An Interview with Ashley Breymaier, Remote Metadata Intern

Today’s interview is with Ashley Breymaier, a remote metadata intern for the Digital Resources Division.

Describe your background

I am a military brat who grew up traveling all over the world. I left Maryland when I was seven years old and moved to Harrogate, England. When I was eleven, we moved to Bad Abiling, Germany and I lived there until I was eighteen. I attended boarding school in Edinburgh, Scotland for my first two years of high school. I love to travel and have visited 16 countries thus far. I have always loved libraries and books, so when I travel I always find at least one library to visit. In middle school, I read one book a night and now I re-read my favorites every year: Little Women, Wuthering Heights, and Jane Eyre. No one was surprised when I decided to become a librarian!

Academic/professional history

I earned my Bachelor of Science degree in professional writing from Old Dominion University while working full-time as a technical writer/project manager for a large government contractor in Washington, D.C. As a graduation present to myself, I went backpacking through Europe for three weeks and visited all of the libraries and museums I could find. When I returned home, I decided I wanted to be a librarian and applied to graduate school. I completed my Master of Library and Information Science degree from Syracuse University while simultaneously working full-time, completing internships at both the Smithsonian Natural History Museum and the Law Library of Congress, working with George Mason’s Special Collections Library, and volunteering at Arlington Library’s reference desk. There was never a dull moment during those three years!

How would you describe your job to other people?

I am an intern for the Law Library of Congress. I produce and assign metadata and descriptive keywords for the Statutes at Large to make them searchable online. I learn something new about America’s history every time I open the statute I’m working on!

Why did you want to work at the Library of Congress?

When I was in middle school my mother bought me a pocket constitution, that I used to take it everywhere. Now, it sits proudly on one of my bookshelves at home. At a young age, I realized the importance of knowing and understanding our rights as Americans and making that information accessible to the public. The Library of Congress makes that happen in an unbiased fashion. Plus, the Library of Congress has over 800 miles of bookshelves–who wouldn’t want to be a part of that?!

What is the most interesting fact you’ve learned about the Law Library of Congress?

I am truly impressed with how international and worldly the Law Library is. It contains legal information for almost all jurisdictions in the world. That’s pretty impressive!

What’s something most of your co-workers do not know about you?

I can debark a tree, create bricks out of mud, and I have a rather diverse collection of hobbies. I enjoying reading, going on long motorcycle rides, hiking, shooting at the range, arts and crafts projects, and watching bad/cheesy scary movies. And I once shared a leg press with Brett Michaels at the gym.