Hello, My Name is Jessica

I'll go ahead and be the first GSE member to introduce myself. My name is Jessica Jacko, and I live and work in Merrillville, Indiana. I am representing Rotary Club #3375, Merrillville, IN. The man in the picture with me is Tony Lux, superintendent of the Merrillville School District and president of Merrillville Rotary.

I grew up in Park Forest, Illinois, a suburb south of Chicago. I attended the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where I received a B.A. in history in 2003 and a M.S. in Library and Information Science in 2004. I worked as a reference librarian at La Porte County Public Library in La Porte, Indiana for almost two years before accepting the circulation services manager position at Lake County Public Library in July 2006.

A little bit about my family. My dad is a retired junior high social studies teacher, and my mom heads the human resources department for a small business in Homewood, Illinois. My younger sister, Leah, lives in Evanston, Illinois (world headquarters of Rotary International!) and works as a corporate event planner. My younger, Tim, recently graduated college and is looking for a job as a high school history teacher. My boyfriend, Greg, works for the computer security and access department at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Big Ten season is always such a happy time in our relationship.

I love watching and playing most sports (I live for college football and basketball, and I was a state qualifier in tennis in high school), reading, watching movies, making handmade greeting cards, and trying new restaurants.

I hope to meet with Australian librarians during my trip to see what problems they are facing, how they are adapting to changes in this information age, and meet Australian families to see how they interact with each other. And maybe take a surfing lesson.