Include

          On April 9^th, 2019, I met with Karen Donovan, the librarian at Sandhills Middle School, to discuss the AASL National School Library Standards for Learners, School Librarians, and School Libraries Shared Foundations. Mrs Donovan chose to the Shared Foundation II., Include.  As with Ms. Scaglione, I asked Mrs. Donovan the questions outlined in our instructions and recorded her answers. The Competencies address the following statements:

A.   Think - School librarians direct learners to contribute a balanced perspective when participating in a learning community.

B.   Create - School librarians establish opportunities for learners to adjust their awareness of the global learning community.

C.   Share - School librarians facilitate experiences in which learners exhibit empathy and tolerance for diverse ideas.

D.  Grow - School librarians explicitly lead learners to demonstrate empathy and equity in knowledge building within the global learning community.

         

          When asked what some of the ways were that she was implementing the Shared Foundation Include Competencies into her library program, Mrs. Donovan spoke at length on her collection development. She talked about having several focus collections that she made sure her students spent time exploring.  She told me that when she came to her school, there were no books for or about LGBTQ students.  She further stated that the collection had only a few Spanish language books.  As she settled into her school, she built up both a section for LGBTQ and Spanish books.  Further, she added titles about diversity.  Mrs. Donovan explained that at the beginning of school year, as students come for library orientation, she does a book tasting that includes these books.  This helps her get her students to understand that all types of perspectives are valued and accepted. 

         The resources she uses to promote a global perspective and teach empathy are these focus collections, but she also pointed out that she has many, many digital copies of books that students can check out or peruse online.  Mrs. Donovan also talked about how she does collaborate with teachers very often and in many of these joint lessons she teaches directly towards tolerance and empathy.  I actually witnessed one of these lessons when I spent the day with her in March.  On this day she and another teacher were teaching about primary sources, but part of the lesson included looking at Jewish heritage documents from the Holocaust.

         When I asked Mrs. Donovan if she had faced any challenges while trying to implement Competencies, she said no.  Mrs. Donovan has a strong personality and has been at Sandhills Middle for six years.  She has gained a reputation for being highly professional and is very respected by both the school administration and district officials.  She has made her program the epitome of what, I think, the AASL Standards exemplify.  I believe this is partially because of the force of her personality and beliefs.  Also, I believe she has had much success because she had very supportive administrators early on when she was beginning to create her program.  As the years have passed and new administrators have cycled through, each set immediately recognized that she was a great asset and has relied on her judgment and professionalism to do things her own way.  This was a very refreshing thing to see.