The Innovative School Librarian: Thinking Outside the Box

Citation

Herring, J.E. (2010), "The Innovative School Librarian: Thinking Outside the Box", Library Review, Vol. 59 No. 4, pp. 304-305. https://doi.org/10.1108/00242531011038604

Sharon Markless and her team have produced a book for school librarians, also known as teacher librarians (e.g. Australia) or school library media specialists (e.g. USA) in some countries, which encourages these school‐based library professionals “to stand back from their day‐to‐day activity” and to critically evaluate their “values, philosophy and what defines their professional practice”. The emphasis in this book is on reflection rather than everyday practice. In a book of 156 pages with fairly large print, plus references and appendices, this is a big ask, and while school library practitioners around the world can certainly benefit from reading this book, they may feel slightly short‐changed by the lack of depth in some areas. There is no doubt that school librarians should read this book because, in this reviewer's experience, school librarians are often so busy meeting the demands of a complex school community – students, teachers, management, parents, the local community – that they have little time to stop and reflect. The novelist John Updike stated that the most difficult part of being a writer was convincing others that he was working hardest when staring out of the window, wondering what he might write. For school librarians, like their counterparts in other sectors of the library world, being innovative (as the title of this book suggests they should be) requires taking a hard look at what their role actually is and what it might be in the future.

The book starts with a chapter that will challenge many of its readers as it relates to professionalism, asking “Who is the librarian?” The chapter discusses three discourses – managerialism i.e. what the school management wants the school librarian to do and involves an emphasis on resource management and evaluation; technical‐rationalism i.e. the role of the school librarian in organising and providing resources and the authors rightly criticise this discourse as limiting the creative or innovative role of the school librarian; and social democracy i.e. an emphasis on “collaborative leadership, shared decision‐making” and responsibility for meeting the varied needs of students. The authors conclude that school librarians should reflect on their own view of what kind of professional they want to be.

The second chapter reviews how the role of the school librarian is influenced by others in the school community and focuses on how the role of the school librarian may be viewed differently by different sections of that community. The chapter concludes that school librarians need not only to take into account the perceptions of others, but also to change these perceptions (where negative) by providing excellent services and evaluating how effective these services are, especially to students. The third chapter examines ways of “bridging the gap” between the school librarian's view of his/herself and the perceptions of others. This chapter, like other chapters, contains some very useful vignettes e.g. “Kate had been at her school for many years… ” and these help to illustrate the points being made.

The second part of the book focuses on ways in which school librarians can gain a better understanding of their school communities and therefore, improve their practice. Chapters on community profiling and being a learning professional raise a range of issues to be considered by the school librarian in relational to his/her role. The third part of the book “Moving forward” is the real heart of the book, where school librarians are asked to examine how they might become inspired by their own achievements or ideas, by other school librarians and by students and teachers in the school. The final two chapters on becoming an integral part of the school and on being innovative are full of interesting and challenging ideas for school librarians.

Overall, this is an important book for school librarians, as it provides the basis for an evaluation of the school librarian's role, as a strategic planner, as a developer of information literate students, as an ICT leader and innovator and as an inspiration to students.