[LM_NET] Validity of research and our image

[Laura Brooks <brooksla@NORTHVILLE.K12.MI.US>]

Gail and Carol,

I agree with you both; however, I also hold academia accountable for the 
misperceptions and utter ignorance teachers and administrators have of media 
specialists and media programs in general. I most definitely agree that we need 
more PhD's among our ranks but how can we realistically expect this when 50 states 
have 50 different standards for the certification of a media specialist; many do 
not even require Master's degrees? I feel every day that I am viewed as what I like 
to call "The Book Gleaner Lightbulb Librarian"; that is, when I'm not 
"babysitting", I'm the book lady and overhead bulb dispenser. This is why so many 
of us are defensive and grasping for valid research in order to be taken seriously. 
Why after working so hard to earn a graduate degree, do I need to convince a 
teacher that I am more than a walking and talking print encyclopedia?

The answer to our image problem, I believe, begins with college teacher education 
programs. Why is it teachers stare blankly at me when I utter, apparently in a 
foreign tongue, the words “information literacy”? Wisconsin actually does (or did) 
require pre-service teachers to take an entire course on the role of the school 
library media program. We are required to take many education courses for obvious 
reasons, but why can a classroom teacher who has no clue as to what we do be 
allowed to teach in the media center, yet I can't enter a classroom? Doesn't this 
negate and invalidate almost all that we do? I, for one, have firmly believed that 
until LIS professors and department chairs start advocating for us by suggesting 
that Ed. Depts. require teachers in training to learn what it is we do; how we all 
work together in a school to further higher order thinking in our students, then we 
will forever be trying to prove our worth. 

Laura Brooks
Media Specialist
Northville Schools
brooksla@northville.k12.mi.us


 

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