AZ May Rethink Axing Librarians

There's still hope for school librarians in Mesa, AZ. The district's governing board—which has proposed eliminating all media specialists over the next three years—now says it's open to other suggestions.

That's great news to Ann Dutton Ewbank, a librarian at Arizona State University and the key organizer of the Fund Our Future Arizona movement to save the district's media specialists.

As alternatives, Ewbank and other library supporters are proposing the creation of several regional librarians to oversee the new library aides who will replace the exiting 78 certified media specialists now working in schools. Another suggestion is to have certified librarians distributed over several schools, Ewbank says.

It's still unclear how much money the proposals will save. Mesa Public Schools hope to cut $1.2 million of their total $20 million budget deficit by axing school librarians.

“We're trying to keep the cuts from zeroing out teacher librarians,” says Ewbank, explaining that it would be easier to reinstate library positions in the future if there were at least some remaining. “It's not good enough, but it's going to have to be given the reality of the situation.”

To help their cause, some 60 supporters showed up at a May 13 rally in downtown Mesa, to attend a second rally and gather more names for a statewide petition in support of strong school libraries. So far, 1,200 signatures have been collected and the goal is to obtain 10,000, Ewbank says.

Arizona doesn't have dedicated funds for school libraries or mandate certified media specialists at any grade.