School Librarians PSA Advocacy

PSA 1 Fact 1: School librarians in the Hawaii DOE must be licensed teachers. School librarians must have successfully completed a master's degree in Library and Information Science (LIS).

PSA 2 Fact 2: School librarians teach students LIFE skills to succeed in their class work and, more importantly, to succeed as future citizens in a changing workplace. Some examples of what they teach: * Finding information in sources ranging from books to the Internet * Evaluating what is true and accurate in all types of resources * Realizing that Google is not the only game in town * Using a variety of tech tools such as Inspiration, KidPix, PowerPoint, iMovie, Final Cut Pro, and HyperStudio.

Who needs a School Librarian?

Have you ever looked But never found what you needed? Frustration Wasted time and effort

I finally found it!! ….apply scanning tunneling microscopy to laterally nanostructured materials obtained by using SPM-based nanofabrication based on strong mechanical electronical interaction between probe tip and..

So what? I dont understand it

School Librarians ensures age and content appropriate resources are available to your child at school

PSA 3 Fact 3: School librarians work side by side with their teachers. By doing this, they: * Provide the busy teacher with resource materials beyond what is available in the classroom * Mentor new teachers * Team teach * Create lessons that the teacher may not be able to provide

School librarians collaborate with teachers in over 3,000 planning sessions a week(< stats)in our 259 school libraries. This averages almost 12 meetings per week (< stats)in every school. These meeting often take place before and after school as well as during lunch hours.

PSA 4 Love of reading Fact 4: Classroom teachers teach students how to read. While school librarians also reinforce reading skills, they also motivate in students a love of reading. Students borrow over 1,440 books daily, (______ books a month) from 259 school libraries. This averages about ______ books a month per student.

PSA 5 School Librarians teach School librarian teach an average of 4 lessons a day in the 259 school libraries. They align all of their lessons directly with the DOE General Learner Outcomes and the Hawaii Content and Performance Standards. They work with all grade levels and all curriculum areas in their respective schools.

PSA 6 A wealth of knowledge School librarians handle over 2,300 information reference questions (< stats) in any given week in 259 libraries. This help can range from finding necessary resources for a busy teacher to helping a student find materials for a research assignment.

PSA 7 School Librarians are Nationally Certified Teachers 15 school librarians have successfully gone through the rigorous review process for National Board Certification for Teachers. Seven of them were among the first cohort of librarians in the nation to receive this distinction. (above figure provided by Julie: list on

PSA 8 School Librarians impact student achievement Students in 16 states have shown consistent and positive correlations between academic achievement and strong school library programs administered by licensed professional librarians. The impact of the library programs could not be explained away by such school conditions as teacher-pupil ratio, per pupil spending and teacher characteristics.

PSA 9 School librarians are often school leaders. They assume leadership duties as chairing curriculum committee, leading and coordinating curriculum mapping, heading accreditation review teams, serving on technology training cadres, mentoring new teachers, and coordinating reading incentive programs.

PSA 10 Impact of Weighted Student Formula

Hey mom….hey dad… I need a book on purple dinosaurs To finish my homework tonight...

Why didnt you get a book at school?

I went to my school library - it was closed. Our library is open only ½ time now due to Weighted Student Formula Budget cuts And we lost our school librarian…whos going to help me now?

Did you know that In 8 schools, children have lost their school librarian for the school year In 14 schools, children will have access and help from their school librarian for only ½ the day?

And this is only the first year … Many school budgets were cut by 10% for school year Budget cuts of ___% will be implemented for school year Budget cuts of ___% will be implemented for school year

Will our schools survive? What will be left for our children?

Act 51s Weighted student Formula has Cut essential funding for educational services that are available to our children Schools are losing –Librarians –Counselors –Elective courses

Do you know what your childs school has lost due to the Weighted Student Formula?

PSA 3 Curriculum mapping HCPS III Scaffolding

Do you know what these terms mean? Do you what to do with this?

Your childs school librarian does. He/she teaches this to your child every day at school

PSA 4 School Librarians offer…

Tailored book collections and websites to… specific curriculum needs of students

PSA 5 Others can fill the school librarians job…

Ever lose a position due to budget cuts? Who picks up the slack? Where does the extra work go?

We all have full plates Others in the school have the knowledge, time and energy to ensure collections contain accurate, reliable resources?

Will others take turns to keep the library open Before school Recess Lunch After school Or will your childs school library be closed during these times?

Who will remove outdated material from the library?

PSA 6 Proposal for PTTs and EAs to cover the library

PTTs and EAs can Check in and check out books Shelve books

PTTs and EAs

Surf Internet use it effectively and critically as a research tool? 0 or 10,000 search results

Teachers & Parents 45 hour course University of Hawaii to effectively teach basic database searching

The other option… Library closed

Who will select what your child reads? volunteer….. different agenda

Volunteer…. beliefs…. religion…. lifestyle

Intellectual freedom American Library Association seek and receive information from all points of view all expressions of ideas

Quality reading material and information Hawaii DOE Standards Students have access to a variety of information….the collection is well balanced…

Would you shop at a store… That has no sales clerks? Business no people Hospital No doctors

a classroom… that has no teacher

A library is … A classroom A librarian is a teacher

So why send you child To an empty library?

Library Media Program It is part of the main course Not the butter on the bread

Back to our single question. Should we have a Librarian Media Specialist?

Beyond Technology Questioning, Research and the Information Literate School By Jamie McKenzie, Ed.D. Copyright:2000

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Essential ? How do we cope … with a shrinking budget? What does it mean to be …. a school with no librarian? What kind of people …. shall our children be?

Subsidiary ? Take essential questions break down into small questions provide insight 2

-Essential question – Do we have a school where our children have no access to a school librarian media specialist? -Subsidiary ?. -Potential benefits -Obstacles to overcome -Available resources? -Who is involved?

Potential Benefits Savings pennies But at the cost of losing …. Our childrens literacy? Subsidiary ?

Neil K. Duke Mean of 3.6 minutes per day spent reading in 1 st grade class room –Reading Research Quarterly 35 (2000)

Anne McGill-Franzon Simply providing teachers with a generous supply of childrens books had little effect on the educational outcomes of students Putting Books in the Classroom Seems Necessary But not Sufficient. The Journal of Educaiton Research 1993 (2) 67-74

Stephen Krashen (5) : Literacy is a problem to throw money at …pour money into library books …Make sure they get read

Potential Benefits 100 years of research Free voluntary reading - lots of it Best predictor of 7 essential achievement basics: Comprehension, spelling, grammar, vocabulary Writing style, verbal fluency, general knowledge Subsidiary ? National Assessment of Educational Progress 2000 US Federal Government

Hypothetical ? Suppose….What if… Whats the worst / best that might happen? 3

Worst that could happen.. Children go to the library less read less Childrens books = 50% more rare words than adult prime-time TV Loertscher, David. Reinventing Your Schools Library in the Age of Technology 2002

Best that could happen Keeping a Librarian Media Specialist: –Avid readers –Strong research skills –Positive impact on raising students achievements –Teachers have a collaboration partner Ontario School Library Association 2002 Hypothetical

Best that could happen Children – can read Students - Information literate Employees - Problem-solve and propose solutions Hypothetical

Telling ? Precise, quantifiable Percentages % Statistics

Improve student achievement Achieve standardized test scores 15% – 20% higher than schools without a library media specialist (1) Ontario School Library Association

National Education Association Task force on Reading states cant be wrong Scholastic Research & Results. School Libraries WorkAccessed

Alaska (1999) Students with a full-time librarian – twice as likely as those without librarians to score average or above average on the California Achievement Tests The more often students received library /information literacy instruction from library media specialists, the higher their reading test scores Lance, Keith Curry. Information Empowered: The School Librarian as an Agent of Academic Achievement in Alaska Schools. Alaska State Library 1999

Minnesota 2003 in grades 3, 5, 8 - above-average reading tests scores 66.8% students came from schools with a full- time library media specialist Telling ? Scholastic Research & Results. School Libraries WorkAccessed

Consistant results (6) Full time certified Library Media specialist High Reading Test scores –Iowa (2002)Missouri (2003) –Colorado (2000)New Mexico (2002) –Massachusetts (2002) North Carolina (2003) –Michigan (2003)Oregon (2001) –Florida (2002)Pennsylvania (2000) –Texas (2001) Scholastic Research & Results. School Libraries WorkAccessed

Also discovered… large collection of reading material in the school library …. is NOT enough to generate high academic achievement by students increase reading scores… Staffed with qualified school librarians Scholastic Research & Results. School Libraries WorkAccessed

Planning ? Which search tool or index will speed the discovery process? Which medium will provide the most reliable and relevant information with optimal efficiency? Is it backed by solid evidence and sound thinking? 5

Internet

Clarification ? Mountain of information block rather than promote understanding

Internet Quality Control cesspool of waste Strategic ? American Library Association

Info-glut and data smog Pertinent and useful Opinions vs facts Reliable from the unreliable Beyond Technology – Jamie McKenzie

Internet Quality Control Doesnt Exist Race relations from Klan sites Strategic ? American Library Association

Whos going to help your child Recognize propaganda, bias distortion Beyond Technology – Jamie McKenzie

Why the Internet is no substitute for a librarian 1) Not Everything Is on the Internet over one billion Web pages only about 8% of all journals are on the Web, and an even smaller fraction of books are there very few substantive materials on the Internet are free.. Strategic ? American Library Association

Internet vs Librarian Internet searches limited –Here are 10 articles on Native Americans. We have 40 others but were not going to let you see them –Need to go through several search engines Strategic ? American Library Association

States Can Now Buy One Book and Distribute to Every Library on the Web Vendors delivering e-books allow only one digitized copy per library. If you check out an e-book over the Web, I cant have it until you return it. if youre late getting the book back, its charged to your credit card automatically Strategic ? American Library Association

Virtual electronic library California Polytechnic State University Worlds highest concentration of engineers and computer geeks, explored the possibility for two years. Their solution? traditional library with a strong digital Media Librarian Strategic ? American Library Association

Only need whats writing in the past 15 years? Internet - Scholarly material 15 years old Vendors offering magazine access routinely add a new year while dropping an earlier one.

Internet It is not a librarian teacher tool

Clarification ? What does temporary mean? How was the case developed for eliminating a position? Who made this suggestion? Based on what data?

What have others tried before? What worked and didnt work? Strategic Questions

Why are charter Schools Lagging?... "Almost no charter school employs librarians or media specialists, Howard Nelson, senior associate director of the American Federation of Teachers 10/1/ School Library Journal

Organizing ? -Power Point –KidPix –HyperStudio –iMovie –Page Maker

Is this good enough?

Probing ? never satisfied - enough to get by never stop investigating Desmond Morris

Probing ? Convergence of Logic* Prior knowledge Trial-and-error

Take raw data….. Information insight

Deep thinkers Translate infer apply what is learned

Sorting and sifting ? Whats worth keeping?

Student Questions & wonders Consumes & absorbs Think & create Summarize & conclude communicate Reflect Find & sort Reinventing Your Schools Library (3)

Strategic Questions What do you do next?

Perfect opportunity Fight to keep librarian media specialist for your children in our schools Work together to help raise funds Look to the future….Expand library staffing after school

Unanswerable How would life be different if… How will you be remembered?

Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation." -- Walter Cronkite, broadcaster

Bibliography 1) Ontario School Library Association, www.accessola.com/osla/osla_home.htm 2)McKenzie, Jamie, Ed.D. Beyond Technology: questioning, Research and the Information Literate School FNO Press, Bellingham, WA, )Loertscher, David. Reinventing Your Schools Library in the Age of Technology Hi Willo Research and Publishing c )U.S. Federal Government, National Assessment of Educational Progress, c 2000 Accessed on the Internet at: on Nov. 19, 2004http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/ 5)Krashen, Stephen. The Power of Reading Libraries Unlimited, )Scholastic Research & Results. School Libraries WorkAccessed on the Internet at: on 19 Nov )Clip Art from MicroSoft Power Point