School Libraries Benefit from Federal Grants

The nation’s neediest media centers are able to purchase up-to-date resources and keep their doors open longer, thanks to the funds they received through the U.S. Department of Education’s Improving Literacy Through School Libraries, says a government study evaluating the recipients of the four-year-old program.

A survey of 400 school libraries that received grants in 2003–2004 versus 400 that were eligible but failed to demonstrate the most need, shows that grant recipients made “great change after receiving the grant, while the nongrantees showed no significant change.”

More specifically, those schools with grants were able to extend the days and hours of their media center’s operation, increase the number of weekly per student visits to the library from 1.1 to 1.2, and purchase more automated circulation systems. Interestingly, grant recipients were more likely than nongrantees to add or expand collaborative research projects with teachers (52 percent versus 30 percent), work with their principal or teachers on curriculum issues (43 percent versus 23 percent), and provide library-related after-school programs (42 percent versus 9 percent). Grant winners were also more likely to have professional development activities related to school libraries, such as ways to improve collaboration, and were able to buy substantially more books, putting them roughly on par with nongrantees in terms of the size of their book collections, the survey says.

What does all of this mean? The Improving Literacy Through School Libraries program—which was established under No Child Left Behind—“infers a linkage between school libraries and literacy,” so these kinds of improvements to media centers also help boost academic achievement and test scores, the study says. The report, however, is missing one important detail: a comparison of the reading scores of students in schools that received grants to those that did not.

“My first impression is that the aims of the program were met, and we hope that it will demonstrate to school districts what a well-funded, adequately staffed school library can do,” says Julie Walker, executive director of the American Association of School Librarians. “The real question, however, is whether school libraries can sustain the changes since the program is just a shot in the arm and not a part of a library’s budget.”

Whether this report will convince Congress to increase federal funding for school libraries is still unclear. Lawmakers authorized $250 million for the program in 2001, the first time in about three decades that federal funds were solely devoted to school library materials. In fact, Congress still has a long way to go before approving $100 million for the program, which would transform it from a competitive grant to one that applies to all states. Only $12.5 million was appropriated in its first year of operation, and the amount was increased to $19.6 million in 2005, enough to cover only 85 grants, which were awarded to districts that then selected schools for participation. In order to qualify, at least 20 percent of students in a school district must come from families with incomes below the poverty line. The evaluation report is a requirement of the program.