Answer: Charter Schools, What-If's, and The Cranberries Debut Album

Question: What seemingly random but really connected stuff is flowing through my brain tonight?

I know what you are thinking: Alex Trebek just awarded me 200 under the category, "I have been eating crazy cakes while reading educational theory again." And now you are thinking of his mustache. Don't worry, it's natural, everybody does it.

If you are a Gen X’er like me, then you probably have heard of the Irish rock band The Cranberries. Their US debut album, Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?, hit the charts in a big way in the early 90’s. At that time I was just entering my 20’s and I remember often wondering at the story behind this particular LP title.

Almost 20 years later, I am again thinking of The Cranberries and that album title. This sudden reminiscing is the product of my recent visit to an urban charter high school. In Indiana, charters are still considered “alternative.” Basically, this means that in some way, shape, or form, these schools are different than our traditional township public schools. They are public, they are schools, but they are not playing follow-the-leader when it comes to education.

And because there is money involved, and it is tax money, there is a lot of controversy surrounding charters, especially in the Midwest. On this issue even a liberal educator can't count on tried and true political teams to help determine which side of the debate is right, left, or independent. It's kind of like this: imagine liberal and conservative lawmakers, teachers, administrators, and the unions as represented by the the main cast from the Gen X defining movie The Breakfast Club. I don't know who is what, you figure it out. In the final scene, everyone is lined up on the statehouse steps picking teams for a kickball game. First, the socially unacceptable and dirty poor kid gets picked by the popular cheerleader girl. Next up, the hottie quarterback picks the wallflower with bad hair, combat boots, and a serious nutritional deficiency. Finally, the nerd, custodian, and detention monitor dude decide to form some weird third party independent team. Anyway, they start out by playing what seems to be kickball (cue a Cranberries soundtrack that has not yet been recorded) and then, all of a sudden, and right before a vote is called on educational funding, they randomly start running in circles, yelling and screaming, creating new teams, and playing rugby. And through all of this, the public (who is, of course, the spectators) act like nothing weird is going on. No wonder I am visiting charter schools and loosing my mind. This kind of stuff is like the flame to my moth.

Usually when I go on these site visits, I get excited and energized and inspired. I covet the flexibility to create progressive learning spaces, course work, assessment practices, and scheduling options. On the flip side, I am always, without fail, depressed and disappointed at the lack of a school library or a good school library/information literacy program. If they even attempt a library, it kind of resembles an extra study hall room or a neglected supply closet. That kind of thing is not good for learning.

Think of what a library represents: equitable access to intellectual, academic, and interest based information, in multiple media formats, and provided regardless of a person's education, age, gender, race, or socioeconomic status. Now, think of the role of a teacher-librarian: information and knowledge organizer, user needs specialists, digital information expert, intellectual freedom advocate, defender of First Amendment rights, copyright and intellectual property knowledge base, professional researcher, avid reader, and teacher of information literacy. Think about it: what type of message does a school send when there is no library, or a neglected library, and no school librarian on staff? What would a school rather invest in anyway? How do these "other" things help foster an ongoing love of learning? Does a love of learning and the ability to independently think matter in this school?

I can't help it. I have to verbally paint a caricature of this scenario or I will explode. Behold, the picture of a school that does not have a solid library program.

In this scene, you will see a group of teachers who are both unknowingly and intentionally swapping copyright protected music with their students. Now they are running a full-length film festival themed around how Walt Disney got history all wrong in his movies. Clever, but dangerously illegal. And while they escape notice by the Feds for these activities, for now, something else wicked, and not so enjoyable, lurks just around the corner. Watch as this teacher runs to the staff workroom during the 11th hour to frantically copying class sets of material for today's course readings. Oh, but the school only owns a single copy of this textbook. Oh my, now the copyright police have show up, and the teacher is screaming something about fair use to plead his innocence. But it seems that only the intellectual property attorney know what "fair use" really means.

Watch the court proceedings now and how the defense attorney is laughing hysterically at the client before entering the court room. Why, what's the joke? It seems that the class set of illegal copies were made from a textbook full of outdated crap that no one wanted to buy in the first place. Clearly the teacher would have been better off letting the students using Wikipedia in the first place. Oh shoot, the judge just ruled in favor of the Texas based textbook company who will now use the summary judgment funds to build a new fundamental church of squeaky-clean, America-first ignorance (ouch, that one will get me some all-American hate-mail for sure).

In our next scene, we are back in the school where kids are having regular, unprotected, and simultaneous relationships with Facebook, Wikipedia, Google's search engine, and, (shudder) Fox News online. Everyone is "doing it" because the topic of informed prevention is uncomfortable for the all knowing adults. Without a school librarian, the school's "soft" policy becomes one of avoidance or abstinence, or both. Let's watch as these teachers passively avoid the subject, and the problem, by saying "the kids know more than we do about computers anyway, so what can we do." Can anyone say, "gag me with a cop-out?" And over in this classroom, a teacher who knows she does not have the resources or expertise to teach relevant and productive online strategies is afraid to admit it, begins a righteously preached sermon of Google abstinence.

Focus again on those darn young folks. No matter what, they are still finding ways to engage in promiscuous online research and social networking. Well of course they are gonna do it, they are teenagers for the love of Pete. And besides, if you look closely, all of the adults are all doing it too! Now for a commercial break about how mind-numbing anarchy leads to an information illiterate nation.

And don't even get me started on the print collection. Sigh, OK you got me started. Now we will take a tour of the school's supply closet, I mean, library. Here we see dogs and cats, living together, beside battered copies of "Go Ask Alice", and "Alice in Wonderland"on the "New Arrivals" shelf.

If you look over to your right, you will see that the full print set of World Book Encyclopedia circa 1991, donated by the principal's grandmother, is now being used to level some dangerously cheap bookcases. All of the set, that is, except for the "B" edition, which is missing, as if anyone would know anyway. This book was just cited as an authoritative source for a report on the 2000 presidential election. After all, the article did state that George Bush was in the running at the time of publication, but unfortunately no one noticed the lack of a W in this entry. To add insult to injury, the 24 year old new teacher who later saw this missing volume B laying on the floor next too the boy's restroom, decided to recommended it to a different student who was doing a report on the war in Iraq... You know, the Freedom one, not the Storm one.

And, no, please don't take this little vignette as permission to eliminate the need of a print collection. Ignoring the need to invest in paper books may sound cyber-savvy and fiscally conservative, but it does not help students become more information literate, for many reasons, but mostly because of digital equity.

What about digital equity? What does that even mean in a school without a strong library media program? What do teachers really know about digital equity? Are they thinking about this when they construct curriculum? Ok, one more scene before we wrap it up.

Let's take a closer look at the two students who used the outdated print World Book volume for research. They really only did this because they did not had a reliable computer or access to high speed internet at home. But you know those crazy teens, they like to pretend they have what everyone else does to avoid embarrassing social labels. Why do they have to be so darned predictable?

One of the students is allowed to leave the building with a school provided laptop, let's see him find free Wifi somewhere in the community. Great, he is resourceful! Watch as he sits at a McDonald's and starts to research the 2000 presidential election. One hour and one billion Google hits later, long after his large fries and coke are gone, the manager comes over and starts to provoke our poor student. Someone complained about a loitering teen boy, and that is just not good for business.

The other student finally talks a neighbor into giving her a ride to the public library. All of the public computers are full for two hours. When she does finally gets one, it kicks her off after an hour of searching wikipedia. But she just doesn't know enough about her topic yet! Another resourceful student, she tries to get a library card so she can check out the latest book on the Iraqi war. After all, she has been told by a teacher that the card is free! Due to budget cuts, the public library had to tighten their policies on borrowing materials. She is told that in order to get a card, she needs three forms of ID plus a parent present to sign for her, and they need three forms of ID as well, including a birth certificate that proves she is really their child. And yet, she is 17 and 6 months old. Oh well, so much for this public service.

Without at strong library and information literacy program, run by a certified and trained school librarian, you will find between the cracks, under the rocks, and in the dark corners of the school, intellectual Armageddon. Some charter schools are so darn close to getting it right, but for some reason, information literacy, libraries, and the importance of both, never make a blip on their radar. Charters will not realize their full potential, or even their potential half-life, if they don't invest in these programs.

I know, I like to sugar coat things rather than tell you how I really feel.

As you can see, these visits are pretty much bad for my mental health. I go a little bipolar and a lot manic for days afterward. I start writing crazy long blogs that look more like a treatise on educational socialism than an article. Being a teacher-librarian you would think that this feeling is old hat by now, but I have not become desensitized.

To cope with my discontent, I let myself get lost in questions, the kind that keep me up at night. Specifically, I start asking myself those great and terrible "what if’s." At least this last mess of questions provided material for:

Brunner's Bullet Points (cue The Cranberries music as my theme song today...)

• What if a secondary curriculum was specifically designed around inquiry-based teaching and learning, not some artificial linear method dictated through scheduling software, textbooks, and teacher-in-a-box programs?
  
  
• What if the assessment of student mastery in new concepts and skill development was based on individual growth and not some ass-backward design founded on the bell curve model?
  
  
• What if the curriculum reflected an organizational understanding of knowledge as abundance instead of knowledge as scarcity?
  
  
• What if schools were not trying to get students to trample one another in a metaphorical “race to the top” (of what I don't know, the top of a bunch of scan-tron sheets and number two pencils?), but instead were thoughtfully and methodically trying to guide students forward as they embark on a lifelong journey that will be fully discovered and explored along the way?
  
  
• What if there was a school defined purpose of education supporting global cooperation in learning and problem solving instead of a purpose that is based on some unfounded political blabber that we must prepare children to compete for vital, life saving resources in a terrifying cut-throat global marketplace? And BTW - if you believe this than you must also believe the collective political mindset that only scientists and mathematicians are important and will be able to finesse their way effectually through these difficult social issues (see also: sputnik circa 1950'ish) so if your student is a liberal arts major, they are screwed.
  
  
• What if creativity, cultural intelligence, authentic learning, social justice, and progressive intellectualism were valued above obedience, quotas, standards, sociopolitical power, natural physical abilities, and short term memorization skills?
  
  
• What if all students were expected to learn how to independently organize, find, and creatively apply information through problem solving instead of being expected to learn how to finish a series of preordained tasks quickly within strictly measured time frames?
  
  
• What if students were encouraged to communicate and negotiate with adults while learning to choose their own academic goals instead of being expected to compliantly fail when they don’t agree with or understand goals set before them by people they don’t know?
  
  
• What if secondary students were not only given a choice in where they learned, but also how they learned, what they learned, and who taught them?
  
  
• What if the collective needs and expectations of the school, township, state, national, and global communities could somehow be balanced with the need to empower and honor the individual learner?
  
  
• What if the school was a living, breathing part of the community, not an isolated series of brick and limestone buildings that lock the kids in and the world out?
  
  
• What if the local community knew that the best secondary education ensures teen students will be seen and heard in the community on a regular basis, Monday through Friday, between the hours of 7:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m.? What if teens believed they were expected, supported and welcomed in their communities?
  
  
• What if the school building was a sacred learning space, a physical sanctuary, and was open and available to students based on their real world schedules?
  
  
• What if intentional social and academic learning did not stop after the school doors were locked, but continued on in a safe and authentic virtual learning space?
  
  
• What if teachers were practicing administrators and administrators were practicing teachers and everyone had direct responsibilities for teaching students and no one at in a closed office most of the day?
  
  
• What if schools were run like a democracy, and administrators, teachers, and students shared power and decision making responsibilities?
  
  
• What if the teachers were trusted by the politicians, the community, and their administrators and were given academic freedom like their colleagues in colleges and universities?
  
  
• What if professional development, quiet reading time, original research, and collaborative planning were required to happen during the regular work day instead of being something “extra” and expected to be accomplished outside of a teacher's job description?
  
  
• What if building and maintaining relationships with a manageable sized group of students that stayed together for 4 to 6 years was not only a “good idea” in secondary education but part of the school’s best practices?
  
  
• What if a school defined a “highly qualified teacher” as someone who could articulate and demonstrate how they have succeeded in fostering a classroom culture that loves and respects learning for the sake of learning, instead of giving that title to those who are assigned to students that will naturally produce the highest test scores, achieve the best attendance rates, and collect the least amount of discipline referrals?
  
  
• What if a school community could take for granted that they would always have an excellently funded print and digital library, managed by a teacher-librarian who provided equitable and free access to library materials while teaching students, teachers, and staff how to find and use information?
  
  
• What if being technically literate was an expectation for everyone in the school, and in turn, the school was expected to continuously support the ongoing development of technical literacy by investing in up-to-date hardware and software?
  
  
• What if a school was built on a foundational layering of social justice, democracy, tolerance, collaboration, and individual freedom for each and every person in the building?
  

So, what if?

Most charter schools around me were organized and are run from a business model perspective. Others are run on a social platform and tied to the NFP or service agency who founded the school. I only know of one specific charter in my city and state (although there may be some I have yet to discover) that was founded, organized, and is currently run by professional educators. I know of none, anywhere, that have been founded, organized, and run by teacher-librarians.

So, this is how and why the title of The Cranberries debut album came back to me after my recent visit to a charter school. I use it here as a question for progressive educators, and especially progressive school librarians.

Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?

Questions That Keep Me Up At Night

Q. What do you call a library without a librarian?

A. A warehouse of unrealized potential and a waste of taxpayer money.

Q. How many school library positions could possibly be cut in Indiana in one year?

A. I am thinking of a number between 129 and 131, but the year isn't over.

Q. How much does the Indiana Code require that schools spend on their library programs every year?

A. $8 per student (see below).


Q. How many schools comply with this law?

A. Due to a lack of transparency in the way compliance forms are shared, tracked, and reported, we must try to answer this question using a collection of anecdotal data. The answer is approximately: Not Very Many

Q. Please read the following statement. Then find and define the phrase "all schools" and the word "integral."

511 IAC 6.1-5-6 Media program

Authority: IC 20-19-2-8; IC 20-31-4-17 Affected: IC 20-31-4-1

Sec. 6. All schools shall have a media program that is an integral part of the educational program. A licensed media specialist shall supervise the media program. Each school shall spend at least eight dollars ($8) per student per year from its 22200 account to maintain its media program. (Indiana State Board of Education; 511 IAC 6.1-5-6; filed Jan 9, 1989, 11:00 a.m.: 12 IR 1192;readopted filed Oct 12, 2001, 12:55 p.m.: 25 IR 937; readopted filed Nov 20, 2007, 11:36 a.m.: 20071219-IR-511070386RFA)

Source: http://www.in.gov/legislative/iac/20071219-IR-511070386RFA.xml.html

A. All schools = all schools, oh, they must mean all of the schools in one school district. Wow, legalese if fun!

Integral = warehouse? No, how about this,

Integral = I am not really sure but if we have to have one librarian we could say they are the supervisor of record in the high school. Then we can disregard student achievement AND maintain accreditation status for our information illiterate graduates (shhh, don't tell higher ed...).

I mean, after all, a fiscally responsible school would never consider paying for a specialist in the elementary school building who is actually devoted to helping children learn to read, think about what they read, communicate what they learned from reading, and do it over again because they love it not because it is required. And don't even get me started on middle schools...

Q. I can't believe someone hasn't done something about that law!

A. Actually, the DOE/ Professional Standards Board tried. Here is a nifty draft they worked so hard on. Notice in the media section what they tried to do to the meaning of "integral." http://www.doe.in.gov/news/2009/07-July/documents/09-481.pdf

Q. How much does the average school librarian pay out of pocket to be a member of their teachers' association, and what has said association done to help save school librarian jobs?

A. Between 500 and 700 per year. Oh, I'm sorry, was there another question? What? School librarians are teachers?

Q. Doesn't seem like you have a lot of friends in high places theses days, does it?

A. Nope, it sure doesn't.

Q. What is the average cost of a new, library-ready, nonfiction book for secondary students?

A. Between $25 and $30 (see minimum pseudo-required budget above)

Q. Well, everything is online right? Even books? Just buy online books, how much could that cost?

A. No.
Yes, but not all of them.
It depends on the license, but for one good database subscription in a mid-sized high school somewhere between $1,500 and $4,000 per year.

Q. Can't kids just use what they find "on" Google for homework? It's free.

A. They could, but no intelligent person would ever do or teach academic research this way, at least not yet (waiting on Googlebooks info, but in no way will it be free). And, there is still a high rate of our students who do not have a reliable computer or high speed internet at home.

Q. What! everyone has a computer right? I don't believe you, how many kids are we talking about?

A. We have little empirical data on this issue locally, but a nonscientific sample of one metropolitan district shows that at least 15% of students fall into that category.

Q. That isn't much, why the big deal?

A. Maybe I should restate that more specifically. In a district sample of 1000 students, 15% means 150 children.

Q. Well, most will be OK, right?

A. It depends on your definition of OK. Many people call this social injustice the digital divide. Others refer to it as digital apartheid. Some say it kind of reminds them of something the old timers used to call Jim Crow. Take your pick.

Q. OK, now you are just trying to confuse me with all that techno-babble. I know that the State says if 90% of the kids graduate on time, then schools are doing a great job! What does NCLB stand for again?

A. No Child Left Behind - the US Educational Policy that has been adopted by our state as law. You are correct in your definition of what an excellent high school looks like to the DOE. In a school of 1000 that means it is not OK but EXCELLENT for the schools to fail 100 children. Have you ever been in a room with 100 children? That is a lot of children! And we are only talking about one school. Decide what 10% means in your high school. Of course most of our high schools have not yet reached the percentage of excellence. But there is still time, right? And, just because kids do pass the "test" and are allowed to legally graduate, that doesn't mean they are "well educated."

Q. Right, so you don't like high-stakes testing then? What kind of crazy liberal are you?

A. Pretty crazy. Whether or not I like standardized testing is not the issue. The issue is school library programs not being valued in an "institution of education."

However, if you believe that kids who pass bubble tests are intelligence incarnate, then you may want to know that research studies from multiple states, including the great Hoosier boot, found that students in schools with certified librarians and well funded library programs are more likely to do better in school. That means they pass tests more often. And yes, researchers controlled for all those crazy empirical things like poverty and race. Here is a link to all of the state studies in case you are interested: http://www.lrs.org/impact.php.


Q. Computers, tests, budgeting, teaching? But, all you do is shush people, stamp books, and berate students who forget their library cards. Why should I listen to you about this? Who is the expert in you building? Let me talk to him.

A. I would answer this but it would be difficult to explain to someone who has not seen the inside of a school, or a school library, in over 15 years. But please, feel free to stop in.

Q. I went to the public library yesterday. It was nice. We can just send kids over there for this stuff right?

A. I'm glad you mentioned this. The public libraries are a big part of the community. And they do have a lot of great resources and programming run by librarians who specialize in helping children and teens. But obviously you don't read the local paper. The public library is funded by property taxes, which have been capped, and the public sector is still feeling the economic backlash from the recession. So, there might not be enough computers, books, or librarians to help kids at your local branch. That is IF it is still open. These libraries are hurting for money too. So, if you get a lot out of your public library, you probably should vote NO to allowing property tax caps to be written into the state constitution. Unless of course you think private citizens are willing to provide enough out of pocket money to pay the library bills...

Q. Do schools really need libraries?

A. I'm sorry, did you just ask if schools really need brand new football stadiums, that extra gym for the basketball team, the semi truck for the marching band, to purchase that administrator a car? No, of course not, how silly of me, I must have misunderstood.


Q. How many School Librarians does it take to educate students for 21st century success?

A. The world may never know. Well Indiana may never know. It will be hard to find that information on Google. Oh, wait, maybe not. Wow, look at this: A Nation without School Librarians: http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=117551670433142326244.000482bb91ce51be5802

This is so cool and so sad at the same time. But very organized and clear. I bet it was created by a librarian, or someone who spends a lot of time with librarians.

Q. You are just a Google Hater, right?

A. No, actually I love Google. I love their free and open source philosophy of web based applications and their helpful resources for educators and librarians. I even like Google Scholar sometimes. In fact, I love Google so much I think if our schools would actually take advantage of these resources instead of selling our souls to Microsoft we could afford wonderful, high-tech, library programs. I would love to be a YA Google Librarian. I bet they hire librarians. Hey Google, we have a lot of librarians (I mean information specialists) in Indiana that need a job! Are you hiring?

Q. So, you think you have all the answers?

A. Well, I do my best to find them. It's what I do for a living. Oh, and I teach your children how to find answers too. And how to think about questions before they look for answers. And how to present their answers clearly. And how to do this online without violating their student code of ethics. And I organize all kinds of information so they can find it. And I talk to them about great books, and the value of reading. And we create 2.0 environments together. And...

Where did you go?

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.

Day 2 1/2 Library Legislative Briefing Day

My brain is a frying egg in an iron skillet.

I need to do a little backtracking and pick up where I left off yesterday to tell the story in its entirety.

John and Corey were up again to discuss Internet and Telecom Issues. Specifically that we need ask for support in simplifying the application process by exempting regular receipts of E-rate from ADA compliance that tie up library funds in unnecessary escrow. Those of us in schools might not have to deal with this directly, but our public library directors can feel the pain. We might also need to get more involved in these discussions in our schools with our IT directors. There were some other issues, but mainly the simplification process is the main issue.

While Yvonne and I were involved in the Internet Telecom briefing, Carol attended a session titled “Stump the Washington Office, Q&A.” Here they reviewed issues that were discussed in the sessions, but more of a open session instead of a panel. If anyone out there was at this session and would like to comment, that would be great.

Our final discussion was about Stimulus money. Here things get a little tricky. The first wave of money was basically distributed to the states and is expected to filter down to individual school districts. As many of us know, this happened very quickly and the actually educational practitioners have yet to see the money in action at their schools. My understanding is that most of this money was allotted to Title 1 programs, and that most secondary schools do not quality for Title 1 status. If you are concerned about this money and the transparency of usage, then please comment. I think that school libraries may need to work together to evaluate where and how this money is being used to strengthen literacy instruction of all kinds throughout the schools. Even if we are not able to be part of the decision making process, I believe it is important for us to be part of the conversation and understand how the money is being used.

The second wave of stimulus money will be in the form of competitive grants. Here the Fed is going to encourage partnerships with schools, governments, higher ED, public libraries and perhaps even private companies. We need to make sure that our legislators know that a big chunk of this money needs to be set aside for library services of all kinds.

By 5:00 we were free to go and debrief in our room. Carol, Yvonne, and I read over our notes and made sure we understood all the issues. I am not saying that I totally get what is going on, but I knew a lot more than before I arrived in DC!

Yvonne and I trotted around the capital to the ALA reception where we hobnobbed and shared stories with other US librarians. Here I met up with Kristen from the ALA GRO and we chatted about Tweeting the next day. A group of us talked about using #nlld and #nlld09 as the hash tags. You can search twitter for these tags to find all the postings. I unfortunately FAILED to get many tweets out, but more on that later.

Here is a picture of the reception in the Rayburn foyer.

On the way back to the hotel, I looked around the grounds on Capitol Hill. Here is a picture of the rotunda.

Did you notice the weird and menacing clouds? Well, we didn’t! Yvonne and I stopped to ooo and ah over some baby ducklings in the reflection pool and promptly got caught in a rain storm a few blocks from the hotel. We ran, got really cold and wet, and it was NOT fun!

Up in the room, I dried off and went down to the restaurant to get some dinner. The bartender recommended Oyster Po Hoecakes (yes, hoecakes), and feeling adventurous, I ordered it.

Here is a picture of the Hoecakes.

What you are seeing is fried oysters on a bed of shredded lettuce, drizzled with chow chow remoulade on top of very thin cornbread pancakes. It was actually pretty good, and spicy.

After this, I was up in the room blogging.

I will post about the actual meetings with the congressional aids in the next blog.

If anyone else was in DC, please comment and let us know how things were for you!

Mother's Day in DC - Start of Leg Day Adventure

Today I traveled for the first time to Washington D.C. My children were stunned. "Mom, you can't leave on Mother's Day!" But leave I did. Around 10:00 a.m., after a lovely breakfast prepared by my husband (my youngest spread butter on the toast) I arrived at Indianapolis International Airport. By noon, I was flying over the muddy Potomac landing in the nation's capital. I can't believe it has taken me 30+ years to actually make the trip to D.C., and it took an act of Congress to make it happen!

As an AIME board member, I was given the opportunity to represent school library media centers during National Library Legislative Day. This coming Tuesday is the actual lobbying appointments, but we get two days to prepare for this major event. Even though I have been in DC for less than 12 hours, I have learned and experienced so much already.

After I got off the plane, I was greeted at the airport by Yvonne Olinger, Director, Brown County Public Library who is the State Coordinator for Leg (pronounced Ledge Day.) I also met Carol Lunce from Indiana State University who is traveling along as well.

We took the metro to Union Station. The metro is the subway system in D.C. Being an Indy girl all my life, and not widely traveled (or even thinly for that matter) it was my first time on this type of public transit. I felt like a kid looking around in wonder at everything. At Union Station we ate lunch (I had to most awesomely fresh Philadelphia sushi role) and the checked in at the hotel.

In line at the front desk, Yvonne, who doesn't know a stranger, introduced herself to Hal Shill, Ph.D., from Penn State. Hal is a Professor of Political Science and also a librarian. Yvonne recognized him as a Leg Day regular. Hal agreed to share a taxi with us and was pressed into service in our group. We only had about 15 minutes to settle in before we had to take off for our Lobbying 101 meeting for Newbie's. The taxi ride was, well interesting (can you say motion sickness) and arrived at the ALA Washington offices in one of the most beautiful neighborhoods I have ever seen. Here is a pick of the building plate (well, I thought it was cool anyway...).




Our main speaker/trainer was Stephanie Vance, who is, well, an advocacy guru! She served as a congressional staff member and is now (in her words, not mine) "a card carrying member of ALA." She is great fun and a very effective presenter. I would love to see her at an ILF conference! You can find out more about Stephanie and what she does at http://www.advocacyguru.com, or on Twitter http://twitter.com/advocacyguru.com.

Here is Stephanie (and me) in the ALA Washington office. She is the very young one on the right.




I also got a photo op with ALA Executive Director Keith Michael Fiels. Despite his "why am I taking a picture with this woman" look in the picture, he was really a very personable guy!




Probably the highlight of my day was meeting two awesome women from the Office of Intellectual Freedom. Here is a picture of me with Deborah Caldwell-Stone (left), Acting Director and Angela Maycock (right), Assistant Director.



Those of you who know me can well imagine my excitement at meeting these ladies. For those of you who don't know me, it would be like meeting a rock star or a well respected actor. My love for the implementation of school reform, web 2.0 in school libraries, and speculative fiction is matched only by my passion for protecting the 1st Amendment rights of my teen students.

If you would like to view the updates of this meeting on Twitter, please follow me at http://twitter.com/yalibrary, or follow AIME at http://twitter.com/AIME_ILF.

After we left the meeting, we took a very nice walk (OMG the weather was perfect!) around Dupont Circle. For those of you who are from Indy, it is like our downtown circle but much more awesome (please no hate mail for saying this, it is true). Dupont has a famously large GLBT community, more ethnic restaurants in one block than in a 50 miles radios in Indy, and ohhh, the shopping (yes, honey, I got these shoes on sale!)

Here are some pics of Dupont that I didn't take but linked from the www.






My group ate some delicious Asian food at the City Lights of China restaurant. I highly recommend it! These sub terrain restaurants are a very exotic experience for me. Do we have anything like this in Indy?



Here is the scary escalator I went down on my way back to the Metro station. It took minutes and minutes to reach the bottom. The optical effect of going that far down inside a huge concrete tunnel really messed with me. I felt like I was going to fall into the abyss at any moment. Of course crazy natives were literally jogging down the escalator beside me while I was holding on for dear life.



Probably the most hilarious experience was when I was busy taking this pic in the metro station. Hal is the blurry figure closest to the camera.



A couple of young girls got in my way and stalled by the doors of the train. When I tried to step forward, the doors closed on me! Oh man, this Midwestern wall flower was being left behind in DC without my group. The looks on the faces of my companions was so shocked, so horrified, that I burst out laughing as they helplessly watched me fade into the background. I laughed for minutes on end while people gave me a wide berth suspecting insanity.

Here was the good news:

1) The terminal was very clean, well lit, and populated enough that I felt safe. In fact, I am sure it seemed that I was the most dangerous person around with my random laughing!
2) Yvonne was such a good teacher that I already knew how to work the Metro system from my airport experience. I knew I was heading for Union Station, that I was already on the red line, and I had a handy little pocket map thanks to the folks at the ALA office.
3) The next train was only a 7 minute wait. The signage at these terminals is excellent! We librarians could learn a thing or two from the planner who designed this.
4) I am a librarian darn it! I can figure out anything given the right reference sources!!!!

My new friends waited for me at Union Station and we had a good laugh about this!

So now it is midnight in the hotel lobby where the wireless is free. I guess it is time for me to get some rest before my laptop turns into a pumpkin and all is lost. Busy day tomorrow, more to report. Forgive me for typos that you catch before I do, I am a bit tired.

Thanks AIME for providing this opportunity. I hope I am representing you well!

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 11 - The Blooming of Ideas

While I was thinking of something quick and painless to blog about today, an organic piece of learning happened.

First, I decided to first look at the History Channel web page, http://www.historychannel.com. I like this site because there is a lot of cool multimedia sources and I personally like learning about the past. I clicked on the "This Day in History" link and by watching a short video clip learned that on April 11 1970 (today in history), NASA launched Apollo 13. A couple days after the launch, the crew had to return due to an explosion on board.

Here is the seal for that mission.

A month or two ago, my husband, my 11 year old son, and I watched Ron Howard's 1995 movie named after the mission. This movie starred Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, and some other guys. My son kept asking me through the movie, "do they live? do they make it back?" It was a really good movie based on a very emotional and excited true story. It always makes me cry. I couldn't remember if this movie won any awards, so I looked on the wikipedia page for the movie - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13_(film). It was nominated for a gazillion Oscars and took home two; one for film editing and one for sound mixing.

Here is one of the movie poster pics:

I remembered that NASA had a really good missions page at http://www.nasa.gov/missions/. I explored this page with students earlier in the year. They were learning about manned and unmanned space exploration. This is a difficult concept for some young people because NASA missions are not a much in the spot light as they once were back in the space race/cold war period. Even those awesome pics of MARS escaped notice by many teens.

The NASA missions page is a great place to explore past missions like Apollo 13, current missions like the the Voyager, Interstella Mission, and future missions of the International Space Station. I was amazed at all that NASA is up too on a day to day basis.

Here is a very nice photo collage of Apollo 13 crew and craft from the NASA mission page.

It is interesting how ideas bloom into inquiry. This short, impromptu brainstorming session of mine mimics, I think, real life patters or learning. I learned quite a bit in a few minutes about history, science, and pop culture by connecting new information to previous experiences. I think I have heard about this type of learning somewhere before...

Houston, it is time for bed!

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.

Easily Distrac...

Yeah Baby! BEDA #7 and Going Strong! My flock of followers is overwhelming me with comments and I just can't keep up! Who knew that library and education research would be so intriguing? (thinking ...resist the urge to write edutainment that is snarky, crass, and basically unworthy of my time just as a ploy for more readers.)

So, yesterday I mentioned that I would discuss more about "what I would do differently" if I were in charge of my own school. I alluded that this blog would be about Internet connectivity for students/families who could not afford a line.

Today, I discussed one to one computing and digital divide with one of my peers Kym Kramer, doctoral candidate at IU. Well, calling her my peer is generous to me, because she knows a hell of a lot more than I do about the world of school libraries and also (wondering... should tell these people I am mentioning their names in my blogs...)

Anyway, she mentioned something about the Bush regime causing a greater rift in the digital divide and something like it being more expensive to get Internet connections and therefor is (speculating.... will the evil residue stain of the last 8 years ever wash off our educational system...)

So instead of brainstorming with you, my imaginary audience, and just articulating the "problem" in my head before I go out and get the real information, I am going to pretend I am one of my YA students and multi task and (googling... Bush Digital Divide... is there a better search strand like maybe, oh, here is one...).

Right, it looks like I found an article on edutopia.com that (listening... husband talking about his car battery dying at soccer practice and now he needs too...). Umm, Oh yeah, anyway, discusses how the Bush Regime thinks federal funding is no longer necessary because of the fast rate of growth for Internet usage in America. OK, well, yeah, for the more affluent people (80% of these school children with Internet in their homes) but not for the poverty line households (less than 30% of these school children with Internet in their homes).

It turns out that general statistics of Internet usage in American, without controlling for specific socioeconomic criteria, convinced Conservative leaders that continuous grant funding for technology in homes would not be slated for renewal and instead (thinking... WT!? Where did these people come from? No Rich, White, English Speaking Child Left Behind World. I can picture it now, myspace is a sparkly white testament to our society's abilities to...).

I guess I am not the only one distracted. This article (swearing... I can't find the original publication date, shame on you edutopia, I thought you would have a higher level of ...) and it discussed events "to happen" in 2003. Six years later, what are we doing about the digital divide? Has it been off the agenda since then? Is the Obama administration including this in the stimulus plan? How could I find funding for my "dream school" to make sure all my kids had access? Oh crap, now I have six more research questions to track down and (pondering... I wonder if @cantconcentrate every replied to my DM of if I should RT that request for...).

Oh, hello "The Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins. Don't we have a date tonight?

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...

Teachers are Fools! We Should Be In School Today

Today, of all days, teachers and librarians should be in school. But alas, so many of us are out on compulsary Spring Break.

This morning, I have been happily inundated with the most interesting of news, blogs, and tweets, and it is not even 11:00 a.m. Who knew how many ground breaking stories could be unleashed in one day? Much of this news directly relates to teens and their interests. Just think of all the reading, witing, and conversing that would be going on today behind those sacred institutional walls, if only... In less than an hour, I was privilaged to be one of the first (million) people on the pulling end of pushed updates on YA authors, Comics, Video Games, Google Innovations, etc...

For example:

Author Neil Gaiman is in danger of being stripped of his Newbery for The Graveyard Book - did you hear? http://tinyurl.com/conu44

Marvel Comics signs fresh, young, talent. Anyone can aspire to be a Marvel comic artist! - http://is.gd/q2na

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 developers just added a new butt-kicking character! This babe is none other than Aunt May. Could this be the beginning of the end for media discrimination of the elderly! - http://is.gd/q5hN

Google unleashes CADIE (Cognitive Autoheuristic Distributed-Intelligence Entity). An online social being that actually learns, you know, like artificial intelligence. And is it ever cute! - http://cadiesingularity.blogspot.com/

YA educators are missing the academic boat load today for sure. Of course we would have to deal with multiple requests for left handed pens, desks and chairs turned upside down and moved about, permanent marker in exchange for dry erase, and books all backwards on the shelves. I, for one, truly believe the pedagogical benefits of teaching on such a great day in history would outweigh these trivial annoyances.

We are YA educators darn it! We should be engaging our student, not lazying around, sipping coffee, contemplating a shower, or deciding for or against wearing our pj's all day. Today is a missed opportunity to teach, a professional crisis.

Are you with me? Then lets start a movement. No Spring Break on April 1st Act of 2009. Go to this form letter where you can write your congress person asking them to bring this bill before the general assembly. Let's put our students education first people!

BEDA

Hi YA's and Librarian Friends,

I am getting ready to Blog everyday in April! If you want more information on BEDA, you should look at Maureen Johnson's (YA Authors Extraordinaire) new ning site , http://maureenjohnson.ning.com/. You don't have to have your own blog page set up, you can easily set one up on her site in minutes.

Reading and Writing and Writing and Reading! This is what makes the world go 'round.

I Wish I Could...

I will soon be finishing my fifth year as a High School Library Media Specialist. There are some really exciting things going on this year in my district. First of all, there are several opportunities for departmental doors opening (on their own accord, not with me using a pry bar) to some serious inquiry based learning and more curriculum centered around young adult literature. Secondly, teachers and administrators are coming together in a working committee to discuss opening up access to web 2.0 sites for students and trying to "mostly" eliminate online censorship for educators. Next, we received AdvancED accreditation for the entire district and the Media program was listed as exemplary. Finally, in these troubled economic times, our library budget looks better than ever! Our business department helped us address the issue of underfunded material accounts and I can honestly say that as long as we can rely on state and privately funded online resources, we are well funded to provide for our large body of students.

We've come a long way baby! So why do I feel such a disconnect lately? Why am I rethinking my future in libraries and education. In light of such exciting possibilities, why do I feel so overwhelmed and unprepared? Did I make the right decision about my post graduate education centering on education and curriculum instead of LIS. Is this just a five-year itch? Will I feel differently after spring break or summer vacation? Calgon take me away!

I think part of the disconnect is this: I wish I could teach a class. I wish I could get to know more of my students and create learning relationships with them. I wish I could teach two sections a semester on research and inquiry and/or on YA literature. Actually, I wish that all of the students in my high school could have the elective opportunity to take a course like this, not just 100 or so a year. Why? Because I really believe that any student who would take "my" course would reach new heights of academic and personal success. Now, if I said this to anyone else than a teacher-librarian, I would be labeled a naive dreamer or a self -entered boaster. But really, we librarians see the possibilities, right?

OK whiner (some of you might be thinking), "Just Do It!"

If I told my building administrators that they could open up a new elective course next semester they would probably be so very thrilled. Four new sections a year, without having to hire another teacher? That is the educational lotto for them, right? But alas, I am only one captain in a ship of over 2000 sailors (students) and 150 officers (teachers). I can't sacrifice the needs of the many for the benefit of the few. I need to protect my "exemplary" school media program. I can't, in good conscious, tell my teachers that I am always unavailable for two periods a day. This may be their prep period when they can meet, or it may be that they need me to collaborate on a lesson, or book talk to their classes, or teach a few days of inquiry skills, or the several other things I do throughout the day that are essential in serving teaching and learning. Believe me, I am always motivated to cut out the "non essentials" and I can spot those duties a mile away.

Then there is the other administrative duties that are extremely important to a successful high school library media program. The cleaning up of a messy union catalog to make searching a better experience for my students. The yearly weeding of a collection of over 25,000 materials. The systematic collection mapping to ensure a strong collection and that tax dollars that I have been given control over are used to purchase the absolute best in materials for my students. The leadership duties of heading up building technology issues. The professional development I plan and implement. And, of course, the constant communication it takes to get more inquiry based learning infused into the curriculum school wide.

Then, there is my own abilities I must consider. How much can I do? How much time can I give to my profession? How do I balance family, my own continuing education, and the time it would take to provide the best possible service and education to my students and staff?

When I was in library school, we talked a lot about making programs essential. We were charged with changing the way administrators, teachers, students, and other stakeholder see and use the school library media center and impacting student achievement.

I have worked hard to meet these benchmarks, and now I think I am dealing with the questions of the aftermath. "How much should I do?" "How much can I do?" "How can I achieve my own professional dreams in the current system." "What do I do next?"