of getting that part of my life back is going to feel really good.” While she’s extremely grateful for being able to do renovations on her house, Mrs. Cooney also misses calling her home a home. With this part of her life coming into a new chapter, she says, “I feel like in life we often find ourselves on pause for one reason or another; it’s easy to kind of just get lost in that pause. So I am excited to begin again, with starting over, moving back into my place, and reassessing where I am at in life.” She also thinks 2026 will be “a new start for a lot of things.” We agree there! 

“I think people should read the newspaper more at this school, and I think people should read more books. I think we’d be a happier world if we all read more books,” Mrs. Cooney said. We all can agree that books can help brighten the world, so stop by the library to read a book!

Thank you, Mrs. Cooney, for joining the high school, and welcome to Chesterton! If you want to meet Mrs. Cooney or the other librarians, stop by the library!