Hi All,
I agree with everything Cheryl has said, but the TL is responsible for
one more thing and this is a major aspect of the role - you are first
and foremost a teacher and curriculum designer and as such should be
activiely engaged in the core business of the school which is teaching
and learning outcomes for students and staff. In this role you should be
co-designing, teaching and assessing curriculum programs with your
teachers. You should be assessing the literacy and information literacy
learning outcomes as well as providing curriculum resource expertise and
support. You are a teacher first and a library manager second. Get your
management under control, then delegate the tasks to your library
technicians
And manage them.
:)
BC
Vice President, Advocacy & Promotion, IASL: www.iasl-online.org
LIS@ECU: http://www.chs.ecu.edu.au/portals/LIS/index.php
Transforming Information and Learning Conference
http://conferences.scis.ecu.edu.au/TILC2007/
Barbara Combes, Lecturer
School of Computer and Information Science Edith Cowan University, Perth
Western Australia
Ph: (08) 9370 6072
Email: b.combes@ecu.edu.au
"Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that
of an ignorant nation." Walter Cronkite
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-----Original Message-----
From: School Library Media & Network Communications
[mailto:LM_NET@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU] On Behalf Of Cheryl Youse
Sent: Thursday, 28 February 2008 7:54 AM
To: LM_NET@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
Subject: [LM_NET] Honest Response Needed
I sent an email privately to Maria but after reading other posts on this
thread, I felt compelled to post to the list as a whole. I have moved
to a high school this year from elementary school and I also have been a
middle school media specialist (K-8 actually in 2 different schools).
My cohort (there are two media specialists for a school of 2300) started
2 years ago and came from an elementary school.
We were both teachers before becoming librarians. Our predecessors were
librarians who worked in schools. I do feel that cataloging and
administration are important. If you can't access the materials you need
because of poor cataloging, or because items are improperly shelved it
is the same as not having the materials. However, that being said, our
mission is first to support the curriculum and second to promote
reading. My books are not cataloged to my satisfaction but they are
cataloged to be usable.
I believe that supporting the curriculum means being ready and willing
to collaborate at any opportunity and to co-teach both in the media
center and in the classroom. It means knowing the curriculum and
selecting print, audiovisual, databases, and websites that will be
utilized in assignments.
It means helping teachers with their technology problems and equipment
and tracking down articles and books they request.
Promoting reading means locating and making available materials that
students want to read (both fiction and nonfiction) and creating an
inviting atmosphere. It means knowing your collection so you can help
students and teachers find books to read for pleasure. I don't have any
statistics on the matter but I believe kids who read for fun get better
grades.
Our predecessors believed the library should be a very quiet and tidy
place. One of them expressed to me the opinion that it should be solely
a research library and that the fiction section was totally unnecessary.
They were librarians and administrators first and did not really
consider themselves to be teachers.
I am first and foremost a teacher. I want to share the changes we are
seeing because of the different approaches...our media center is moving
towards becoming the hub of the school. Circulation is up 228% over
this time last year. It's not a silent place though we sometimes do
remind them that there are groups working who need to concentrate. It
is full of student created displays, student volunteers, kids who stop
in to say hello every day, students who come in at lunch and read books
and magazines for fun. Today, all at the same time, I had 2 classes
doing research for different projects, one class looking for books to
check out, random students in on passes for various reasons, the book
fair going on, student helpers shelving, and teachers popping in for
cables, etc. Our administrators have noticed the increased reading in
our building and volunteered funds to replace the carpeting this summer,
repaint the walls, and for a general (long overdue) facelift to try to
further our efforts in the promotion of reading. These are huge changes
from the library in this school in the past. So while my cataloging may
not be perfect, as long as it's good enough and I can help the person
standing in front of me find what they need, learn something new, or get
them interested in a book, I'm happy and it seems to be working for us.
(I'll step off my soap box now--thanks for 'listening'). By the way,
though my name tag says media specialist, my favorite job title is
teacher librarian.
--
Cheryl Youse, MLS
Media Specialist
Colquitt County High School
cyouse@gmail.com
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