Letters

CORRECTION: In the January 2004 Teen Talk column, "Beyond Books" (p. 37), Dr. Shifra Baruchson Arbib was incorrectly identified as a school librarian. She was director of the Department of Information Science at Israel's Bar Ilan University at the time her experiment to identify the benefits of self-help book collections was conducted. Arbib now heads up a new speciality on social information at the university.

The cultural bias of American children's books

Thank you for publishing the article about works in translation by Stephen Roxburgh (January 2004, "The Myopic American ," pp. 48–50). I never considered that all of our multicultural literature is truly about one culture—an American one. Why don't books about the rest of the world fare as well? I think it goes back to the fact that Americans do not tend to travel far beyond our comfort zone, literally or figuratively, and that includes teachers. With curriculum restraints and mandated testing, I would imagine there is an even smaller chance that global cultures or geopolitical awareness would enter a classroom.

If parents are also unaware, where will kids get the spark? Not that I am disparaging my fellow citizens, because I am proud to be one, but considering a world beyond ours is not our habit. But how to change that, I do not know.
--Melissa Cavender, Grade One Teacher, Jakarta International School, Jakarta, Indonesia

The Ohio Educational Library Media Association (OELMA) and the Leadership for School Libraries would like to take this opportunity to thank you for the coverage of the "Student Learning through Ohio School Libraries" research study in School Library Journal (February 2004, "13,000 Kids Can't Be Wrong ," pp. 46–50). The Ohio Research Study is a ground-breaking project that will have a long-range effect on the perception of school libraries and their impact on student learning. Through this study, Dr. Ross Todd and Dr. Carol Kuhlthau have added considerable understanding to how effective school libraries help students, and the response to the study has been extremely positive and overwhelming!

This critical study could not have happened without a great degree of statewide collaboration and financial support. We would like to make the SLJ readership aware of the outstanding support and funding for "Student Learning through Ohio School Libraries," which was not mentioned in your article. This study was funded by the State Library of Ohio through a Library Services and Technology Act grant from the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services. The project team for the study was Leadership for School Libraries, a collaborative coalition of OELMA, INFOhio (the state K–12 information network), the Ohio Department of Education, and the State Library of Ohio. Gayle Geitgey was assistant director for the project. Ohio is extremely appreciative of both the financial support and the collaborative partnerships that made this study possible and would like to be sure they are properly recognized.

Additional information on the research study is available at www.oelma.org/StudentLearning.htm.
--Ann E. Tepe, Project Director, Student Learning through Ohio School Libraries, Columbus, OH