Justification?

Wouldn't it be great if we lived in a world where the importance of Libraries was given? Where school Libraries didn't have to fight for funding or their importance within a school?

I came across this recently on Cathy Nelson's blog, and thought it was worthwhile to re-post.

Now more than ever it is important for School Librarians to understand marketing in the same way that the school registrar understands marketing. What are the numbers telling you about borrowing patterns? Have you surveyed your students to find out what they like or do not like?

School Librarians need to work smarter using technology and tools to be proactive within their school and not reactive.

“Our new school won’t need a library” (Johnson 2002)

I was quietly grinning while reading through Johnson's articles on the promise of research gold with the permeation of internet resources in school.

picture via

When I taught at MLC many moons ago, there was a lot of discussion about “classrooms without walls” and how learning would be seamless as students moved from home to school. There would be no classrooms, just learning pods ...

Johnson makes the point of the powerful blend that both “print and electronic resources” can make within a school library (2002 p 5). He talks about the serendipitous nature in which students can use both print and electronic resources to find and discover information for themselves when they are not all hell bent on “using Google” but when they have been exposed to the power of online databases and quality paperback resources.

References:

Johnson, D. (2002). Print and electronic library resources. School libraries in Canada, 21(4), 5.

Johnson, D. (2007). Managing the intangible: Digital resources in school libraries. Library Media Connection, 26(1), 46-49.