Texas Study Links Libraries, Test Scores

A new Texas study has shown that good school libraries lead to higher scores on the reading portion of the state's basic skills test. In fact, in schools with librarians, an average of 10 percent more students passed the test than in schools without librarians.

The study, conducted for the Texas State Library by an independent research firm, also found that very specific activities on the part of librarians—such as planning lessons with teachers—along with certain library characteristics—such as how current the collection is—affect scores on the test, known as the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS).

The Texas study is similar to those of Colorado researcher Keith Lance, who last year published findings from three states—Colorado, Alaska, and Pennsylvania—showing a strong correlation between school libraries and student achievement on standardized tests. ("Dick and Jane Go to the Head of the Class ," April 2000) The Lance studies are considered so persuasive that several other states, like Texas, have wanted to replicate them on their home turf.

"If you ask most principals, 'Would you be willing to do something that would increase your test scores 10 percent?'," they'd be eager to put money into their libraries, says Mary Lankford, director of library services for the Texas Education Agency.

Thanks to a grant of about $50,000 from the federal Library Services and Technology Act, and to the oversight of Christine McNew, youth services consultant at the Texas State Library, the study got under way last fall. The result is an exhaustive, 207-page document based on a random sample of 600 school libraries, with a response rate of 84 percent. Here are some key findings from the study, the full text of which is available at www.tsl.state.tx.us/ld/pubs/schlibsurvey/index.html.

• On average, 89.3 percent of students in schools with librarians passed the reading section of TAAS, compared with 78.4 percent in schools without librarians.
• The main predictors of student performance on the TAAS were socioeconomic factors, but when those were accounted for, so-called "library variables," such as collection size, explained four percent of performance at the elementary- and middle-school levels and 8.2 percent at the high school level.
• Certain library characteristics—such as the level of collaboration between librarians and teachers and the amount of library resources—had a greater influence on test scores than others. For instance, at the elementary level, key factors included the number of volumes purchased in 1999–00 per 100 students; at the middle school level, key factors included identifying appropriate materials for teachers' instructional units; and at the high school level, they included librarians spending planning time with teachers.