Are We Passing Our Own Test?

Veteran librarian Barbara Berger has never stepped back to examine the impact of her own program. Now that Jefferson High School's teachers are taking a closer look at their school, she has that opportunity. They are collecting and analyzing data with the goal of improving student achievement. A planning team led by Principal Joe Ryan is determining which data should be collected and is seeking correlations that will help inform their practice.

Barbara, who is on the planning team, works hard each day, but are her day-to-day activities really making a difference? She suspects her ability to articulate such evidence would solidify support for the library program and what she might learn from data collection could help her improve her own practice.

But where does a teacher-librarian start? What types of evidence can Barbara collect to determine the extent to which her program made a difference in student learning? What suggestions can Barbara make within the context of the planning team to engage colleagues in evaluating the place of her program in the continuous improvement of the school?
—Joyce Valenza ( Joyce_Valenza@sdst.org ), librarian, Springfield Township High School, Erdenheim, PA

Barbara's problem is common because traditional evidence collection centered on organization level measures circulation, the library's size, the collection, and traffic. While interesting, these facts are not enough today. Barbara should measure impact at the learner level and at the teaching-unit level in addition to the organization level. These measures need to concentrate on: reading (who reads more, and how much); collaborative planning (how learning experiences are enhanced); information literacy (how expert learners handle information); and technology (how we make a difference beyond Google).

During collaborative planning, create a joint rubric for students. The teacher wants to know about content knowledge. The library media specialist wants to know how much each child reads, about the development of skills that help the child learn the content, and how technology is being used so that more is learned in less time. All four concerns by the team have rubric items and at the end of the unit, team members know the results and have a measure of impact. Over time, the team improves and has something to report.
—David V. Loertscher, professor San Jose (CA) State University

Barbara is right. This is exactly the time and climate to evaluate and improve her library program. As a library media specialist, she has expertise in collaboration, curriculum development and selection of materials that can be tweaked easily to support continuous improvement. She should begin by connecting with the district testing coordinator to discuss results on standardized tests, identifying at least one area where her expertise can make a measurable difference. This target area can then be used to set clear goals with her administration.

In my district, the testing coordinator and I agreed that I need to develop a collection of audiobooks and a more up-to-date professional collection. Requisitions for these areas are clearly tied to targeted learning needs. Teachers will collaborate in the promotion and documentation of the use of these resources. Planning logs, circulation records, user- need surveys, recording of anecdotal evidence, and test-score analysis can document the library's effect on students' literacy, the long-term goal of the library program.

How to Conduct Action Research (ALA, 2003) by Lesley Farmer and Leverage your Library Program to Raise Test Scores (Linworth, 2003) by Audrey Church can help Barbara match the strengths of her program with this new focus.
—Sara Kelly Johns, library media specialist. Lake Placid Middle/Senior High School, Lake Placid, NY