Page1

In a perfect world, school library media centers have unlimited budgets with the latest technology. They are staffed with full-time professional school librarians, paraprofessionals, and a district media director. The students, staff, and community understand the breadth and depth of the school librarian's job. However, in this world of economic woes, many school librarians are clearly not in a perfect world. IF they have kept a job, many have seen their time and energy split between multiple buildings, sometimes with no paraprofessional or district media director. How does one serve multiple schools and "empower learners," as AASL recommends?

Though serving multiple schools isn't a perfect plan, it is possible to impact students, inspire teachers, and stay sane. Think about how an emergency room works in a hospital. The staff never knows what will happen, but they typically handle even amputated limbs with aplomb. They prioritize the needs of the patients and the most critical take precedence over the less needy. They stay calmly personable. Let that philosophy provide the guide as you serve multiple sites.

An emergency room staff does not make up things in the moment. Long before a real emergency happens, lots of preparation has been done. The same goes for school librarians in these difficult times. //Empowering Learners:Guidelines for School Library Programs// and //Standards for the 21st Century Learner in Action from AASL// provide great starting points for painting a picture of what excellent inquiry education should look like and give strategies to help that happen.

First, a vision is recommended by both sources. Build this vision with input from you, your students, your staff, and your administrators. Inquire about their expectations and priorities. Surveys will give you data, but they also give new ideas to others about possible professional services. Use the information gathered to map out where you are and where you want to be. Knowing their priorities and being aware of your personal strengths and time commitments provide you a framework in which to work. Set priorities. Focus on curriculum and student achievement. Emphasize professional services. Then set steps in place to move from where you are to where you would like the program to be at the end of the school year and where you would like it to be in three years. Share your vision with your administrator and at least a few key teachers. Remember, every journey starts with one small step.

Another element of preparation is a collection development procedure (CDP) or policy manual, including all details about the operation of each library. If you can make similar CDPs for all buildings, it will simplify your life and help you be consistent about decision-making, purchasing, and programming. If your district has a challenge procedure, include it in your policy manual; if one does not exist, make one. Share this CDP with your principal and library support staff, if you have any; some questions that arise while you are at a different building may be answered with this document.

Emergency room personnel work as a team. A school librarian can never successfully work in a vacuum, but one serving multiple buildings relies on these outside relationships even more. Build collaborative relationships in each school with teachers, parents, and students. Start with one or two teachers that you determine are leaders in the schools and are open to collaborative planning. Many times this will encourage others to jump on the bandwagon when they witness successful projects. This will take time, but taking that time up front to build relationships will pay off all year long. Keep in touch via voicemail, email or texting. Most people are willing to be involved, if it doesn't mean more committee meetings. These people will help you be attuned to building priorities and decisions, and they give you a voice in local meetings when you are unable to attend them. Do go to curriculum/back-to-school nights at the schools so parents see your involvement there.

Some of the team members with whom you will work most closely are paraprofessionals and volunteers. Since you cannot be on-site all of the time, be sure policies clearly state expectations. They need to understand what questions and concerns they can address and which ones should be passed on to you or the building principal. Take time to talk to assistants and provide inservice opportunities for them. The more they understand, the better the program will run. One danger of a multiple school situation is assistants that do not follow the program you have set in place and undermine what should be happening routinely. Having clearly written policies posted helps everyone to know the expectations and makes them more likely to be followed. Also, have schedules posted in all of your schools, so people know when to expect you at that location.

One more important lesson to take from the ER is this: some things are best left to the specialist. Do the collection development for each school. If you have paraprofessionals in the schools, they certainly can have input, but choosing the materials remains your responsibility as the trained professional. You may choose to build the collections differently from one another, based on use or curriculum emphasis or you may make them very similar because the needs are so much the same. No one else will have the excellent overview of the students, staff and curriculum as the library media specialist. Also, direct the library instruction programs in all of your buildings. Resist the temptation to assign teaching roles to library assistants in your absence; their lack of knowledge hurts your students, as well as negates your importance.

Hospital ERs take advantage of technology tools to efficiently diagnose and provide patients with the best care. Put technology on your side in your compromised situation. Use an electronic calendar to track your collaborations, your programs, and meetings with staff. The calendar also can assist you in creating your year-end report, providing a record of your professional service. If you do not have schoolwide networking, utilize flash drives to take important files from building to building. Spreadsheets can help you track lots of data, including when you've taught specific lessons and to whom, as well as budget and programming details.

Tools like Skype or videoconferencing equipment can allow you to actually be in two places at one time. You can provide information to groups of students in different locations and then they can discuss it between themselves. These tools can also provide special opportunities to multiple schools at once. An author visit, a sister school discussion on the weather,or a virtual field trip can all be orchestrated from one site, but include all of your buildings if they have similar types of students. Creating instructive videos with Flip cameras, Mimio software, or online video tools like Animoto allow students to receive your lessons, even when you are in another building. These items can be available 24/7 so students may reference them at any time. Creating lessons in a reusable format also provides you a record that allows you to be sure you did include everything you wanted to say and can be easily updated in the future. They can also become professional development for teachers, as you use technology that is new to them.

Another important thing to do that is similar to a hospital ER is create an annual report telling all you have done throughout the year. Though this is important in any situation, an annual report shows stakeholders your work and it can act as a tourniquet in stopping further cuts to your program. Share it with the administrators and the teachers. If you have a website, post it there for parents and students to view. People need to see all you have accomplished and annual reports give those facts. In this accountability climate, we need to show we make a positive difference.

Emergency rooms are front line operations. Many "amenities" provided in other departments are low priority here. So what are some less critical activities that need to be pushed down on your ER list? Go back and consult that survey. Standards and curriculum should be given priority. If your principal still feels bulletin boards and library decorations are an important duty, try to delegate to volunteers with an artistic eye. They will love what they do and you probably will like it, too. They need to know your philosophies, so the displays reflect them, but volunteers can make that happen without you taking hours to cut letters or put things up. Be sure shelves are marked clearly and then teach volunteer and older students to shelve books. Teachers within each school and some volunteers need to know how to circulate materials. Most automated systems have different levels of security now, so give them the ability to check items in and out, but lock down the more detailed operations.

Working in the triage unit of school libraries has some definite ups. When you create your lessons plans, based on state and national standards, as well as local curriculum guides, you can use them in all your schools serving the same grade levels. When you create a recreational reading tracking program, inquiry process, or young authors experience, programming can be very similar in various schools and you've done the legwork only once. If your multiple school assignment involves grade levels that feed into one another, you know what instruction the students have received since you delivered it. That eliminates students saying they were never taught a particular concept. Also, take advantage of the broad view you have of your school system. Very few employees have the insight you do by seeing life from so many points of view. Use this information to improve communication between buildings and to assist with district-wide implementations.

As you serve multiple sites, sometimes it is important to make it clear what you could do if you were available full time. Share your willingness to work on special projects, but avoid changing your scheduled days to accommodate various requests. Don't whine, just state the facts. When in multiple buildings, you really can't provide all the same services as you did in one school. Sowing those seeds of vision may eventually grow into a shared goal to return your district to the full services of a school librarian in each school.

So how do you effectively serve your "emergency room" libraries? Prioritize. Make professional services the first main concern. Build collaboratively relationships. Keep connected to your professional organizations. Focus on instruction. Use today's technology. Accept your realities. Most of all, enjoy your students and staff members.

Resources

//Empowering learners: guidelines for school library media programs//. (2009). Chicago: American Library Association.

American Association of School Librarians. (2007) . Standards for the 21st-Century Learner. Retrieved June 7, 2011. []

.