Why us?
Friday, April 23, 2010 at 07:04AM "Why's everybody always pickin' on me" - lyrics of Charlie Brown by the Coasters
In response to my last post, Dangerous statements for librarians to make, Robin Henry asks a question I am sure many of us have asked over the years:
... why do librarians constantly have to justify their existence, when classroom teachers do not? I have also seen some pretty disengaged teachers in my professional experience, and yet, they are not marginalized as a group, the way librarians are.
What makes us different from classroom teachers or other, seemingly less vulnerable, positions in schools?
Why us? We're important!*
There are two simple reasons as far as I can tell, and we don't like to acknowledge either one of them. First, classroom teachers have primary custodial responsibility for kids. Schools have been given the charge of containing and protecting children and young adults by society. There has to be someone in a school to do this even before anything educational can be undertaken. Unless the librarian is in a fixed schedule that offers teacher prep time, librarians do not help fulfill that obligation.**
Classroom teachers also have responsibility for a mandated*** curriculum. (This is why teachers of electives in high schools are more vulnerable than social studies teachers.) For states that have mandated research skills, "library skills," information/technology literacy skills, it is most often the classroom teacher, not the librarian, who is held accountable (teaching, assessing, remediating, reporting, etc.) for teaching them.
Librarians are support personnel. And support personnel, far more than regular personnel, must have a "customer/consumer service" mindset to survive and thrive: "It's not about us, it's about them." 'Cause if you ain't providing valued service, why are you needed? (Operative word: valued.)
The other comment to the post that struck me was from Judith who wrote:
Yes I've heard similar phrases and yes it frustrates me that our profession is judged by them. But please don't let this be about library bashing as there are some amazing professionals out there.
Judith, bashing wasn't the intent, but maybe a little "tough love" was. And for what it's worth, I suspect I've said some version of many of these dangerous statements myself. I believe we are a profession that can only be reformed from within and that means some honest self-appraisal.
* I DO think good library services are of genuine benefit to every child. But is about what school boards, legislators and administrators think that matters here.
** I think is why not allowing kids into the library for some reason what really rankles many classroom teachers. "Don't we all have a shared responsibilty for supervising our kids? Why do you get to do so when you want to and I don't?"
Reader Comments (7)
Hi Doug!
I really enjoy reading your blog! I agree with your statement: "I believe we are a profession that can only be reformed from within and that means some honest self-appraisal."
I think we as librarians can be our own worst enemies. We have to understand our own value and educate our fellow educators as to why librarians are important. The saying "Well you just can't have a school without a library" is not going to cut it. We must champion our cause by being innovative and sharing our knowledge with our academic partners.
I have taught elective course before and I understand the battle of justifying one's own existence. It takes a lot of work, research, and data to prove you're impacting student achievement.
Thanks again, great post!
You mention that the teachers are usually responsible for the teaching, assessing, etc of the "information/research skills." We do help teach, but librarians rarely help in assessment (and evaluation, remediation and reporting). So, I say to other librarians, take on that mandated role yourself. Find ways to assume those most valued roles within the school in order to make yourself indispensible. What teacher doesn't want help grading papers? Maybe it doesn't seem like "that's part of your job description," but if we make those essential roles our roles then we make ourselves essential as well. I think being a part of assessment is a really important part of our jobs that we don't take on enough. Try seeing yourself more as a teacher and act more as a teacher and perhaps you'll be put into that indispensible teacher category. If we do assess student growth, help students grow through remediation, and report our successes than we advocate for ourselves through actions instead of just relying on research or something else outside of our building. Make yourself matter in your building and you won't be indispensible, but it may take a reimagining of what your roles actually are.
Let me play devil's advocate. OK, so teachers are responsible for mandated curricula, they actually have custody of kids, etc. What about nurses? School secretaries? (gasp) Adminstrators? Are these people called upon to "make themselves indispensible? Don't get me wrong, I pretty much agree with most of the comments about doing things to help, making ourselves useful, etc. I would like to think that I have done that here in my own little part of the world. What I am looking at is the larger picture. When it is time to cut budgets, the bean counters are not going to say, "Well, we can't cut that librarian at school A, she has really made herself indispensible, but as for school B, that one's a slacker, she's gotta go!" It will be all or nothing generally speaking. As a group, librarians are perceived as extra. A nice extra, granted, but still an extra. I am not sure how to fix that on a global level. Each librarian making herself indispensible really isn't going to cut it.
I've seen nurses in the same position many a time, actually. (And suggestions that they be replaced with health care aides, etc. )
Sometimes I think of schools like the Science Leadership Academy and I can't even imagine this sort of conversation taking place, because no one is "separate" and everyone combines to work as colleagues and a team.
I think there's also something to how our schools are set up, at least most of them, where you have this separation of "classroom" and other functions of the school instead of this sense and functionality of shared mission.
Maybe as our ideas of school evolve this will change? I guess I can be an idealist can't I?
Teachers may not be "safe" any more. Outside the school hierarchy, some very powerful people are beginning to question the invulnerability of the classroom teacher, particularly if students are not achieving as much as the public thinks they should be achieving.
Read this excellent article from early March from the New York Times Magazine. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/magazine/07Teachers-t.html?em
My personal view is that as education begins to be controlled more and more on a national level rather than on a local level, the less control individuals and local school systems and boards will have over who is deemed important and who is not. I've pretty much decided to do the best I can and not worry about it too much. We gave our power away several decades ago.
Our state has site-based management, so though our district gives each school an allotment number (how many personnel they will pay for) our Principal makes the ultimate decision on which personnel to keep. So, while it may be different in other places, at least here, if budget cuts are made a Principal could make the decision to use his allotment money however he likes including get rid of a slacker librarian or keep an indespensible librarian. In our county now, media assistant hours are not mandated at every school, but many principals use their allotment money to make sure they have a full time media assistant because they know the importance of having a fully staffed media program. Further, if ALL Librarians make themselves indespensible, and there is no slacker Librarian to be had, then we as a profession will be indespensible to the decsion makers. I agree that if cuts are made accross the board, they won't look to see who is good and who is bad and only keep the good librarians. So, ultimately we as a profession need to make ourselves indespensible to the school boards and state school boards. That's the material point. If we aren't all working towards that goal then we will all be lumped in with the slackers of the bunch and be considered a position that can be cut.
Hi Erin,
Thanks. This need to justify one's existence has both its positive and negative sides, but I think on the whole, more positive. It certainly seems to make us more entrepreneurial!
All the best,
Doug
Hi Annie,
I agree with you. I've always said it is not enough to report that you have taught. You also have to demonstrate students have learned!
Doug
Hi Robin,
I understand your question but I don't know the answer. My gut tells me that until we have required skills that we alone are responsible for teaching, we will remain vulnerable.
Nurses, secretaries, administrators, custodians, techs, etc - are all also support positions that have specific responsibilities that are similar from district to district. And these positions get reduced all the time around here too!
Thanks for the conversation. I think it is an important one.
Doug
Hi Carolyn,
I've argued before that there are schools that don't need librarians since such a position does not fit with certain educational philosophies (text-book and test driven models). I wouldn't want to work in such a school or have my grandkids attend one, but they exist.
Thanks for the comment and I hope more collegial models evolve.
Doug
Hi Martha,
I'd agree completely. I believe in accountability for teachers, too. I just don't like the single measure method (test scores) that are being proposed.
Tell me more about how we gave our power away several decades ago. It's an intriguing statement.
Thanks,
Doug
Hi Annie,
And if a district has seniority rules, one slacker can kill an entire program. The principal cuts the slacker's position to half time, so s/he moves to another full time position in a different building, where that position is cut.
We need to be more supportive of administrators who stress remediation and improvement of poor performing media specialists rather than invent ways to pass the problem on to others!
Doug