Book fairs - unfair?

This email came the other day:

I am trying to generate a discussion in my school district around the topic of book fairs and equity and would like your opinion.

By design, book fairs cater only to those with money. And because they generate money for the schools, the interest in talking about equity and the possibility of ending our relationship with Scholastic Book Fairs, isn't happening.

Twice a year we set up a Scholastic Bookfair in each of the elementary schools and the middle school.  Classes come to browse and make purchases.  Some students bring cash, others have money put into an electronic account, and others don't have money at all.  Racially and economically it is almost always white, privileged, kids who walk out of the bookfair with a stack of new books and it is the kids who need to own books the most that leave empty handed (to be fair, [our school is in an overall a pretty white community], but we do have a growing black/brown population).

Every year there are little kids who pick out the books they want only to find out they don't have money in their account- and then the tears come.

I believe there are also parents who really can't afford to spend money at the bookfair but give their kids ten or fifteen dollars because they feel guilty and don't want their kids feeling left out.  This is also a problem and should be factored in.

I brought this up in an email to the principals but I only heard back from one who said she didn't see this as a problem (she is African American so I would have assumed she would have a heightened concern about the racial inequity).  [The superintendent] passed me by in one of the schools and said he would send me $200.00 to help out the kids with no money but that really isn't enough and it doesn't address the root of the issue.  And....I never received any money.

Have you heard of other Media Specialists being concerned about this?  What are your thoughts?

I immediately forwarded the question to a colleague who is a retired school librarian and college professor and is far more “woke” than I who replied:

Are book fairs fair? I don't think so, so that's what I googled. I found this article that pretty much summarizes how I feel, and it brings up a lot of points the email stated. Let Me Ruin Your Childhood: The Inequality of School Book Fairs

Sure, there are subtle ways you can try to provide for those students whose families can't afford to buy them books. The article suggests some. But, those kids know. They know they can't buy as much stuff as others or as much as they want. And, I say "stuff" because so much of merchandise sold at book fairs is junk, not books.

One thing that immediately came to mind as I read [the librarian’s] email was to have a bookstore book fair, the kind where parents are alerted that on a certain day or days, if they purchase books at the local bookstore, the profits go to the school. The public shopping in the store that day can also ask that their purchase profits go to the school's cause, also. That doesn't generally generate as much money as a book fair at school, but it resolves the embarrassment for students who come to the school book fair and can't buy anything. The librarian can use the money at the bookstore for a wider variety of books than Scholastic offers, and the bookstore benefits then, too. It's a win-win. (Follet is now in the book fair business, so I guess they might offer more book choices, but it's still a book fair.)

Another option is to have the book fair on parent conference days/nights. Students can visit the fair during the day to make selections, but they can't buy anything. Only parents can buy things when they come for conferences. That lets kids save face.

Of course, the best solution is to fully fund school libraries so librarians don't have to resort to fundraisers. But, who am I kidding? Schools aren't even fully funded, much less school libraries. I like the idea of just giving away books. It would be nice to have people/organizations (like the American Legion) donate money so librarians could buy books and just give them to kids so they can all have books of their own. I'd donate to that cause!

This to me this question is a tough one. While I have complained about book fairs before (see Book Fair or Toy Fair - be sure to read the comments to the post), I did not really address or even think about the equity issue. I had always viewed book fairs as a means of getting books into children's homes rather than as a library fundraiser.  School-enabled book sales were always a part of my childhood, even though I grew up in a relatively modest income household (Tab Books, as I remember, were a delight to me.)

So one part of me says that we should eliminate book fairs if they highlight economic disparities among our students and make some students feel bad. On the other hand, this may be one of the better ways of getting books into low-income student homes if one could find a way to fund the effort without making kids feel like charity cases. (Reading the book Toxic Charity was an eye-opener for me.) In reality, book fairs will be just one of dozens of things that will bring the attention of children to economic inequity in our society. Sort of a fact of life.

I have never liked the idea as book fairs as a means of providing funding for school libraries. Anytime that happens, it sends the message that the library is a program not important enough to be funded through regular school budgets. Or worse, not a real part of the educational system.

I suggested the librarian post her question to our state school library association’s Facebook page and to LM_Net. She kindly allowed me to anonymize her email and post it to this blog.

Blue Skunk readers, what are your thoughts? Any helpful advice?

Image source: 10 Things We Loved About School Book Fairs, Bustle, 4/30/15 
(I encourage you to read this article for a very different POV!)

Don’t advocate for libraries (From Machines Are the Easy Part)

From Machines Are the Easy Part; People Are the Hard Part. 
Illustrations by Brady Johnson

 65. Accentuate the things you can do that the Internet can’t.  

The Internet has also threatened other services. Nobody is picking on libraries. What do these entities still offer that their online counter parts cannot? 

• Bookstores -> Inviting atmospheres 
• Schools -> Child containment 
• Travel agents -> Expertise/time savings 
• Banks -> Traditional services enhanced with online services 

Physical spaces are still relevant, even in an increasingly virtual world. But they have to be inviting, personal and worth visiting. 

66. Be a teacher first, librarian second. 

Schools need only two things: students and teachers. Everything else is optional. 

We need to be teachers. That means: 

• Having a curriculum that only we teach that is considered valuable by the community we serve. 
• Having a concrete set of benchmarks that can be objectively assessed. 
• Directly teaching students. 
• Assessing student performance. 
• Reporting student performance back to students and their parents. 
• Having a required teaching license 

These are all things teachers do. And we should too. 

67. Don’t advocate for libraries. 

It’s self-serving.  

Advocate for library users. 

68. Poor librarians reflect on all of us. 

Alice couldn’t cut it in the classroom.  

Alice couldn’t be fired.  

Alice was made the school librarian. 

Because such a path into the profession has not been uncommon in the past, principals and teachers only experiences may have been with untrained, incompetent librarians. Unfortunately, they still exist. 

We need to actively encourage those folks to find another line of work. We need to tighten up entrance requirements to library schools. We need to police our own ranks. 

If only we could get these people into Congress – both professions would be vastly improved. 

69. Weed. 

I once took over a job for a woman who had been a school librarian for 20 years. During her tenure, she never threw a thing away. Most of the books were of an age that they could legally drink and many could have gotten Social Security. 

I know this because the bottom left drawer of her desk contained about a dozen years of the Sports Illustrated swim suit editions. Happy, happy Doug. 

I envisioned Evelyn’s dilemma. “I can’t put this out where children will see it, but I can’t throw it away.” It must have cost her sleepless nights. 

Poorly weeded collections are not the sign of poor budgets but of poor librarianship. Small but high quality collections are the sign of inadequate budgets. 

The librarian is the library (From Machines Are the Easy Part)

From Machines Are the Easy Part; People Are the Hard Part. 
Illustrations by Brady Johnson

 61. The librarian is the library. 

The best facility, the best resources, the best budget and the greatest curriculum do not make a great library program. 

The single key ingredient of a successful program is a library media specialist who is approachable, collaborative, and supportive of staff and students.  

If the right media person is in place, the rest of the “stuff” follows.

62. The paraprofessional is often the face of the library. 

When Mrs. Palardy was my library clerk, I was called Mr. Palardy about half the time. Of course, Mrs. Palardy was also called Mrs. Johnson frequently as well. 

Library patrons, especially kids, don’t know and don’t care who the “professional” librarian in the media center is. We are all “librarians” in their eyes. 

So? 

When is the last time you provided a staff development opportunity for your paraprofessional? If the clerk is crabby, what do the kids think about your library? Have you given your paraprofessional a chance to be creative or try a new task lately? 

Behind every successful librarian is a competent paraprofessional. Never underestimate the para’s importance. 

63. There is no reason not to have a budget. 

Too many library media specialists confuse having budget with having a fully funded budget. 

It is our job to create yearly budget proposals that realistically reflect the resources necessary to run a program that makes a difference in student achievement. Just because it may be unlikely the budget is fully funded doesn’t mean it should not be submitted. 

How’s a principal going to know what you need and why you need it unless you tell them? 

Schools, administrators and states have lots of money – more than enough to support quality library media programs. They may not choose to fund such programs, but they have it.  

Help them make good choices. 

64. Be virtual.  

Don’t fight the fact that kids would rather access information online than in a physical library. Quite frankly, so would I. Even the most convenient library is never as close as my computer. 

Every library needs a web page that guides its patrons to reliable and relevant resources. Librarians should be taking and answering requests and question by e-mail. 

Learning to make web pages is not rocket science. 

Tom Peters observes, “If you don’t like change, you’ll like irrelevance even less.”