Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.
~Frederick Douglass
If a school has no school library or a flimsy excuse for a library, students are denied access to books and reading material. They miss opportunities to learn information and become proud of who they are. Look for racism behind the decision.
When school districts diminish school libraries and those who run them, they fail to address the critical issues involving history, civics, and race relations. With all the talk of schools and equity, it’s unconscionable that closing school libraries and firing school librarians are accepted practices.
In May 2020, the Washington D.C. school district passed a $70 million budget increase. In January 2021, the American Rescue Plan infused over $368 million of COVID relief and new aid to DC Schools. Today, school librarians there are begging to keep their jobs.
In 2023, there are those educational leaders in D.C. still threatening to close school libraries to save money.
The dismal account of dwindling libraries and librarians is happening across the nation, especially in poor schools and schools with children of color. If your child’s school fires the librarian, the school library may close. The public school is also likely on borrowed time.
Librarians and Social Change
In a January 2021 interview with the American Association of School Librarians president Kathy Carroll Librarians Uniquely Equipped To Address the Tenor of the Times, Carroll states:
We as professionals have to be brave in our convictions. We are the curators of accurate unbiased information. Don’t be afraid to have hard conversations or to stand behind truth and facts. Our students are counting on us! #TruthWins #FactsMatter
Book Banning
Social justice book banning is serious in America’s schools, so if school libraries are eliminated, and librarians are given no voice by being fired, this issue is swept away.
According to the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF), which monitors challenges to books, more than 273 books were challenged or banned in 2020, although the majority of attempts to remove books go unreported.
Test Scores and Libraries
For years, students of color and students from low-income families have scored lower in reading proficiency than their peers.
We learn from Phi Delta Kappan: Data from more than 34 statewide studies suggest that students tend to earn better standardized test scores in schools that have strong library programs.
But if students don’t have easy access to books and reading material, how will America close the gap (Condron, D.J., 2009)?
Eliminating Library Racism
In A History of Racism in American Public Libraries, Anna Gooding-Call writes about weeding out racism in public libraries.
School libraries might also need to reassess how they respond to current events. Students and parents should be involved in this process.
But this cannot take place if there are no school libraries and librarians.
The Hub of a School
Some school districts deem the school library dated and replace it with another function, like STEM or maker spaces.
In Toledo, Ohio, Washington Local Schools plans to convert school libraries into STEM rooms relying on teachers to set up classroom libraries.
But the school library is the hub of the school!
Phonics Focus
A recent Mindshift report about the need for phonics in California’s struggling schools ignores the lack of school libraries and school librarians in that state.
Sixteen percent of California schools don’t have a library, and only 9 percent of California schools have a credentialed librarian (Ahlfeld, 2019).
Students will only thrive with phonics if they connect phonics to reading books and material that reflects their interests, culture, and backgrounds!
Rich Schools Have Libraries
Private schools like Sidwell Friends have libraries and librarians.
Lakeside’s website notes that students still love to curl up and read with a book. The library has a screen-free couch for reading, and librarians have monthly themed book displays that introduce students to new authors, genres, and books in the collection.
As reported in Politico, in New Jersey, Camden has no public school librarians, and Cherry Hill has one for every public school.
Demand School Libraries and Librarians
Every student deserves a great school library, stacked with various books and material, including books that address our most current issues to help them seek answers. They need qualified librarians to help guide them.
When school buildings are reopened ask, who is the school librarian, and what are their qualifications. What kind of library exists in the school? No matter whether the school is charter, traditional public, private, parochial, or virtual; a school library and an authentic school librarian matter greatly.
References
Condron, D.J. (2009). Social Class, and School and Non-School Environments, and Black/White Inequalities in Children’s Learning. American Sociological Review. 74: 683-708.
Ahlfeld, K. (2019). They Paved Paradise: School Librarians and School Libraries Are Disappearing, and We Won’t Know What We’ve Lost Until It’s Gone. Journal of Library Administration. 59: 927–938.
I first encountered the de-emphasis of school libraries as a teacher in the mid 1990’s. The argument made by the principal at that time was that libraries were a thing of the past. I was shocked. It is painfully ironic that in this age of the “science of reading” we ignore the soul of the well read. Phonics is a mechanical approach that fails to provide a motivation to read. If we take away libraries as a resource then we take away a critical pathway to a child’s imagination.
Phonics should lead to reading. And students need libraries with reading material. How basic is that? Thanks, Paul.
Having excellent libraries in schools should be a right for every student. Please support school librarians and libraries.
Amen! Thanks, Connie.
Thank you for your post, Nancy, and your spot-on analysis of the endangerment of school librarians and libraries in the U.S.
For more information, I invite you and your readers to read about a research study currently underway: School Librarian Investigation: Decline or Evolution. You can access information about it at: https://libslide.org/
The Publications and the State Survey sections of the website may be of particular interest.
As a retired school librarian educator and an advocate for the critical role of school librarians in student learning and classroom teachers’ teaching, I appreciate you for lending your voice and influence to this unconscionable inequity in education today.
Thanks, Judi. I appreciate the link to the research.
Alas, Nancy, it’s not only in the US! We are having the same troubles here in Australia and I believe there is something similar in the UK. Usually the Principal argues that “they’re getting it all on the Internet now, why waste the money?” State schools – the poorer ones, anyway, there are middle class state schools here, which are not too different from private schools – are losing libraries or replacing teacher librarians with non teachers and, in some cases, completely unqualified teaching aides. My disadvantaged school, which was rebuilt with a special grant, does have a teacher in the library though not a librarian, because she is the sister in law of the campus Principal and there was no way she was going to be cut.. At least she is a teacher, and has started doing real library things. If she ever leaves she will not be replaced.
We have a National campaign here, Students Need School Libraries. Fingers crossed!
Hi, Sue. I appreciate your sharing this. Schools here often replace the librarian with a teacher or volunteer if they still have a library.
The idea that technology can replace books is embraced here too. However, many reports say children prefer books.
I love the idea of a National campaign! Please keep us posted…
Thank you!
Isn’t this trashing of school libraries part of the reason we have Common Core with us still? Isn’t it to marginalize public education as much as possible to convince parents that schools-for-profit is the only way to go?
I would say yes, Patrice. Good point.
The Golden Age of School librarians and Libraries is behind us and probably will never return. Classroom collections are just that, definitely not libraries
Unless there’s a better fight and commitment to public schooling, I’m afraid you’re right.
I don’t think most people really understand what training it takes to be a librarian. To many it’s just the lady who sits at the main desk and checks out books, although even that function is being automated. It’s a little bit like the thinking some people have about teaching. They all have been to school, so they all know how to be a teacher. They have all used a library, so they know how to be a librarian. Does anyone assume they know how to be a banker because they use a bank?
Agreed! I remember kids asking me once when I left school. I told them about my university degree and one kid said, “You need a degree to check out books?” I think, though, that once you show them what you do, they stop. I ran a school library for many years. I had a lunchtime book club, took kids to writers festivals(and paid from my own pocket for kids who couldn’t afford tickets), did book launches, let kids choose books from displays and add requests to my shopping. One year we did a Banned Books Week DVD, We did the Premier ‘s Reading Challenge and voted for child-voted awards. One publisher offered manuscripts for kids to read and comment on. I did everything I could think of, that didn’t cost too much, because my budget was tiny. Oh, and I taught regular classes, as well as research skills in the library. English and history and ESL and Literacy.
The kids certainly knew what I did, as did the campus Principal.
But yes, adults in general don’t know or care.