ETL503 has illuminated the collection practices behind the The Teacher Librarian (TL) role in a school library which impacts across school communities. Australian research shows the inverse relationship between student to equivalent full time (EFT) library staff ratios and increased NAPLAN scores (School Library Association of Queensland, 2013, p. 6). Australia’s House of Representatives (2011) has detailed the importance to school libraries of buildings, collections, and qualified staff. The aspects of collections including: development, management, evaluation, as well as ethical and legal considerations do not always have clearly delineated boundaries but are all critical to effective function of library spaces.
I would like to move away from the limits of “the imperial origins of our information institutions constructed in the Western ideological ideal of taxonomic breadth, hierarchical control, and limited accessibility” (Sacha.juggler 2019 May 22) and the dichotomy of censor vs selector described in Jenkinson’s (2002, p. 22) work. Though the contemporary praxis is shown to be one of continues compromise (School Library Association of Queensland 2010) I aim to remedy this through collaboration as (Sacha.juggler 2019 March 24) “Firstly I advocate for the establishment of stakeholder advocacy groups empowered and emboldened to put forward items for the collection. Groups could consist of teachers, students, or parents and these bottom up organisations would be accountable to their peers and guided by the collection policy whatever process they used for decision making” though I would be ultimately responsible through my professional responsibilities to the selection criteria as the structural reforms for alternatives would be beyond most principals.
The importance of a written collection policy lies in its process of creation and implementation. As every library collection exists for a different audience the policy must be constructed individually for that community while taking account of best practice such as Australian Library and Information Association Schools and Victorian Catholic Teacher Librarians (2017) recommendations. The creation attunes the policy to the vision, mission, and objectives of the institution and needs to be endorsed by the executive in order to provide authority to the outcome. The implementation allows for resilient processes and outcomes not vulnerable to challenge from ignorance, fear, or bigotry. This is critical to the ethical duty of the school library towards providing open access to diverse viewpoints.
ETL503 has shown me the depth of complexity of collection practices such as evaluation through collection mapping, regular stocktaking, the perils of selection and acquisition and the pains of weeding. Also that “The TL is the steward of the collection which can be collectively a significantly sized financial asset. Management of the funding resources therefore goes not only into acquisition but also maintenance and repair” (Sacha.juggler 2019 April 13) and there are never enough resources of staff and volunteers to complete all these tasks that the ideal library system would encompass so ruthless triage of priorities by professionals is essential. There is also not complete agreement in the best way to approach digital resources such as Ebooks as “established processes, relationships, and stability in how libraries made books available to their users which have been upended by the nature of the digital medium … Some … are refusing to engage in purchasing these works at all as the risk of corporate failure removing access to purchased works is too great” (Sacha.juggler 2019 April 14). Risks such as these must be encompassed in collection policy to future proof the resources held, the physical infrastructures that hold them, and the qualifications of the people who manage them as any lapse in in any one of these can lead to an inexorable decline of what can be delivered to the population that you serve.
The practitioner’s duty to the collection also includes legal and ethical considerations as well. Ethically librarians are needing to be “more assertive in their professional responsibilities to protect the free speech rights of their users” (Lukenbill 2007 P. 5) which in the Australian context (McCloy v New South Wales, 2015) means the right to political discussion which has been interpreted as encompassing International, federal, state and local issues which implies all topics should be able to be discussed and therefore resources from diverse views should be provided on all topics possible in the collection as according to the collection policy. The largest key legal issues discussed in ETL503 were issues of copyright and licensing. The former of which is part of the specialty of a TL and needs to be constantly promulgated to staff and students. The latter of which encompasses sourcing the most advantageous licenses for the school community and reading all the small print carefully to minimise hidden costs or unethical clauses like being able to use the information generated by interactions with the licensor to further monetise, limit, or exploit the school community.
Reference list
Australian Library and Information Association Schools and Victorian Catholic Teacher Librarians. (2017). Manual for Developing Policies and Procedures in Australian School Library Resource Centres. Retrieved from https://www.alia.org.au/sites/default/files/ALIA%20Schools%20policies%20and%20procedures%20manual_FINAL.pdf
House of Representatives. (2011). School libraries and teacher librarians in 21st century Australia. Canberra:Commonwealth of Australia. Retrieved from http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/House_of_Representatives_Committees?url=ee/schoollibraries/report.htm
Jenkinson, D. (2002). Selection and censorship: It’s simple arithmetic. School libraries in Canada, 2(4), 22. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.csu.edu.au/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lih&AN=7277053&site=ehost-live
Lukenbill, W.B. (2007). Censorship: What do school library specialists really know? School Library Media Research, 10. Retrieved from http://www.ala.org/aasl/sites/ala.org.aasl/files/content/aaslpubsandjournals/slr/vol10/SLMR_Censorship_V10.pdf
McCloy v New South Wales 2015 257 CLR 17
Sacha.juggler. (2019 March 15) Reflections for Information Professional Transformation [Blog post] Retrieved from https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/sachareflections/
School Library Association of Queensland. (2010). Primary School Case Studies. Retrieved from https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=2ahUKEwi5nZyPwrHiAhVUg-YKHUf6C0AQFjAAegQIARAC&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aph.gov.au%2FParliamentary_Business%2FCommittees%2FHouse_of_Representatives_Committees%3Furl%3Dee%2Fschoollibraries%2Fsubs%2Fsub283.1.pdf&usg=AOvVaw0uttzRW8H4LFHgn_Q7h9tK
School Library Association of Queensland. (2013). School libraries, teacher-librarians and their contribution to student literacy in Gold Coast schools. Queensland: School Library Association of Queensland. Retrieved from https://eprints.qut.edu.au/60260/37/60260a.pdf