I Believe in My Profession

Relevance is a big word in education these days.  We wonder how relevant our curriculum is to our students' lives.  We wonder how relevant what we teach today will be to our students in adulthood.  We wonder if the skills employers are demanding us to develop in our children today will actually be relevant when they are in the workforce.

There are those who might question the relevance of a school librarian in today's day and age.  In fact, many school districts have eliminated librarians in favor of volunteers running their libraries.  After all, all librarians do is check out books, right?

I suppose in some cases this could be true.  I have known the librarian who feels safe in her fiefdom, sheltered from the reality of today's education environment.  These are the people who enter the profession because "they love to read" or because "the library is so quiet."  They are totally unprepared to be a school librarian.  They give the rest of us a bad name.

In economic downturns, "they" threaten the existence of "us" and the good work we do.

The School Librarian, or school library media specialist, has a lot to offer her school community.  She serves on committees that makes key decisions; she stays current on curriculum trends and provides professional development opportunities for her faculty and district.  She creates her own professional development opportunities to stay ahead of the demands of her job and to help the teachers with changes as they come.  She builds relationships with her teachers, students, administators and parents and is a visible, positive presence for her school and her profession in the community.

The school librarian serves as an instructional partner to her colleagues.  Whether she is coteaching alongside her colleagues or actively developing lessons and providing materials and assessments for learning activities, she is in the trenches.  She learns as much as she can about her faculties' teaching contexts and how she can support them.  She ascertains that the library's collection meets the needs of the faculty, as well as those of the students.

As an information specialist the school librarian creates virtual learning resources for her community.  She ensures that 24/7 access to information - and the school librarian herself -is available. She maintains a webpage, writes or blogs, collects electronic media for students' use.  She communicates the availability of information sources to parents, teachers, and students alike. She finds new ways to bridge information and service gaps.

The school librarian is a teacher in her own right.  She has a curriculum to be delivered to her students and abides by standards set by the American Association of School Librarians and the West Virginia Department of Education.  Her job is to teach information literacy as well as literature appreciation.  Sometimes we are asked to teach out of our subject areas as well.  We are master teachers and approach these responsibilities with aplomb.

Finally, we are program administrators.  We market our services, we attend to the day-to-day operations of the library, we supervise volunteers.  We develop long-term plans that illustrates the library's role in the school's mission. We carefully select materials so that our children get the best resources.  We carefully plan our budgets so that all groups and needs are represented. We plan reading incentive programs and contests.  We advocate for our programs. And yes, we check out, check in and shelve books.

I believe in my profession and am very proud to be a school librarian.  I do not always live up to the tenets and standards described above, but it is my goal to do my very best and to uphold the values of my profession in the most positive light.  When I fail to live up to these values, I must be held accountable.

My five year plan for our library is slated to be finished in August.  I will post it on this blog so that all parents and teachers can see my vision.  Changes and suggestions are welcome, because my goal is to be relevant to my users.

What Should an Administrator  Expect a School Library Media Specialist to Be?

Our STEAM Adventure

This week I had the opportunity to teach three of the five days at Brookhaven's STEAM Camp.  I wish I had taken the opportunity to work the first two days.  These kids were absolutely AWESOME.

AWESOME was a theme in NASA Education Specialist Jesse White's presentation today.  In addition to teaching the finer points of rocketry to these rising 3rd through 5th graders, he inspired the students to develop passions and work to achieve their goals.  He stated that being successful did not necessarily mean being the smartest person in the class but did depend greatly on ethics and the ability to persist when things don't necessarily go one's way.

The rocket assembly and launch today was wonderful.  I am certainly looking forward to the Dominion Post's coverage of this event.

Throughout the week, the kids had visits from Carnegie Science, SPARK, the Morgantown High Robotics Team (which gained very high marks from the teachers), Omni Associates, and NASA.  The children interviewed had very high praises for the camp, which had a consistent attendance in the 30s every day.

In the words of rising third grader Brandon, "This was the best camp ever!"

I can't wait to get that Makerspace in the new library!

Go for the Gold at the Library This Summer

Three Weeks of Olympic-Sized Fun Await During Summer SnowFlakes!

This July, join two extraordinary Brookhaven teachers as they host the library's Summer Snowflakes program.  Susan Culpepper and Sherri Pisegna have devised wonderful activities for our students.  

No Registration

No Cost

BIG FUN!

Here is a list of the Summer Snowflake activities, including a visit from a real Olympian!

Twenty Years...and Counting

It is pretty amazing to me that I just completed my 20th year at Brookhaven Elementary.  Never have I stayed in a job this long. I think it is safe to say I have found a professional home!

Many changes have occurred to both the library and the librarian in the past twenty years.  For starters,while certified to teach elementary library, most of my experience was secondary and public.  Really, I knew very little about elementary school students or curriculum, but I did know that I could learn just about everything I needed to know by watching the fantastic teachers at this school. I can honestly say that I still learn something every day from Sherri Pisegna, Christy Lillard, and others who have been with me throughout this journey.

The library was only two years old when I started in 1996, but actually it had been used less than a year.  Mr. Collins, the principal, gave Mrs. Goodin ample time to set up the library.  She did a meticulous job, and I came along and changed everything. I have probably made a dozen changes to the physical layout of the library before I settled on its current configuration.  One of the best things I did early on was to identify "easy readers" and to create a separate Easy Reader section.  This section was specifically geared to the needs of the  second grade teachers, who were and continue to be focused on their students reading developmentally appropriate books.  This quickly became the most used section of the library.

In 1996 the Follett Library Management System was just on step above DOS --black screen with white characters.  The library workstations were running Windows 3.1, and teachers had a very archaic bulletin board-style email.  Not that many people used email. The five people who did use email became the school tech leaders.  The school lab was equipped with a learning management system that booted from floppy disks. By the year 2000, all of this had changed, upgraded to new machines running Windows 2000.  We were making progress, ready to implement "21st Century Skills."

Mr. Collins was a completely supportive principal.  He allowed me to develop and implement my vision for the library, and he gave me the money to back it up.  With his help we initiated Accelerated Reader in 1998.  Any extra money he had in any of his accounts were funneled into the library, largely into the Accelerated Reader program.  The collection expanded greatly under Mr. Collins's watch.

Mr. Collins also allowed me to change the scheduling from fixed to flexible.  He cautioned me that he did not want to hear from teachers that I was sitting in the library reading magazines.  I assured him that if used correctly, I would be busier than ever.  Sure, there might be times (and there were) when no students were there, but there would also be times when there were 50 (and there were).  The idea is that the library would be available when the students needed it.  Within a year the library circulation jumped from around 12,000 to 20,000+.  Accelerated Reader data verified that students were reading more.  These were gratifying statistics to me.

Mr. Collins retired in 2005 and was replaced by Mrs. Patty Benedum, a woman who was largely responsible for the formation of elementary libraries in Monongalia County.  This should have been the perfect scenario for a school librarian, but other factors limited this potential.  Patty came to our school with her own vision of how things should be run; our faculty was reeling over the loss of  Mr. Collins.  Her vision collided with our grief, and things did not work out as well as the might have under better circumstances.  Patty left in December for a coordinator's position in the county office.  Davene Burks replaced her until the end of the year, when Joe Newcome became our principal.

I simply loved Joe.  He supported my vision for the library completely.  Under Joe's direction, I implemented Open Library Night and Writers Club.  We bought new library furniture that provided great warmth to the library. Under Joe's watch I received my Technology Integration Specialist endorsement and worked on National Board Certification.  These were very important years for me in terms of professional growth.

Davene Burks became principal when Joe retired in 2009.  Her support has allowed the library to complete the furniture acquisition started by Joe and included the rearrangement of the library to make room for a comfy reading area.  When Davene told me about the proposed new school, I quickly began to make drawings of the new library.  At last my vision for an integrated, hands-on library collection would come to fruition!

The picture at left is a rendering of my vision 

for the new library:  three distinct areas that 

could potentially accommodate three classes

at one time.

Mrs. Burks facilitated the meeting with the

architects, who took my rendering and greatly 

improved upon it.  The final product flipped my

vision and added features of an aesthetic nature 

that the kids would love.  I am greatly looking 

forward to working my final year before 

retirement in this new library.

The collection has changed greatly since 1996.  Now, a wide range of digital media expands the library

beyond the school walls.  Students can access many of our resources at home.  With the addition of 

Chromebooks for every student in grades three to five next year, students will be even better equipt 

to use our digital resources.  Information literacy instruction will be much easier to achieve when each

child has a Chromebook.

The future of our library is exciting!  I want to thank everyone who had a hand in getting the program

 to where it is and those who will help carry it into the future.