Letters

For the most part, I agreed with SLJ Editor Evan St. Lifer's editorial "A Librarian at the White House" (Feb. 2002). Recruitment money is a good start, but we must alter perception. However, this piece did not, in my view, offer specifics on how to alter perceptions.

In the same edition, Walter Minkel's column, "Selling Information Literacy", discusses promoting a library Web page, but did not mention the technical and design requirements for making a Web site marketable. Librarians cannot be complacent about simply having a Web page. It must represent thoughtful, contemporary design that is of greater use to students than Ask Jeeves or Yahoo! In short, librarians must view themselves as competitors with such Internet sites and offer an array of electronic services through the library Web site that make it worth visiting. That is how we can change perceptions. Until then, librarians' reputations will continue to languish, and so will our salaries.

My library Web site (www.gslis.utexas.edu/~nkras/Hays_Library) has been completely overhauled recently. And in the future, I plan to make the site more advanced, allowing students to request holds and renewals online, and register for reader's advice electronically. Library users will soon expect these features that many public libraries now provide. During my redesign, I found very few high school library sites worth emulating.

Judging from most school library sites, secondary librarians, by and large, are far behind in their skills compared with other Web designers and public and academic libraries. We, as a profession, cannot demand higher salaries without a consummate increase in our technical skills. We all need to dedicate ourselves to learning the language and conventions of the high-tech community. In the future, librarians should be as comfortable discussing the latest trends in Web design as we are now in discussing the newest books.

Neil Krasnoff, Librarian
Jack C. Hays High School
Buda, TX

This is in response to the November article on computerized reading programs ("Keeping Score "). It must be nice to work in a school where most incoming students are reading near grade level and all you have to do is move them up one grade level each year. We don't have that luxury. Most of our incoming sixth graders are reading below level, many of them at the second and third grade level. How can we stand by and let them read what they want and not be concerned about the fact that they will not be proficient readers when they leave at the end of eighth grade? After using Accelerated Reader we have seen gains of four grade levels in two years. The reading specialist and I don't worry about instilling the "love of reading." Students first need to be able to read in order to learn the love reading. Perhaps we will worry about the love of reading when math teachers are told they can't make students do math until they instill the love of math.

Anna Passante
Library Media Specialist
Lincoln Center of the Arts
Middle School, Milwaukee, WI

When Linda Jaeger and Shelia N. Demetriadis wanted to begin a middle-school book club ("Book Club on a Budget ," March 2002), did they have difficulty finding multiple copies of the same book with the local public library? In our system, we deliver teacher-requested books to many area schools. In order to get books delivered, teachers register with our monthly service. But if they want to pick up a collection themselves, all they have to do is give two weeks notice at any one of our 41 locations. Our librarians are happy to get books into the hands of area students and teachers.

Sometimes it's difficult to provide more than one classroom with multiple copies of the same title, but it seemed like Jaeger and Demetriadis were willing to use different titles connected by a common theme. Our staff would applaud their creativity and flexibility with their school book club, were we to help fill this teacher collection. Rather than depend on the charitable natures of the big chain bookstores, perhaps there is a way to partner with the local library to supplement a school's curriculum with borrowed books. Money would be saved and a system could be worked out that was long lasting and beneficial to both the school and the public library.

Lisa Hamrick, Manager
Children's Learning Center
Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County Cincinnati, OH