LAUSD Doubts that Seasoned Teacher-Librarians Can Teach

So what is your position Follett? Working for years with Follett, from the beginning days of their automated catalogs to their present day “one-stop shopping” corporate offering of automation and selection purchasing, I ask: What are you going to do Follett? California’s chief fiscal officer is saying that librarians can be replaced by a Follett kiosk. How are you going to use your corporate money and pull to help the profession that is the reason for your existence? How are you going to join in the fight to save school librarians?
I concur with all of the many comments above describing the invaluable contributions school libraries and school librarians make to the education of our students. We teach students how to learn….what could be more important? And I don’t think even the venerable Jonathan Swift could have come up with a better satire than the one of lawyers facing off librarians on trial with armed police standing guard lest there be an outbreak of literacy.

Another clue that LAUSD is down the rabbit hole: I’m one of the librarians who did not receive a RIF notice; I’m simply “displaced.” Since I can’t be fired, and I won’t be paid to keep my school’s library up and running, and I’ve been out of the classroom for, not five, but eighteen years, I wondered aloud to the District 1 personnel specialist, what might I be doing for my pay check. Seems that I can be a librarian or a classroom teacher or any combination thereof that any school will hire me for. Where’s the logic, I wondered, in allowing me to return to classroom teaching after 18 years when my colleagues are considered unfit after 5 years of running a library. With some asperity but no discernable sense of irony I was told that the District is not basing this on logic but on law.

As the daughter of two teachers, I grew up in a household where the ability to think critically and to imagine were valued beyond measure. It was an easy decision for me to pursue graduate studies in the fields of Library Science and Education. I applaud Janice Airplane’s comments. She has hit the nail on the head and I only hope enough folks speak out against this further dismantling of our public education system under the guise of saving a few dollars. Rod Serling saw the writing on the wall with his Twilight Zone episode, “The Obsolete Man.” I encourage all to re-view that old episode and to think about the ramifications of what is happening to the L.A. school librarians, because the situation will have consequences beyond the local level. As Airplane said, “In fact, closing libraries and getting rid of the experts who live there (the Teacher Librarians) is the first step in stifling the American Spirit, Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Expression, and the Freedom to Read…” I point those interested in learning more about the effects of cutbacks to: http://www.nea.org/home/43952.htm
I am back in Massachusetts now, where those American ideals had their origin and where I plan to continue my role of the last 14 years: information manager: resource provider (print and electronic): TEACHER specializing in 21st century information literacy skills…

When the education of our students becomes more important than the salaries of our “educators”…

It is nothing short of evil that inhabits the world of “education reform”, and in particular the attorneys that are working for LAUSD. Does LAUSD have a problem? Yes, of course, they are in a horrible situation where they must cut SOMETHING … and yet, what is superfluous?

I have heard a rumor that cannot possibly be true. I heard that administrator positions were eliminated and these people were put into classrooms and they failed! Yes, past principals, vice-principals, supervisors, coordinators, directors, assistant superintendents, and the like were unable to “stand up to the rigors” of the classroom. Many of these were long time “cubicle or office dwellers” that hadn’t worked with children in decades. This is the reason the Teacher Librarians are now being vilified! Teacher Librarians are being ascribed the same attributes as these cubicle dwellers, yet they work with student every day in the library. Somehow, counselors, vice-principals, coordinators (and the like) are not being questioned with veracity about their relevance and currency of credentials. I wonder if there are people looking out for them at the top … fair is fair … if you are going to hold Teacher Librarians to this level of accountability, it must be applied to every category of teacher, including past administrators.

The truly chilling effect, the part that scares me, is that everything that makes education interesting, relevant, and entertaining (the very things that parents, educators, students, and in fact EVERYONE knows is important) is currently being eliminated in public education in a misguided attempt to raise irrelevant test scores. The truth is that TESTING must be eliminated. The cost is unbelievable, enriching all the wrong groups for all the wrong reasons. Do we want to make publishing companies rich at the expense of our children getting a great and enriching education?

No Valentine’s Day (or virtually any holiday activities) … instead we have test prep. Summer school … no, only for Special Ed students. Field trips … no. Assemblies … no. These are TOO EXPENSIVE and don’t contribute to standards-based evidence learning that is reflected on STAR tests.

Drill and kill, learn what you don’t need, eliminate the really good teachers, especially those evil LIBRARIANS that believe that intellectual freedom should be valued … YES! Eliminate all teachers that encourage children to love to learn, to learn in order to change the trajectory of their lives from poverty to riches, from oppression to opportunity, from ignorance to enlightenment. These attorneys want to kill thinking and encourage regurgitation, and all in the spirit of racing to the top.

Think back to what made school FUN and INTERESTING for you…it is currently under attack? Yes! What is being eliminated? Electives, libraries, art, music, field trips, holiday events, performances. Reading to learn something that you want to learn … no. You might be very surprised to find that your children are not being encouraged to think for themselves, to look critically at issues, to be innovative. In fact, closing libraries and getting rid of the the experts that live there (the Teacher Librarians) is the first step in stifling the American Spirit. Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Expression, and the Freedom to Read is truly under attack.

Regurgitating uninteresting bleck to support state standards determined by “experts”… yes. That is exactly what school reform is aiming to do. It will create a working class that votes contrary to its own interests, supports further erosion to freedoms in the name of safety, and doesn’t understand that corporations are only interested in increasing their shareholders wealth - that is in fact their sole mission! Having an uneducated and unthinking public is the best possible way to keep the wealth structure intact, with the rich getting richer at the expense of the working people. Teachers are being vilified for wanting to help students create a better life - the American dream!

All of this is part and parcel of the vilification of Teacher Librarians by LAUSD. I believe it would be better to keep the libraries open with experts there to help the students than to fund the expensive, unnecessary tests that do nothing more than point to the fact that these students do not have access to these important resources!

What a sad commentary on the state of education in California.

We teach, darn it! Two teaching credentials and 1000+ interactions with students daily make us the most “with it” teachers on campus.

How on earth do they ever hire a new teacher if you have to have a recent experience with teaching? You can’t tell me that coming straight out of college is more qualified to teach than a librarian!

Teacher Librarians are dedicated educators who want the best for our children. What message are we sending to our kids, to our future by demeaning these role models of service and dedication? What LAUSD is doing is so shameful. It is up to us to hold them accountable.

School libraries are classrooms and school librarians are teaching day in and day out -day after day! Why bother mandating that librarians have a teaching credential if they are not recognized as teachers? Shame on the “investigators” for putting highly trained professionals through such a demaning process. What a terrible way to try to solve a problem…

The letter you quoted in the first paragraph of this article was written by my very own funny and smart husband - Bennett Tramer!
xx,
Sonya Sones
www.sonyasones.com

LAUSD’s idea that a room full of library books provides adequate educational support for students is ludicrous, especially in a district with a high-poverty student population. If simply providing instructional materials worked, we should be able to eliminate all teachers, replacing them with a classroom full of textbooks. Students can surely find all the information they need to prepare for college if they are surrounded by textbooks, right?

Hogwash! We live in an information tsunami, where all students must learn how to locate the information they need, determine what information is untrustworthy (or dangerous!), and use information for projects, assignments, or personal needs. This is especially crucial when students come from from poverty-level homes that do not provide access to books, magazines, the Internet, or role models/guidance in how to use these resources.

Beyond the reality that using information resources needs to be taught, that collections of (expensive) information materials need management to be accessible and current, there is another reality for many students, especially at the middle school. In a world where bullying is rampant, the school library provides a safe haven for youngsters during open periods of the school day. When the staffing the provides this safety net is gone, the occurances of bullying— and student injuries or dropouts— is likely to rise.

What LAUSD is doing, through legal chicanery and intimidation, is so counter to good educational practice, and further removes LAUSD students from any opportunity to compete with youngsters from the rest of the world for educational opportunities, jobs, and a future.

Don’t send LAUSD Librarians to the Inquisition, send the downtown bureaucrat

http://www.examiner.com/public-education-in-los-angeles/don-t-send-lausd…