Prior to their Colloquium presentation, Laura Fleming and Shannon McClintock Miller sat down with Dr. Valenza and RASL for an informal Q&A session. Between the three of them, they have 65 years of library experience—in both school and public libraries. Laura was a classroom teacher for 7 years and has spent the past 10 years in school libraries and also serves as a library consultant. Shannon has 8 years of library experience and works as a consultant as well. This is a summary of our discussion, not verbatim.
Q: As school librarians, what was your relationship with the public librarians?
JV: It depended on the situation. Clearly the hope was that there was a collaboration between them, but sometimes there was conflict or jealousy over who has the biggest budget. I know that the public librarian was resentful of my position as a school librarian with access to a larger budget.
SM: Speaking of budgets, my school library had an annual budget of $1,000. [To Laura,] you once told me your budget amount and I nearly fell off my chair. When budgets are an issue, you have to take advantage of those free resources available like Symbaloo. But to your question, my relationship with the public librarian was fantastic. When I started, I had just been a stay-at-home mom. I had experience with the school system as a parent and as an artist, but had not been in the classroom. My first year, I decided to close the library over the summer to reorganize the materials. I switched my non-fiction section to category-based, away from Dewey. While my library was closed, I formed a partnership with the public library and got a ton of ebooks for students to use at the public library. This became such a great relationship that I think my assistant librarian was scared that I was going to replace her with the public librarian. After switching my nonfiction to category-based classification, circulation rose 30% in the first month. Kids were not just checking out more books, but they were also reading more broadly, from sections they never had explored before. Parents and teachers were also more present in the library and circulating materials. Good, effective signage is all you need after this kind of switch. Shortly after the success of moving away from Dewey in non-fiction, I genrefied the fiction as well.
Q: How did you become consultants? Do you see just libraries that are in trouble? Can you talk about some of the trends you see happening right now from your work in consulting? I’m interested in consulting in general.
LF: Libraries do not necessarily have to have a “problem” to call upon a consultant. But, many libraries that I have worked with will Skype me in to their library and show me this gorgeous facility that they are very proud of…and no one is inside.
SM: Exactly. And, pertaining to consulting, I was just in California and I’m heading to Australia and elsewhere later this year. These are jobs that developed because of my presence on Twitter. One of the best things you can do as a librarian is to be active in the online community.
JV: Yes! We can’t tell you enough how important it is to get involved on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, TLchat (the chat hashtag for school librarians on Twitter)! In fact, because your professional presence online is so important we are having a professional photographer take LinkedIn profile photos for anyone who wishes to partake at one of our colloquia. Dress nice!
Q: What’s a curating tool you can’t live without?
JV: I use LibGuides. I’m a big fan of them.
SM: Symbaloo. Definitely Symbaloo. I also use MackinVIA with Destiny.
LF: Pinterest as well. That’s really popular now. Have you used it? Yeah, everyone is using it right now. It’s great. It’s popular with the students too and they enjoy it.
Q: What are your thoughts on ebooks? Don’t some kids just prefer paper books?
SM: In my library, the move to digital was because of how outdated the non-fiction section was. I did massive weeding after my first year. 800 titles went to 500. I did not spend any of my budget on fiction because that is not what the students used my library for; they got that from the public library. Then 500 titles became 200. Then finally 200 became zero. The more accurate and relevant non-fiction materials were online, and my school in Iowa has access to a consortium of free digital content. So, my non-fiction library is bookless.
LF: This year we got a new principal, and this principal has told me that he wants to have an entirely bookless library. So, I know that is where I am headed. Some students do prefer print materials and that is a challenge, and I encourage them to speak out and voice their opinion about what is happening to the collection in the library because it is for them.
RASL thanks Shannon and Laura for joining. Their Colloquium presentation was inspiring!
Please visit Shannon Miller’s blog The Library Voice and Laura Fleming’s Worlds of Learning.