LM_NET: Library Media Networking
On Fri, 2 Mar 2001, Mashbaum, Helen wrote:
> I have followed this thread concerning library space with interest. What I
> cannot seem to fathom is the constant harping on the need for librarians to
> better promote themselves and what they do. Do the physical education
> teachers, the coaches, and the other area experts have to continually remind
> and explain what they do and where they do it.
I have given this line of thought *no* thought before this very minute,
but is it possible more administrative types have come up thru the ranks
of physical ed and such than through libraries?? Or elementary classrooms?
(where I have long experienced the greatest support)
... Because I don't know why *why* there exists a need for libraries to
continually promote, promote, promote, but the need is real!
I'm sure I've shared this information before but one of the comments
that will stick with me until the day I die was one uttered at a
school board budget committee meeting. One of the board members told
us it was necessary to cut libraries in order to increase funding
for football because football had an impact on a greater number of
students. Nevermind that libraries serve EVERY student or that
EVERY student in the district had enjoyed direct instruction from
our teacher-librarians and the same simply cannot be said for
football. What was that man thinking?
Then there was the superintendent who told us early literacy experiences
play no role in learning to read, that teaching comprehension is all
that is required to teach reading and that teaching comprehension is
something that only teachers do. Okay....
The same superintendent is the one who told me that because we had
a computer in almost every classroom, we had information literacy
taken care of. Of course, he's also the same person who went to the
net to get some research which he subsequently distributed to the
board and teachers across the district -- without realizing that
the page he was distributing had come from an obvious parody site.
The man stood before the board and shared that information and
the board nodded and approved!
More recently I've heard thru the grapevine that librarians are
expendable because we are not an "instructional" position. Nevermind
that individually we provide the same number of direct instructional hours
per day, week, month and school year as an elementary classroom teacher.
According to someone a lot higher up the ladder than me, we are not
involved in instruction.
Perhaps those in the position to make decisions remember libraries
of their youth, where "quiet access" set the stage, and don't know
things have changed in the last 10 or 20 years?
I'm not in the mood -- nor do I have time -- this morning to explore
more deeply the behaviors and motivations of all involved tho if
we truly understood the cause of the problem we might be better
able to "fix it."
But I do know the problem is real.
> Libraries aren't going anywhere
Some have already gone somewhere (or nowhere depending upon how one
looks at things) though I certainly agree with what it is I think
you're *really* saying! :)
> and neither is the printed word. But
> someone is missing the boat because our students do not understand the
> process of research and finding information. If they can't click on the
> mouse, then in the student's mind, the information just isn't there. Time,
> effort, and resources must be put into these skills and all of the computer
> laboratories in the world will not take the place of this.
>
> Perhaps no one else out there agrees with my position but I feel that I try
> very hard to do a good job. When can I find the time to do this other job
> of promoting and justifying, along with substituting and teaching?
>
One would hope that our "good work" would speak for itself, that what
you do IS what promotes and justifies. But sometimes those in the
position to make decisions have no contact with us and do not see what
it is we do.
==========================================================================
"Obscenity and hate speech alike only become free speech issues when their
foes turn from censure to censorship. When we decided to let a thousand
flowers bloom, we always knew that some of them would be weeds."
-- Henry Louis Gates Jr., educator, c. 1990
=========================================================================
J. Rathbun, Library Teacher
Lincoln E.S., North Las Vegas
Email: jrathbun@orednet.org
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