Reviving Canada's School Libraries

After watching the condition of many of their school libraries slip from bad to worse over the past decade, Canadian teacher-librarians are mobilizing. By as early as June 2002, the Canadian Library Association and one of its divisions, the Canadian School Library Association (CSLA), hope to complete the final version of a document that will establish, for the first time, nationwide standards and goals for school librarians. The National Information Literacy Framework, as the new document will be known, will also include a vision statement, guidelines for teaching information literacy, and statistical findings taken from the National Report Card, a survey of school libraries now under way. The inclusion of the results of the National Report Card is particularly significant, given that there has never before been a nationwide statistical study that addresses the shortage of librarians in schools and the paucity of library resources.

What kind of shape are Canada's school libraries in? "The state of our nation's school libraries can only be described as desperate in almost every province in Canada," National Librarian Roch Carrier has written in the foreword to an early draft of the information literacy document. At present, "only two percent of elementary schools in [the province of] Ontario, for example, are large enough to qualify for a full-time teacher-librarian."

CSLA President Karin Paul, who has been a school librarian for 12 years, also decries the state of her nation's school libraries. Many librarians are "distraught," says Paul, about the dearth of librarians in schools. "In Nova Scotia, for example," says Paul, "there are only 12 teacher-librarians in the entire province… and because of a 1994 provincial contract, those librarians can be replaced by non-teachers—technicians, clerks, anybody." Last spring in Quebec (where schools are not required to have librarians), the English Montreal School Board decided to trim approximately $1 million from its library and support staff budget. And although teacher-librarians are mandated in the western province of British Columbia, only one librarian is required for every 702 students.

Still, Paul is hopeful that the new document will enable Canada's national librarian, Carrier, to make a strong case before the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada, for increased funding for school libraries.