A Letter In Support of Student Achievement

Fellow Parents, Educators and School Leaders,

I have the pleasure of serving on the board of my professional association as the school library representative in Indiana District 4. As part of my appointed responsibilities, I am contacting you regarding a very important issue. The students in your district are at risk of losing one of their most valuable assets in the journey to becoming well educated adults: a strong school library program, and a certified school librarian.

This winter you have been asked to undertake a very difficult and perhaps unprecedented task. You must construct an operational budget for your school district in a time of economic crisis. Though you have been given limited financial and professional resources from our state policy makers, you are expected to finalize a budget without negatively impacting the academic achievement of the children in your schools.

Often, in a time of budget downsizing, leaders decide it is necessary to cut professional and support staff positions. While considering staff cuts, you always try to protect positions that directly interact with students and support their learning. Because many of you are currently in this decision making position or have previously made these decisions, it is vital that you more fully understand the fundamental instructional activities that are the responsibility of your school librarians (media specialists). In an effort to help inform your decision, included in this message is research-based information illustrating how school library programs increase student learning and achievement.

Studies in over 19 states (including Indiana) have found that students tend to perform better on standardized tests in schools with better-staffed, better-stocked, and better-funded school library programs (see - http://bit.ly/yablog1). I am sure you agree that while standardized testing is only one of many ways we should assess student learning, it is the method most valued by state and national policy makers in education. Test results are most often how lawmakers, the media, and the community evaluate the effectiveness of your school. If the quality of your school library program is reduced by cuts, more than likely student tests scores will drop.

Passing tests based on memorized facts is not an adequate predictor of how successful our students will be after leaving high school. Professional educators must look beyond testing and create programs for authentic learning. Because information and ideas are now produced and published at rates never before experienced, it is impossible for any student to understand and remember enough content in core subject areas. In the modern digital age, there is just too much to know! Now that an abundance of facts, figures, and opinions are literally at our fingertips we no longer require rote memorization for efficient problem solving. Instead, our schools must provide effective instruction and meaningful assessment to strengthen students’ critical thinking abilities. To ensure a future of opportunity for our students, we need to teach the skills necessary to find, evaluate, use, and create information using a variety of tools and resources. We are developing minds to deal with a future we cannot predict.

No other staff member in today’s school is more poised to lead and provide this instruction than well supported, certified school librarians. In fact, your school librarians may be the only educators in your district that actively plan curriculum for student and teacher development based on two sets of academic standards: The academic learning standards issued by the state, and the Standards for the 21st Century Learner (see - http://bit.ly/yablog3 ) developed by our professional organization, the American Association for School Librarians.

If you review the framework of the Partnership for the 21st Century Skills you will note that our students require the development of information, media, and technology skills as the foundation for authentic learning (see - http://bit.ly/yablog3). School librarians are trained to simultaneously deliver instruction in information literacy skills along with core content through collaborative planning and teaching with classroom teachers. When a content area teacher and a school librarian collaborate, the student-teacher ratio is cut in half, response to intervention is more timely and personalized to the needs of each student, and the assessment of understanding is more reflective.

While considering cuts of school librarians, library support staff, or library materials funding, you may wonder what children regularly do in the school library under the instruction of a school librarian. Among many other activities, the students:

• Learn and develop a love of reading
• Find stories and information that allow their imagination and creativity to soar
• Discover how to successfully and confidently utilize resources of higher learning
• Understand what it means to be a critical consumer and producer of information in a digital age
• Internalize the importance of ethical and safe behavior in online environments
• Experience how to actively and intelligently participate in a democracy

It is important that your school library programs are well funded and contain an exceptional collection of up-to-date, accurate, and age appropriate print and digital resources that directly support the curriculum. It is more important that a certified school librarian is available to teach learners how to appropriately utilize these resources. The library support staff is vital in helping with the day-to-day business of a library. Without their assistance, a school librarian cannot fully respond to the informational and instructional needs of students or teachers. However, because they have not been professionally trained, educated, and licensed in teaching and library science, these individuals cannot replace a school librarian in providing instruction, selecting materials, and preparing students for the 21st century.

In a recent blog article, Doug Johnson, author and Director of Media and Technology for the Mankato (MN) Public Schools, tells us that “…in times of budget cuts… a school's true values come starkly into focus” (see - http://bit.ly/yablog4 ). As you make final decisions about staffing, I ask you to consider the essential role school librarians play in educating students. In the words of our former First Lady, and fellow librarian, Laura Bush, “School libraries help teachers teach and children learn… Books, information technology, and school librarians who are part of the schools' professional team are basic ingredients for student achievement."


Thank you for taking time to read this message. Please do not hesitate to contact me for additional information.

Maureen Sanders-Brunner
School Librarian
District 4 Representative
Association for Indiana Media Educators
Indiana Library Federation
mdsbrunner@gmail.com

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The above letter was sent via email to over 60 school leaders in Central Indiana. The school districts they represent are considering, or have already, cut funding for school library staff and/or library materials.

I want to thank Carl Harvey II, for helping me by creating the foundation for this letter. Please read his excellent blog at http://www.carl-harvey.com/. As of the date of this blog, Carl is a candidate for President of AASL, our national professional association.

I also want to thank the amazing school librarians who helped to edit this letter and who serve AIME. It is awesome to work with those who are dedicated to helping the most wonderful professionals in the world!

Those who are advocating in support of strong school library and media programs staffed by certified school librarians are encourage to link to or borrow ideas from this post. Also, please visit the AASL Advocacy website for a well stocked advocacy toolbox.

BEDA Buddy Episode 3 - Meet Karson

Yay, Yay, It is Karson's Day!!!

Karson is another BEDA Buddy that Maureen Johnson was so awesome in picking for me. MJ likes to do these match making blogs, and I thought they were kind of silly. But, I know now that she really does have a talent for this, at least for friends.

Here is my Top 10 of why Karson is Awesome!

10. Her name ends in the "n" sound. So do all my children. It really is an awesome name. I would like to know how she got it. If I was still having children, I would name my 4th child Karson. It would not matter if I had a boy or a girl (... must find a novena that covers me from having more children, might have jinxed myself).

9. She is on Twitter - @karsonreed - Follow Her Now!

8. She has a blog on a ning site - http://maureenjohnson.ning.com/profile/KarsonReed - Once again, Follow this NOW! You will learn why if you keep reading.

7. She is on Facebook, but you can't be her friend just because you read this, you have to be special like me. I am HER BEDA Buddy and I will only share her with Rafia and Cassandra, so no stalking!

6. Despite the aforementioned #'s 7, 8, and 9, Karson thinks that she is somehow behind the game on this Web 2.0 thing. I mean, seriously, she is a social networking diva! She even does all this stuff on her phone! Egads! woman, what else do you have to do to be high tech??? (wondering... if my iPhone and her Blackberry got together and had 2.0 babies, what would that look like? Thinking my iPhone is the guy, but I could be wrong?)

5. She is a teacher. Future of the world in her hands and what not. 'nuff said!

4. She is a Language Arts Teacher. She knows that reading and writing are the most important things in the world (obviously not money or job security considering her vocational calling).

3. She is a LA teacher for Middle School kids. I teach 10-12 grade. I do not have the cojones to teach students younger than this, especially middle school students. They scare me. Check out "You might teach middle school if..." My personal favorite - You believe "extremely annoying" should have its own box on the report card.

2. She is a Library Media Specialist! She says she "used" to be and is now in a smaller classroom, but really Karson, once you get the initial retina scan, undergo insertion of the "know it all" data chip in your brain, and learn the secret hand shake, there is no leaving. We are watching! And anyway, Batgirl was a librarian (wait a minute, Batgirl kind of looks like Karson... what if...?)



#1. She is a writer and can do the most amazing things with just 55 words. It should not be legal. And she blogs about it! Just puts it out there for the whole world to see. Really, you have got to see this! (I WILL answer your challenge Karson. I am just not as awesome as you with brevity. I have to tell all my dirty secrets in long hand.)

So, you have now met the gang. Twitter, Maureen Johnson, and Providence -- Thanks!


P.S. Karson. It is OK if you correct my grammatical errors. I can handle it.

BEDA #20 - BEDA Buddies #1 - Meet Rafia

First of all, we are going to pretend that BEDA #19 happened. Actually, BEDA 19 is a seekrit. BEDA #19 is actually a lot like Platform 9 3/4 Kings Cross Station in London. If you run fast enough at my blog, and veer a little to the left, you will experience it in all it's glory. But for the love of Pete, just don't ask the blog station master how to get there!

Last week, Maureen Johnson did a truly incredible, some might say crazy, thing. She took about 400 BEDA bloggers who use her ning, follow her blog, or follow her on twitter, and matched them with at least three other BEDA buddies. I am not sure if she has time off, if we are her big social experiment, or if she is suffering from writers block and this was just one way to pass the time. However, it was an awesome thing to do, especially for someone like me because now I don't have just an imaginary audience anymore (happy, but a little intimidating). So, here is a brief introduction to my one of my BEDA Buddies. I will feature the other two in BEDA 21 & 22. Gosh, I get virtual friends and three more topics for BEDA. This is BIG!

Meet Rafia! Her blog/vlog/multimedia treat for the soul is at http://cheshire3000.blogspot.com/ . If you were born before 1975, then her last two blog entries will be a nostalgic treat. Honestly, to watch cookie monster disco, and then to click a few minutes later on the same page to see the original introduction video of the Wonder Woman TV series I watched as a kid, well, it gave my heart a little squeeze. I remember wrapping foil into arm and leg band and then running around the house dodging imaginary bullets my brother shot at me. Well, I hope they were imaginary but I wouldn't put anything past him then or now.

She also has a "serious" blog for us library folk. And I know if you are reading my blog, and not a BEDA Buddie, you follow serious library stuff! Her other blog is http://seriousblogisserious.blogspot.com/. Follow it too!

I don't know much about Rafia except that I would probably like to go to a chili cook-off with her and drink some good beer. Why, well besides her obvious wit and librarianess, I think she is from Texas. I love people from Texas as a rule. I have not met one I didn't love (bless their collective little hearts). I also love following musicians from Texas like:

Lyle Lovett
Bob Schneider
Dan Dyer

My favorite Spongebob episode is "Texas"





To round out the Rafia experience, don't forget to find her on Twitter, @chesire3000.

Tomorrow, another awesome BEDA blogger!

BEDA #17 - It's Social AND It's Networking - Part One

If you wonder why I start most of my blogs with BEDA and a number, I will tell you why again. At the end of March 2009, YA Author Maureen Johnson started a little revolution via Twitter and Ning for people to Blog Every Day April.

Last I heard, there were around 400 folks who have decided to BEDA. It is a commitment, and can be tedious, but the benefits are outstanding. I decided to jump on board for two reasons. I need practice writing and a warm up for National Novel Writing Month. A group of readers/writers on Goodreads.com (look me up - Maureen Brunner) decided that we would participate in our own NaNoWriMo this summer because we are too busy during the other times of the year. Probably most of us are educators. So, BEDA has been my training. Now only if I could lose 100 calories for every word...

The second reason is that I am currently enrolled in a course on learning spaces at Butler University College of Education. I am pursuing my second masters degree as the first leg of my doctoral (I hope) journey. Through my blog I am documenting the process of finding that perfect thesis project and a niche for a doctoral speciality. I am leaning towards online learning environments but I am not giving up my love for YA lit. One of my dreams is to start my own school that is 100% student centered and structured around inquiry based learning, social awareness, and exploring relevant topics found in YA fiction and narrative non fiction.

My co-worker (see @libraryhipster on Twitter) talked to me about micro blogging earlier this year. Over Spring Break I joined up. In less than a month, I have been in contact through reading and sometimes messaging, with more than 100 people/groups. Over 60 of those folks follow my micro blogs as well. My fellow Tweeters include authors, librarians, educators, teens who love to read, gamers, professional associations, news organizations, some weird and freaky but very cool Zombie dude, Darth Vadar, comic book gurus, and many more. I hope I have contributed to Twitter and my followers information flow in some positive way because I have gotten so much in return.

Since I started Tweeting, I now feel I am on the cutting edge of information. I wonder how I was ever an effective librarian without Twitter. I am frequently the first in my school to read news that effects my profession. I am exploring other interests in depth that I only thought about vaguely before. I am keeping up with teens around the world and what interests them. This really helps me connect with the teens I serve. Conversations with my students are become more relevant and meaningful every day. I am networking with other academics who are interested in creating online learning environments for teens. I have learned about vlogs and created one. Really and truly, the world has opened up in less than a month. I sincerely hope my head doesn't explode with all this new stuff I am learning. I keep waiting for themes to just repeat themselves over and over again, but that is not happening. I know first hand what "Knowledge in Abundance" means and why schools are wrong to create learning environments that treat knowledge as a scarcity.

So, now that Oprah is Tweeting, I am sure more and more people will join up. I think this is wonderful. I hope that I, along with my fellow #educators, can find a way to use Twitter or other micro blogging sites in schools and halt the mass blocking of everything social networking. Just like living in the physical world, there are several scary things about living online. But as a society we work to keep the wolves at bay and our children and YA's safe. I foresee the online community become strongly self-monitored (like a neighborhood watch) as more and more people join up. I foresee schools becoming relevant by helping student navigate their way through this web while still having a safety net. I foresee my library regulars in school making like minded friends around the world without having to worry about the "fit in" or "look" factor. I see so much good. I hope more education power holders will start seeing it too.

Tomorrow I would like to introduce everyone to my BEDA buddies and demonstrate another way social networking can bring more of us together.

BEDA 10 - BTW FONS R NP

My BEDA 10 blog today is a hybrid. A bvlog. My first vlog actually. I took all frames of me out to increase your viewing pleasure.

Part of my research is centered around asking students and teachers what they would change about high school.

Will the answers follow a pattern? Will answers intersect on some issue of practice? Will they connect in meaningful ways? Or, will teacher and student needs and wants run an infinite, generational parallel?

Today my blog is a segment of an interview with Kaitlin, a 10th grader at a medium to large public high school. When asked what she would change about high school, her first answer pretty much sums up what many teens are telling me.

Cell phones. In the school where I teach, and in Kaitlin's school (which are not the same), teachers are finding it very difficult to enforce the "no cell phone" rule. Actually, within the last 5 years, the prevalence of cell phones in the hands of students has made a once very "serious" offense of being caught with a phone, become more of a verbal warning nuisance for teachers and students. Some school are changing the way they deal with cell phones by officially allowing students to use phones in the hallways during passing periods and in class during down time. There is a lot of unofficial cell phone usage going on in hallways and classrooms right now because teachers and administrators become wary of spending too much time on writing disciplinary forms, arguing with parents, and fighting practices that are now accepted cultural norms.

Cell phones with 3G networks are also throwing a wrench in legal expectation. The federal and state government required that school filter Internet sites available to students at school. Before web surfing cell phones became common place, the arguments surrounding filters centered on poor quality software and 1st Amendment rights. Commercially sold filtering software is often seen by teachers and teens as being too restrictive. In my school, we have seen a librarian and teacher complaints at having software make access and content decisions on their behalf. As we work through issues of the amount of access to restrict the main problem is changing. The issue of "how much to control" is becoming lost in the fact that students are bringing their own networks with them from the outside. Schools can't censor student cell surfing habits because schools can't enforce the usage of cell phones, period, without taking time away from teaching and learning. And you know what? The kids know this too.

I think the issue of "control" is probably the most difficult hurdle schools will need to breech. What things do educators want to control about student behavior? How much control do educators need? How much control can parents or the government expect out of High School educators? How much control is even possible?

A wise administrator once said to me, "You should never make rules that you can't enforce." Large high school leaders may think they can control cell phone usage at schools, but they are kidding themselves. If students purchase their own phones and plans, or if parents do and give the student texting and 3G capabilities, is it worth the fight? Can we use the phones for learning purposes instead wasting time on forms, detentions, and suspensions?

I asked my husband how he would have answered the same question (what would you change in High School) way back when? Both of us had a hard time deciding what the answer would have been. One reason may be that it has been (OMG) around 20 years since we were in high school.

The first three things that popped into our mind were:
1) Pizza every day in the cafeteria,
2) Being able to leave school for lunch,
3) Bringing back the smoking room that was available to students a few years before we came to high school.

It might be that our brain cells are deteriorating with age, but mainly I think the reason we struggle to connect to our teenage memories is because the culture has changed so rapidly since the latter part of the 80's.

There is a saying that "the more things change, the more they stay the same." I wonder if this age old wisdom is becoming obsolete. Yes, student do still want more pizza on the menu and many of them would like to have the time and ability to leave during lunch, but these wants are not a priority. Teen awareness of smoking hazards and the current legal age of purchasing cigarettes has pushed the once coveted smoking room off teenage radars completely.

Yes, teens still want to spend more time with friends, and less with parents. However, the way teens communicate, share, play, and learn is different from teens one, two, and three generations ago. It is surely a question for social scientists to wrap their heads around.

So, if you are a teen, what would you change about school? If you are not a teen, how would you have answered this question when you were in school?

Textbooks Must Die

Good BEDA #9 Afternoon and Happy Thursday!

Today I received another timely link from edutopia.com about textbooks, so I am dragging this issue through the mud one more time.

From me to you for your reading pleasure: "the dysfunctional world of textbooks," a $4.3 BILLION per year industry.

Couldn't schools help stimulate the economy in other ways that are better for learning??? http://www.edutopia.org/textbook-publishing-controversy

My ideas: More authentic literature/media for libraries and classrooms, plus hardware, software and Internet connectivity for online learning environments. Add a healthy dollop of time for professional collaboration and development. Of course this one fix everything but would help get public schools on the right track.

Thoughts? Anyone out there (crickets chirping...) I would love to hear what you think.

A Pox On Textbooks

BEDA 6 - Things I Would Change #1

If I were princess of my own school, what would I do differently?

Textbooks would never be ordered.

They are big, bulky, expensive, and in my opinion full of very biased and incomplete information. And even when textbooks are digital, the content is still so watered down from political and economic pressures that they are less valid than normal tertiary reference sources.

Here is one example of the lack of breadth and depth of textbooks. My colleague and I recently did a presentation on non textbook print digital resources for the social studies curriculum. We ran a quick discussion of the Japanese Internment during WWII. We had letters, pictures, signs, and interview, and a scanned image of the actual order signed by the president to move citizens into these work camps. It took me about one hour to gather all of these sources. Everyone got to choose one piece of information to review for 5 minutes. Then we discussed it in a large group setting for another 15 minutes. Everyone learned something and there were some emotional discussions. When I asked the teachers who much space the textbooks devoted to this subject, I was told "less than a whole paragraph and one tiny picture." BTW - we have many students in our school with Japanese heritage.

School districts spend millions of dollars per year on textbooks, and I per school district. I am not exaggerating. This money, at least in Indiana, comes from one of two places.

The first thing schools do is bill the families for these texts. Most call this book rental. School fees are getting really, really expensive. My daughter, who is in High School, brought home her book rental last August and the cost was almost $300. At about the same time, my mother just happened to give me some documents from my high school days in the late 80's. There was a receipt for book rental that amounted to $35. Book rental fees included some technology funds and other "disposable" fees as well (for toner, printer paper, and some supplies), but most of that money goes to pay for textbooks. Textbooks that I believe are worse than a lot of the free information on the web.

Unfortunately not every family can afford to pay their school fees every year. Our family is firmly on the middle class scaffold, but that $300 fee was a punch in the gut of our budget. So, what happens is that many, many families just do not pay these fees, ever. When $300 is all you have for food or day care, or your light bill..., well priorities are priorities.

What then happens is that the schools encourage students fill out forms for financial aid (free and reduced lunch as we call it) from the state to supplement what they cannot pay, or schools just don't get money for a student, period. If students do not complete the application for aid, or are deemed to be financially able to pay, some schools will send parents or guardians to a collections agency. Mostly that money is not recovered and if it is, the attorneys get a big chunk off the top. So schools in poor areas take a loss every year on textbook fees, and somehow in Indiana our property taxes or other state/local funds need to make up the difference.

No matter how much money schools recover (or not) for book fees, the publishers always paid. Of course they do, they are for profit organizations. They are in the business of making money, not in educating children. This, IMHO, is a huge conflict of interest. Not because publishers and authors of original work don't deserved to be paid. It is a conflict because these companies know that their client base (students) is basically unable to make their own choice for purchase because they are captive to a compulsory system that requires them (or the state) to purchase approximately one book per student per subject per year. The average high school students will have lug around more than 40 books in their 4 years in high school. This is a much different scenario then say, students and teachers deciding that it is worth to all read Elie Wiesel's, Night. This book was not written primarily for the purpose of making money off of schools.

Publishers spend millions on marketing to schools, especially schools in states like Indiana, where the DOE committee adopts a set amount of textbooks on a 5 to 7 year cycle. Schools are expected to choose from the vendors on a list approved by the state. It seems that publishers will do or say just about anything to get their product in front of administrators and teachers. And in some cases their marketing messages are getting downright insulting.

Last semester I was writing a curriculum review for a prepackaged curriculum along with other students in my class. One teacher wrote her review on a software/textbook/testing program that was all nice and shiny and shrink wrapped. Here was their selling point. The "Teacher Proof" curriculum. WT? In my line of work, them's fighten' words. What has our profession come to when a publisher can feel safe make those claims while marketing to the same people they are insulting?

Many states do not have compulsory text book adoptions. I think the ration of adoption states to non-adoptions states is close to 50/50, but I would have to double check this claim, my info is a bit old. Even Indiana is realizing mandatory textbook adoption is a waste of time and money. This year the DOE released a statement about the lack of quality in social studies texts (see: http://thejournal.com/articles/24033). However, still districts have the last word, and many teachers opt for the crutch of textbooks rather than choosing their own curriculum from better sources.

What would I do instead of textbooks?

Teaching and learning would be based on authentic literature, peer reviewed non fiction sources, primary source material and user created content. This would includes print, digital, and multimedia genres. All information collected would be written/produced from a variety of viewpoints (not just the rich white guys of old).

Students would read periodicals, picture books, trade books, short stories, plays, etc... in the original, unabridged form. Often the students would self select reading materials and as they get older and would evaluate the content they use in their learning. However, one of the main roles of the teacher or teacher-librarian would be to keep up with new information, creatively and collaboratively collect and create information, evaluate information for credibility, and then push it out to students, families, and the community.

Instead of purchasing millions of dollars for 6+ to 1 technology (each student has more than 6 books per year), we would invest in that old fashioned sharing technology I still like to call a library. Support your school libraries and there will be thousands of current and quality print and media materials that can physically circulate. Students would receive and create digital content on school provided Netbooks or inexpensive laptops. This isn't a stretch of my imagination. Schools are already doing this.

I would also invest in Internet connectivity for the community to ensure that all students had free and equal access to the same information. But more about that tomorrow...

Still Mucking Around

As I consider my discontent further, and try to find my road to research, I am thinking back on three pieces of advice I have gotten recently.

The first was from my husband (who clearly didn't coin this phrase, but I first heard it from him). He was not talking about public education, but investing in the stock market, which requires a good amount of research in order to be successful.

Invest in what you know.

I would also include ...what you love, and ...what most interests you. At this stage in my life I think all three pretty much connect in one form or another. Please just take my word for it and do NOT make me illustrate with a Venn Diagram. God I hate Venn Diagrams.

I would also argue that a person cannot really and truly "know" something unless they experience this "thing" first-hand on a daily basis (except of course on school vacations and other major holidays...).

This piece of advise is really common sense, but I guess I don't have a whole lot because I needed to hear it. Why would I spend time concentrating on anything else when I will be investing my time, money, and my soul (I think this is a requirement of admissions to a doctoral program) for this research.

So, by following my husband's advice and defining what "know" really means to me, I have narrowed my focus professionally (not personal, my family would be at the top every time) to the short list below (in random order).

High School Education
Library Science
Information Science (including web 2.0)
Literature
Writing (Probably what I know the least but it is more than a passing interest and I am actively involved)

I know a little about cooking, playing guitar and piano, and knitting, but not enough to warrant giving away too much of my time, money, and soul to further my investment. Maybe someday I will be a one woman band while whipping up a souffle and knitting sweater vests, not probably not in the next 100 years.

The second piece of advise was given to me, at different times, by two of my professors at Butler University (Shelly Furuness and Jody Britten).

Isolate the things about your work as a High School Teacher-Librarian that trouble you, that you feel are just not right, then decide if you want to change it.

Notice they didn't say "then decide if you can change it." As master teachers they did not limit my creative problem-based thinking by undermining my confidence. All learners can do that just fine on their own. What learners need is someone to believe in them. I digress...

So, how could I make change? I could stick around where I currently work and try to be a change agent at my school. Or, I could identify other educational environments that are more in-line with my academic ideology and have already implement changes, or are on their way. Regardless, I still need to narrow my focus on those things that rub me the wrong way.

Some people would say that I have another option: leaving the profession. Don't get me wrong, I do have those fantasies of leaving in early June and forgetting to come back in August. I could work at Starbucks (yummm, soy vanilla latte) or work in a Book Store (yummm, soy vanilla latte and that new book smell). I think all teachers AND librarians have at one time or another.

I didn't include leaving as an option because being a YA Teacher-Librarian is not a J.O.B. but a calling. Even if I didn't need the money (which is in no way lucrative or even desirable for most people with my level of education) I am not sure I would be happy doing anything else, at least not in this stage of my life.

The third piece of advise came from Dr. Britten about two months ago.

Articulate why these things are wrong and how you should make changes to the power holders in a way they could understand and not ignore.
Basically, beat them down with it. Leave no room for someone to come along and say, "Brunner does not know what she is talking about." One of my dreams is to start a free public charter school. When I look at research and learning strategies, I always see things through this lens. What would MY school do differently. Even if I was CEO and Principal of a new school, I would still have to answer to many people.

So, in short I am working on articulating what I think is wrong and then the why and how these things can be changed.

The what will come from mostly from my own organic experiences (invest in what you know).

The the why and how will come mostly from those who are much smarter than me and have hopefully done some of the work. (content area professionals, education researchers, master teachers, and proactive librarians) and those that will have the most to gain or to loose from my work.

Often times in education we forget ask the end users key questions: What do you want? What would make things better? What can we do for you? What are your goals?

In my case, the ultimate end users who could benefit or not from my work are are my students, current and future. Second on the list are high school educators including other YA teacher-librarians. Third, the community at large. Every citizen, domestic or global, has a stake in public education.

Tomorrow, what "I" think is wrong and should be changed in public high schools today.

Change. Blink. You Missed It. Here it Comes Again.

Hey, you. Yeah you. The library hipster drinking that Red Bull and Vodka at the bar. Your School Media program is OLD, OBSOLETE, OUT DATED, and INEFFECTIVE! Yep, you blinked, and one nanosecond later, you are reduced to the 21st Century equivalent of the bunhead herding teens out of the restricted section while book-talking the merits of the new Nancy Drew series.

Many of you who graduated from Library School in the last 10 to 15 years are probably feeling indignant or at least uneasy with this bold statement. You are no doubt thinking something along these lines...

Change? Us? But we are CHANGE incarnate! We are the GC (Generation Change)! WE brought Harry Potter, streaming media, manga, and blogging into the world of the school libraries. WE cast a pox on Donald Rumsfeld for his snide disinterest in the looting of Iraqi libraries and museums (yeah, "Stuff Happens" doesn't it Rumsfeld? People under pressure just "step down" from their jobs too...). WE (hand-and-hand with our bunheaded forerunners to be sure) earned the honorary title of "Radical, Militant Librarians" from the FBI for daring to question the Magnum Opus of the Bush Regime! WE don't shush people! WE even renamed our Libraries and call them Media Centers by golly!

So, how could the "new" generation of teacher-librarians be behind the times already? We are just hitting our stride, right? Wrong. Why?

Simply put: We are part of an outdated organizational structure that has been busy with the job of staying in business instead of effectively serving it's patrons. The Public Schools.

Our society has changed, rapidly. Our teens (and little ones too for my elementary hipsters) are Digital Natives. They come to school because they "have too" not because they "want to" or because they know it is the only way they can "get ahead" and "earn a decent living" someday. Schools are not in harmony with the rest of their social schema. School is a place apart to be tolerated. It does not connect with how they live and what they do in their natural habitat. This isn't about teen angst, rebellion, or coming of age. For the first time in history, we are literally speaking a different language (not just adolescent slang, yo) and living in a different world than our students.

But why? Why is it so hard to make changes that are research based or based on common sense? Don't bother asking the legislators and politicians who hold the purse strings because frankly, they don't know. That would be like asking my hairdresser to recommend the correct dosage of Prozac (that is, if I really needed to take Prozac, and being a teacher, chances are good that I would) and then asking my physician what level of developer would make my hair that lovely shade of strawberry blond (that is, if my hair wasn't naturally that color, and it is, really...).

We should instead ask the academic gurus (teachers, union reps, principals, supers, school boards, School of Ed professors) right? Here are some of the the answers I got when I asked:

- The teachers' union make it too difficult
- Parents would not like it or understand
- We would have to change the way the system works, (or better yet):
- The system can't do that (system being computer networks, scheduling programs, grading software, etc...)
- Teachers are not trained properly and will reject this change
- Our students just can't handle it
- The administrators are uninformed or don't understand the need
- There is not enough funding available
- We have to be very careful about how we spend tax payer money that is available
- and my personal favorite: I don't think we can do this under the current education laws and/or school board approved policies.

Frustrating right? At times, it kind of makes me want to stick my head in the wheels of the machine and be done with it! Well LMS's, times have changes, we missed it, we are still missing it, we have missed that we missed it, we are 1.0 in a 2.0 world, we are pullers not pushers (of info I mean) and we are NOT serving our patrons with the measure of equality they deserve.

Not surprising that over the years, and especially over the last 10, change (or reform if you dare) in public schools has been slow at best, stagnant as a rule, and punitive for students and change agents at worst. I know from experience that to introduce change, I mean real lasting curricular and pedagogical change, you must tirelessly fight the machine. If you are a change agent, you are a cog out of place. You will hopelessly throw everything out of whack if you go messing around with the way things are done and darn it missy/mister, they just can't let you do that! At the very least, not without a written and approved proposal, an action research pilot project, committee discussion, legislative action, and a papal bull!

But what exactly needs to be changed? All this talk of change, but no clear answers, no marching orders, no strategy? If you want to know what needs to be changed and how we can change it, join me for my BEDA installments and I will share with you what I am learning, real time.

But I warn you, if you want to make change my friends, get ready for a fight. Thankfully, the odds are in our favor. You will NEVER find a profession that can organize and defend civil rights like a School of Teacher-Librarians. We helped fight Donny, the FBI, and the Supreme Court, almost simultaneously, and we persevered! We can take on this insignificant institution we call public schools, right? Hum, well, we can always call on Batgirl and the Ninja librarian when we need reinforcements!

Keep reading, writing, and loving it, because you can!