Letters

ALA and AASL need to stick together

We are writing in response to your recent article “Should AASL Go It Alone?” (May 2007, p. 19).

Despite a glitch from time to time, we think that the American Library Association and the American Association of School Librarians are a great team. ALA has worked extensively with AASL on a variety of legislative and advocacy projects, all of which have increased the visibility of school library media professionals and emphasized the importance of school media centers.

We recognize that we face nationwide threats to school libraries, and are working hard to get school librarians included in the definition of “highly qualified” within the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation.

ALA and its members understand how vital school librarians are to a student’s and a school’s success and have pushed hard for an amendment to NCLB calling for a school library in every school, headed by a state-certified school library media specialist.

ALA also helped create the Improving Literacy Through School Libraries (LSL) program, which is a part of No Child Left Behind legislation, and marks the first time since 1965 that special federal monies are being made available for improving school libraries. ALA’s priority is to boost LSL funding from the current $20 million to $100 million, so that every state can benefit from the funds.

Although the “65 percent solution,” another threat to school libraries, is not federal legislation but a state-by-state issue, ALA and AASL worked successfully with other educational organizations to oppose and defeat the measure in several states.

Finally, one of the longstanding priorities of ALA’s Office for Information Technology Policy (OITP) has been to strengthen the E-rate program, which provides discounts to public and private K–12 schools on telecommunications services, Internet access, and other technology costs. This program has benefited thousands of school libraries in every state.

Could we have done all this without working together as a single voice? We don’t think so.

We face an unprecedented array of challenges to the future of libraries of all types, and must work together to make sure the next generation has libraries that are stronger and better and can meet the needs of people of all ages.

Given the challenges we face, we think we need to stick together, and are proud to be working together as one.

While I sympathize with the school librarians who feel disconnected from the ALA and other branches of librarianship, I must take issue with Katherine Koenig’s call for me to “get a clue” about what a school librarian does each day (June 2007, p. 13).

Many librarians are former teachers, and most public librarians would like to build any partnership possible with the schools in the communities they serve. Instead of being frustrated with the public librarian who wants to do booktalks and teach database skills, how about figuring out a different way for the public librarian to work with her?

Many public librarians have more money for materials and often have more freedom in collection development than schools, and they want to let the teachers and school librarians know about these items. Perhaps Ms. Koenig can meet up with the local librarian and develop opportunities to bridge the gap, rather than begrudge the public librarian the extended hand.

I just read your editorial about the importance of school librarians (April 2007, p. 11). You missed the most important part of school libraries: the students.

School librarians not only educate students, but also encounter many more young people on a day-to-day basis than the children’s/young adult librarians do in public libraries.

My former positions as children’s librarian and head of children’s services in public libraries were idyllic interludes compared to my current position of school librarian, with the waves of students passing through the school library every week.

It is our influence which creates future users/supporters of public libraries when these students become adults. Every time a bond issue passes, thank a school librarian (working independently and in isolation from other librarians) for some of those adults who actively support libraries.

In the Letters section of your May issue (p. 15), Bonnie Briceno defends parking her children in front of the Baby Einstein videos when she is too busy to interact with them. She opines, “Although I still don’t like the idea of a toddler in front of the TV, I know that it is at times a necessity.” Oh? It may come as a surprise to her, but there are a goodly number of us still drawing breath who were babies and toddlers before there was TV who somehow managed to grow up more or less intact, even though our parents were not able to constantly give us their full attention; the sainted Einstein himself never had the benefit of TV as his amazing young brain was forming.

The world is full of safe things to play with and learn from that provide small ones the opportunity for actual interaction, coordination development, etc.—they are called balls, blocks, crayons, stuffed animals, crib toys, board books, etc. Will your child be better off (a) watching TV, even “educational” TV, in the other room or (b) playing with alphabet blocks in the playpen or magnetic letters on the refrigerator while you sing to her or teach her nursery rhymes while you fry the pork chops? I submit to you that the answer to this question is clear.

On occasion, TV can nicely augment the other tools in our box of helpful child-raising aids, but we do ourselves and our progeny a great disservice if we forget that there’s a whole delightful world for little ones, explorable with minimal assistance from us, which does not happen in front of the screen.

“The lost arts of boyhood.” Are you kidding me? This book (The Dangerous Books for Boys, Collins, 2007; author interview appeared in Extra Helping, June 27, 2007) unscientifically and unabashedly presupposes that boys are hardwired for “dangerous” activities.

A quick glance at current sociological literature on boyhood will tell you that what we have situated as the norm is nothing more than gender socialization at work, and that boyhood is not so much a fact of biology as it is an economic and political construct.

Boys are doing miserably in school, specifically boys of color and working-class white boys. Their numbers are significantly down when compared to female peers in terms of college enrollment, persistence, and graduation. And here is where this reverence for boyhood “danger” concerns me: boys/men are four times more likely to commit suicide; are more likely to be the victims of a violent crime (at the hands of other men); are more likely to abuse alcohol and drugs; and they constitute more deaths in drowning, smoking, and motor vehicle deaths.

So, I assert that there doesn’t seem to be any lack of danger for boys—quite the opposite. But in order to sell books, these authors would have us believe that schools and society are creating weak boys who become weak men. We simply can’t have caring, intelligent, emotionally connected boys running around. What would that mean for the sexist-patriarchal structures that intend on keeping the oppression of women, people of color, gay people, and working-class people in tact?

What this book is ultimately saying, between the lines, is that femininity is secondary and inferior to masculinity, and it is to be feared by boys. To be feminine or gay is the greatest insult a boy/man can suffer. This is a message that when reinforced times over creates great danger for women and gay men. It strips the nonmasculine of all worth.

Why is it that what is good for girls (connectedness, emotional expressiveness, vulnerability, etc.) is not good for boys? Who made that ridiculous rule? I see boys in pain from their inability to be expressive or to show emotion, their lack of true connection with other men, their nagging sense of competition, and the specter of inadequacy. To truly set boys free doesn’t mean creating a gauntlet of danger for them, it means allowing them to be a full person.

I don’t know if you are aware of this, but iTunes has used a quote from your magazine to endorse this book. It reads, “...the overall premise is that action is fun and can be worth the risks.” I truly hope they have misquoted you. As a journal dedicated to the education of young people, I would think you’d see the nonsense in this type of thing.

I am wondering why we should go with the popular instead of the trusted. The advice from “Can We Make Peace with Wikipedia?” (June 2007, p. 26) makes me wonder if we are throwing in the towel for something that is quick, easy, and cheap, yet questionable in quality. As school library media specialists, aren’t we supposed to encourage students to use the best resources possible? It is sad to note that over a third of households are using a questionable source of information when most states pay for their residents to have access to edited and reliable databases free of charge and from home. The state of Pennsylvania sponsors AccessPower Library, which is a collection of databases for children and adults. Topics range from automobile maintenance to patient information. All that is needed to access this service from home is a library card. Maybe the article should have focused on methods of promoting the use of these state-sponsored databases. If no one uses them, why should taxpayers pay for them? Do we want them to go away? In addition, the rule of three sources for fact verification does not necessarily apply to Web sites. You can easily find multiple Web sites that replicate—that is, plagiarize—incorrect information on a particular topic. A better idea is to encourage students and their tax-paying parents to use edited online database sources first. Why begin with bad information?