In an article in the Marin Independent Journal which was published on Monday, March 22, Rob Rogers reports on the state of school libraries in Marin County.
A couple quotes from the article:
"The way I look at it, I'm a teacher two times over," said Redwood High School librarian Tom Kaun, who like all teacher-librarians holds credentials in both library science and another academic subject - in his case, biology and physical science. "We don't have classrooms, and we don't give grades, but we work in collaboration with classroom teachers to teach the kids to cope with the tidal wave of information they're confronted with."
"For a long time, I've thought we need to get a parent to sue the whole state, and do for libraries what the Williams settlement did for textbooks," said Kaun, referring to the state law that allows students to sue a school district if they lack textbooks or other required instructional materials. "Right now, districts will do whatever they need to do in order to save their budgets, and libraries are considered relatively expendable."
Showing posts with label school library funding. Show all posts
Showing posts with label school library funding. Show all posts
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Monday, February 1, 2010
President's Budget Reduces School Library Funding
In response to a press release submitted by The American Association of School Librarians and reported on the AASL blog I posted the following comment:
If the Administration had, as Stephen Krashen has suggested, budgeted funding for a well-staffed, well-stocked library in every school in the country it would have more of an impact than any of the “scientifically” vetted programs promoted by Race To The Top. And it would cost a lot less.
It’s already been demonstrated, over and over again, the positive impact school libraries make in student achievement. The President’s budget will never be passed as is (it never is). Nevertheless, I appreciate [AASL President] Cassandra [Barnett]’s message to the President. But each of us [school library supporters] also needs to contact our local Congress member and make sure they are aware of the research and the difference school libraries could make–and we must also ensure that each of us is doing the best job [as school librarians] we can, wherever we are.
From the blog post:
"In January 2009, the Department of Education released the Second Evaluation of the Improving Literacy Through School Libraries Program, which indicated that students attending schools participating in this program are performing higher on state reading tests than students in schools that do not take part in the program. Additionally, the study stated that in schools that participated in the program in 2003-04, the percentage of students who met or exceeded the proficiency requirements on state reading assessments increased by an extra 2.7 percentage points over the increase observed among nonparticipating schools during the same time period."
If the Administration had, as Stephen Krashen has suggested, budgeted funding for a well-staffed, well-stocked library in every school in the country it would have more of an impact than any of the “scientifically” vetted programs promoted by Race To The Top. And it would cost a lot less.
It’s already been demonstrated, over and over again, the positive impact school libraries make in student achievement. The President’s budget will never be passed as is (it never is). Nevertheless, I appreciate [AASL President] Cassandra [Barnett]’s message to the President. But each of us [school library supporters] also needs to contact our local Congress member and make sure they are aware of the research and the difference school libraries could make–and we must also ensure that each of us is doing the best job [as school librarians] we can, wherever we are.
From the blog post:
"In January 2009, the Department of Education released the Second Evaluation of the Improving Literacy Through School Libraries Program, which indicated that students attending schools participating in this program are performing higher on state reading tests than students in schools that do not take part in the program. Additionally, the study stated that in schools that participated in the program in 2003-04, the percentage of students who met or exceeded the proficiency requirements on state reading assessments increased by an extra 2.7 percentage points over the increase observed among nonparticipating schools during the same time period."
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