Dragon ladies and other elephants in the room
I’ve been using LibraryThing on and off since Deb asked me to write an article about LibraryThing’s usefulness in school libraries for SLMAM in January 2008. (Click on the LibraryThing categories in the sidebar for additional musings by my colleague Roberta Sibley and me on this topic.) I got in a better habit of posting my latest reads when we incorporated it into the children’s literature class we were teaching.
Today, I got a surprise comment on my LT profile:
Just from looking at your library I want to replicate you and bring you to my elementary school as our media specialist. We have one of those dragon ladies who likes the media best with no kids in it - it has the atmosphere of a cemetary and my students are terrified to go browse for books. sigh…….
Now, of course I like being flattered, even though my LibraryThing account is a tiny representation of who I am as a librarian. (This fellow LT member has never seen the ever-accumulating pile of stuff-I-was-just-sure-I’d-take-care-of-that-day near my office door that has been there since December vacation, my lackadaisical overdue notice schedule, or the cockeyed ceiling tile in the Storytime area, a souvenir from the time I let kids use the space to film a football demonstration video. Loose shoe + football demo = conversation piece.)
But then I got a wave of sadness. This isn’t the first time that I’ve gotten a compliment and had the conversation instantly segue into, “I like you, and especially because I don’t like our librarian.”
Does this happen to you? That when someone finds out that you’re a school librarian, they instantly tell you how crummy their/their child’s school librarian is? It’s awfully sad. (In past years, when I answered, “English teacher” when someone asked my profession, people started confessing their distaste for/lack of skill with grammar, but they didn’t point the finger at someone else.)
AASL Advocacy calls this situation “The Elephant in the Room” and points out that we have to be realistic that when we are publicizing libraries and librarians and recognize that we may have folks remaining in our profession who aren’t doing that vision a service.
On one hand, being a school library media specialist is one of the most entrepreneurial jobs in K-12 education. Those in the profession who want to create a dynamic space/program generally have some flexibility to make that happen. What other teacher has access to and freedom to spend as much money as we do? But what do we do about those who are not interested/able to do so? Unlike real entrepreneurship, there’s little incentive — beyond the pension/retirement benefits at the end of the 30-year road — for those folks to change. Their incentive may be simply to make it until that pension kicks in.
I’m watching HGTV as I write this. I just heard Angelo Surmelis of Rate My Space describe the kitchen as “the heart of the home.” Hmmm … think he makes makeover house calls to the dragon ladies in “the heart of the school”?
If not, what strategies do we have to pull along those who want to stay put?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Additional resources on the Elephant in the Room from AASL Advocacy:
- AASL Blog post, “The Disposable Librarian” an excellent articulation of this issue.
- Blog post: “Houston, We Have a Problem”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
February 2nd, 2009 at 9:35 pm
As a first year librarian and classroom teacher for ten years, I too take it as a compliment when teachers tell me they like the way their student’s library visits are friendly and open compared to last year’s visits. Through experiences I have learned that all makeovers are surface. The room, house, or person look wonderful. So how do you makeover the heart and mind? Classroom teachers and librarians alike need to be open to change. Look at what other teachers and librarians are doing. What do you like about their classroom or library? Try it on for a change. Just like a shoe, you won’t know how it feels until you wear it for awhile.