From old school to new profession

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From old school to new profession

• Hazel James
• Assistant Librarian
• Dame Alice Owens School, Potters Bar
• Presentation for CILIP Careers Development
  Group/Diversity Group
• New Professionals Conference, 6 July 2009

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An opening thought

• I dont get it. Why do I need to do this
  survey?Isnt it obvious to everyone that we have
  to have our school library to do all our school
  work. Its impossible to do without it, thats
  for sure.
• (unnamed respondent to the Ohio School Libraries
  study student survey, 2003)

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The bad news

• Into battle for school libraries
• Save our books
• Authors fight to preserve school library
• Schools philistine plan to close library
• School library fears spark petition
• Authors lobby government for statutory school
  libraries

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and the good
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The New Professional

• Freshness of perspective
• Participant in shared occupational endeavour
• Ethical values
• Responsibility for own practice and development

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The secondary education sector today (1)

• Specialist schools
• Academies
• Occupational settings
• Further education colleges
• International qualifications
• Vocational training
• Faith schools
• Sixth-form colleges
• Independent schools

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The secondary education sector today (2)
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A framework of school processes

• Leading at every level
• Managing
• Creating a fit environment
• Learning, teaching and assessing
• Developing staff
• Self-evaluating and critically reviewing
• Brighouse and Woods, 2008. What Makes a Good
  School Now? London Network Continuum.

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UNESCO/IFLA School Library Manifesto (1999)

• The school library provides information and
  ideas that are fundamental to functioning
  successfully in todays information and
  knowledge-based society. The school library
  equips students with life-long learning skills
  and develops the imagination, enabling them to
  live as responsible citizens.
• www.unesco.org/webworld/libraries/manifestos/schoo
  l_manifesto.html

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CILIP Role Description for School Librarian (2009)

• Advise on policies for the provision of learning
  resources across the curriculum
• Mediate between learners and resources
• Lead the teaching of transferable information
  skills
• Manage and promote resources
• Promote reading and literacy skills
• Manage a study environment
• Enable teaching staffs professional development
• Participate in school-wide improvement
• Collaborate with feeder schools
• Work with other school partners (FE, Connexions)
• Support the engagement of parents/carers in
  childrens learning
• Involve the library in family learning
• Ensure that the library supports all aspects of
  Every Child Matters
• Abridged from CILIP (2009). 21st Century Schools
  A World-Class Education for Every Child. The
  Response of the Chartered Institute of Library
  Information Professionals. Online London
  CILIP.

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School processes and the role of the librarian

• Leading at every level
• Advise on policies for the provision of learning
  resources across the curriculum
• Lead the teaching of transferable information
  skills
• Collaborate with feeder schools
• Work with other school partners (FE, Connexions)
• Managing
• Manage and promote resources
• Creating a fit environment
• Manage a study environment
• Learning, teaching and assessing
• Mediate between learners and resources
• Support the engagement of parents/carers in
  childrens learning
• Involve the library in family learning
• Developing staff
• Enable teaching staffs professional development

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Impact of School Libraries on Achievement and
Learning

• The presence of a librarian and quality and
  frequency of their instructional input has an
  impact on learning but the relationship between
  this and qualifications and personal attributes
  and experience is less clear. However, school
  librarians who take a professional and proactive
  approach to their role within the school can cite
  evidence of their impact on teaching and
  learning and are more able to reflect,
  self-evaluate and develop further.
• Williams, Wavell and Coles (2001). Impact of
  School Libraries on Achievement and Learning
  Critical literature review of the impact of
  school library services on achievement and
  learning ().Online. Aberdeen The Robert
  Gordon University.

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The view of Ofsted

• In the most effective primary and secondary
  schools visited, libraries and well trained
  specialist librarians had a positive impact on
  teaching and learning.
• Ofsted (2006). Good school libraries making a
  difference to learning. Online. London Ofsted.

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Opportunities for the New Professional

• Inherently worthwhile
• Worthwhile career step too
• Full exercise and development of professional
  skills
• Excitement and fun!

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The current generation of New Professionals

• Youth and diversity
• Have grown up with the information revolution
• Global, borderless experience
• Comfortable but critical perspective on both
  print and ICT
• Traditional librarianship skills and new media
  savvy
• Ideal mediators

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The New Professionals new workplace bargain

• They () know they will not work at the same job
  for life, because they have learned early on that
  no job lasts forever. They know that they will
  have to maintain a steep learning curve for years
  to come, regenerating old skill sets and gaining
  new ones. They will have to stay ahead of changes
  by preparing for their next position even as they
  begin their current one, because they never know
  when the librarys budget is going to be cut or
  their position eliminated.
• Urgo (2000). Developing Information Leaders
  harnessing the talents of Generation X. East
  Grinstead Bowker-Saur.

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Challenges for the New Professional (1)

• Variation in occupational setting
• Fragmented workforce
• Entry

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A New Professionals perspective

• () school librarianship was never really
  presented to me as an option when I was doing my
  MA. I applied for a job because my job was
  deleted due to Public Library cuts and I saw an
  advert at a school in the CILIP Gazette. I wasnt
  sure if schools were where I wanted to be (but it
  turned out to be the ideal place for me!).
• Anonymous e-mail correspondent, 20/05/2009

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Challenges for the New Professional (2)

• Pay and status
• Progression

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Another New Professionals perspective

• I do worry that the prospects for school
  libraries are somewhat bleak () Im concerned
  that I might not be able to get a job which pays
  enough in the future (). There isnt much scope
  for me to work my way up a payscale as I get
  older, unlike in other professions (..) The
  biggest thing I feel is that I need to be
  flexible in the future to gain as many skills
  as possible, keep up with new technologies and
  developments, keep up with what is happening in
  the Education world, and to keep proving to my
  managers how invaluable I am! I feel like I have
  to continuously validate my existence, otherwise
  I might find myself out of a job.
• Anonymous e-mail correspondent, 20/05/2009

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Day-to-day challenges
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Conclusion

• Not an ideal opportunity but a real opportunity
• Genuinely critical situation at a key moment
• Real opportunity to exercise and develop as
  professional
• Information provision here not an end in itself
  but rather means for students engagement with
  the world and the self

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Day-to-day inspiration
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A closing thought

• Literacy allows access to a huge force for
  development. When an adult in a remote village
  rejoices that ABC is mastered, it isnt just
  because books bring the world to them books
  bring them, in new ways, to themselves. If the
  new reader is a child the situation seems even
  more charged with promise. We grow yet more
  certain that the book in hand is a tool of
  growth. Fictions onward movement fuses there,
  not with the ordinary traffic of our existence,
  but with the accelerated coming-to-be that we do
  in childhood.
• Spufford (2002). The Child that Books Built.
  London Faber and Faber.