Mice or Lions?

We are constantly being told that the library is the heart of the school, the key to learning, good qualified librarians are vital to the progress and advancement of the educational vision of the country, but who is saying this? Is it just the polemic of closeted librarians sitting in their echo chamber repeating the same thing over and over again to their own audience with a few celebrities and authors waxing lyrical about the joy of reading and their fond memories of libraries as a source of inspiration. So why isn’t the message getting through to the schools and colleges who seem to be hell bent on chipping away at the priceless resource that they possess. Undermining their own foundation and leaving a hollow space. If we want an outstanding label for our institution, don’t we need an outstanding library?

There seems to be little awareness of what an incredible resource the library represents. How we can support independent learning, improve engagement, improve attainment, provide a safe place, boost literacy.  

We have huge resources in terms of print and online resources and staff with the skills to assist with the use of these resources.

 There is a gulf between the library and the chalk face. How can we bridge this gulf?

Partly I think it is a failure of communication and librarians are probably not completely innocent in this. There is a tendency to hide away in our libraries, not necessarily connecting with teaching staff or management staff if we can possibly avoid it. We are a strange hybrid, the students see us as staff, the staff see us as technicians who stamp books. We might see ourselves as the custodians of knowledge and the facilitators of research, but that is not the image we present to the world. Self-promotion does not come easy to us, but it is something we need to learn. Especially if we are to protect the precious asset of the school library from the eroding tides of cost cutting and rationalization. Librarians are not naturally charismatic, we don’t stand out, if anything we prefer to hide, like library mice. (I know there are exceptions to this, I am really talking about myself here). But what is needed in this current environment is not mice, but lions! 

The Future of Libraries in an Electronic Age

Can libraries continue to function and serve their purpose as a repository of knowledge and a heart of research in a digital age? Why use books when you can Google it? Why come to a physical place called a library when you can access the internet from the comfort of your PC? These are the kind of questions being asked of the library service at the current time and I will try to answer them according to my own knowledge and experience.

Libraries, as learning resource centres, are responsible for the provision of resources of all kinds. Increasingly these resources are digital. It is vital for library staff to be conversant with these.  As well as an impressive collection of print resources, in the ENSFC library we have 18 computers. These carry the potential to access vast amounts of information. However there are dangers inherent in this boundless access to knowledge. It is not just a question of quantity of available information, but its quality and reliability. Most people are aware of the limitations of Wikipedia. It is often the first point of call when researching a subject, but how far can such a resource be trusted? How many students are tempted just to cut and paste (maybe altering the wording a little bit in the belief they will get away with it). It is partly the librarian’s task to educate students about the nature of information available and how they can learn to assess its worth. Google something and you can be swamped in an ocean of references most of which will be irrelevant, some will be misleading, in the often vain hope of finding a glint of gold in the bottom of the pan. Librarians can provide the guidance needed to get authoritative, useful materials without drowning in a sea of irrelevancies.

Part of a librarian’s task is in selecting and enabling student’s access to the most trusted and reliable sources available. By providing this service the Learning Resources Centre becomes a place where students can start their research from a strong position. The Moodle library page is becoming a useful portal to a range of paid for resources  including The Oxford English Dictionary online, The Times digital archives 1785-1985, Infotrac  newspapers, Up to date issues  statistics for the social sciences, Philip Allan Update review magazine to support a range of A level subjects, and free resources such as  including 3000 eBooks through  the Jisc ebooks for FE project ebray, and http://core.kmi.open.ac.uk/search  which allows access to literally millions of scholarly papers. I have recently added a link to an Open University resource http://www.open.ac.uk/libraryservices/beingdigital/?ONEML=pf1873&MEDIA=pf0910os_1121 called “being digital” which offers good step by step advice on using the internet for research and the values and pitfalls of social networking.  New resources are continuously being added as they become available. In some ways the problem now is not the quantity of quality resources, but in enabling students to structure their research questions to make best use of what is available.

One area in which the print resources of the library excel is in the matter of art materials. We have a large collection of big format art and photography books which are in constant use. However, the internet can also give access to a huge number of visual resources. Another link I have just added onto the library Moodle page is the http://www.googleartproject.com/ – giving access to over 184 collections many from major museums and art galleries. You can view them on your screen in fantastic detail or even walk the corridors street view style (but without the crowds).

Academic libraries are places where students can work in a supportive environment where excessive noise and disruptive behaviour is discouraged .Libraries; especially academic libraries have always been places where individuals can receive guidance as to how to access the information they need.

The future

What I have just described isn’t the future, it is the present. Libraries are changing and it is vitally important that we embrace change and the huge new possibilities and opportunities which are presenting themselves.

Primarily we need to ensure that the students receive training in the use of information services. They need to be well versed and familiar with the dangers and pitfalls of relying on poorly referenced materials gleaned from the internet. They need to know where to go to find accurate and reliable data, correctly cite their sources and avoid plagiarism.

Also students need to know how to structure their research so they are not overwhelmed by the sheer volume of material available.

We must be open to the use of social networking applications. This may be controversial and there are strong arguments on both sides. Many feel that social networking is largely negative in an educational setting, merely providing distraction from the tasks in hand. Therefore access to face book and twitter are often blocked on college computers. However, it is important to be open to the positive aspects of social networking that the value of collaborative working and research. It is clearly an area about which there will continue to be a great deal of discussion in coming years. I use both applications to keep up to date with news of book awards, specific authors, literary events and news and innovations in the learning resources sector.  I follow other librarians and information professionals and subscribe to several blogs which provide useful ideas and suggestions from the experience of others in this sector. Useful and entertaining news items often find their way to the Moodle book news forum.

We must also be open to including more eBooks in our collection. The ebray is a trusted source for nonfiction, but perhaps we should consider sourcing more fiction books online?  I have included a link to http://www.booksshouldbefree.com/ on our library page and read an interesting article recently about the use of kindles in a school’s library to encourage reluctant readers. This remains an area of debate. However I am deeply committed to the promotion of literacy and anything which supports reading is to be encouraged.

Books are not dead; they are merely a part of the resources the library provides.

 “The evidence continues to accumulate that libraries – and their librarians – lie absolutely at the heart of 3^rd millennium learning organisations: a place for scholarship, a place to escape into adventures, a place of discovery, a place to share and explore, a place for deep thought, a place for surprise and above all a place without limits. The best schools have libraries at their centres not as some sad throwback to an earlier age but as a clear and evocative prototype of what ambitious learning might look like in this century of learning.”

 Professor Stephen Heppell (quoted in http://www.cilip.org.uk/news-media/pages/news072010.aspx )

Pam Riley

Learning Resources Coordinator

East Norfolk Sixth Form College

Holocaust Memorial Day

This is the blog I wrote to go with our library display:

It is Holocaust Memorial Day tomorrow and we have set up a display in the library to mark this. The theme this year is Speak Up, Speak Out and the emphasis is not just on remembering the terrible events of the genocide of Jews and others under the Nazi regime, but to be aware of current events happening around the world.  The books selected are a mixture of factual history, biography, and responses such as photography, plays, novels and graphic novels. Please browse these, they give different and thought provoking pictures of events.

The two photography books are subtle, not depicting the horrors of concentration camps and death but rather the impact of past events on the present: A feeling of absence, empty rail tracks leading to the gates of a deserted death camp; A pleasant suburban German street whose name records the ghost of the people who once lived there.

There are two books about Anne Frank, firstly her famous diary and secondly a collection of photographs depicting a lively teenager living in hiding up until their betrayal. . I have also included Schlindlers’ Ark, the film of which everyone should see, and The Girl in the Red Coat the account of one of Schlindler’s rescued Jews.

I have included two novels, even though I always feel slightly uncomfortable about the idea of fiction based on such stark real events.  It seems slightly wrong, as if the stories are being stolen from those who really own them. However, the Boy in Striped Pyjamas is worth reading. It captures the terrible innocence and vulnerability of childhood in clashing contrast to the evil madness of genocide. 

The plays include one called Kinder transport which makes my blood run cold. The terrible sacrifice of parents knowing their own situation was hopeless, packing their kids off on trains across Europe with sweet lies. “You’re going on Holiday, we will join you later, don’t worry.” How could the world let this happen? I saw the statue at Liverpool Street Station recently. I used to know a sweet old lady who used to send lovely presents to the children, she was a Kinder Transport orphan.

I also included 2 graphic novels: Maus and V for Vendetta which show a different reaction to events. V having become a bit of a rallying point for the anti-globalisation and occupy movement in recent months although it is based on a dystopian world in which the Nazi party wins.

When I was a teenager (it is possible) I took a gap year before university and spent some time in Israel working on a Kibbutz. I met elderly concentration camp survivors and was befriended by a Dutch couple. The man had escaped capture because although living in Holland when it was invaded, he had a British passport. So instead of being murdered as a Jew, he was interned as an enemy alien. This saved his life although he had the terrible awareness of knowing what was happening to everyone else while he was safe in internment. Whilst in Israel I visited the Yad Vashim Holocaust memorial museum in Jerusalem and was shocked by the accounts of boatloads of Jewish refugees being turned away by allied ports and having to return to certain death in Germany.

It is impossible to underestimate the horrors which humankind is capable of. It is also impossible to underestimate the courage and self-sacrifice which is possible. Another book on the display is Corrie-Ten Boom’s Hiding Place which tells the true story of a courageous Christian Dutch family who sheltered and helped many refugees to escape before being betrayed themselves.

There are also a wealth of Ebooks available, just write Holocaust in the library catalogue (OPAC) and click on them and follow the instructions.

Finally, the message of HMD 2012 is clear. Be prepared to Speak up and Speak out against injustice and inequality where ever we see it.

Books Used:

Boyne, John – the Boy in Stripped Pyjamas

Langham T Anne Frank - Beyond the Diary
 Ten Boom, Corrie The hiding place
Samuels, Diane, Kindertransport
Pascal, Julia The holocaust trilogy
Hiller, Susan; The J. Street Project, 2002-2005
Norfolk, Simon; Ignatieff, Michael For most of it I have no words : genocide - landscape -memory
Spiegelman, Art;The complete Maus

Keneally, T Schindler’s Ark

Moore, Alan; Lloyd, David (ill) V for Vendetta

How silently, how silently

Very short blog or rant about paralells between youth work cuts and library cuts.

Youth work should be a statutory responsibility of the state, like libraries.  I can see the parallels between the dissolution of  local youth work and its impact on young people’s moral and the chipping away at the foundations of our libraries with the inevitable consequence that will have on education and culture. Youth work needs professional qualified youth workers just as libraries need professional qualified librarians. Volunteers have their value in both settings but cannot replace the need for trained professionals, to suggest they can undervalues the importance of both services and cripples future development. The youth service in Waveney was dismantled quietly and quickly with barely a whimper. Partly it was our fault because we weren’t watching. My new academic year’s resolution is not to let that happen again. If we lose our libraries it won’t be without a lot of ineffectual shouting and banner waving, but it won’t be silently.

Pam Riley (Signpost Gunton  Trustee and occasional Dreamworx volunteer)

Silence in the Library...Stay out of the Shadows!

Spot the Dr Who reference, I am not that kind of librarian but I am feeling a bit disenchanted. Call it post conference blues. I had a fantastic time at umbrella, met some great people and came back thoroughly inspired only to encounter the cold shower of reality. It's all very well to believe yourself that the library is the heart of the school/college, but sometimes difficult to get that over to senior management, who barely know it exists. Moan over, Umbrella was great, courtesy of the Affiliates Group who gave me sponsored place. Now I have the summer holidays to mull over the lessons I have learned, develop my online presence and formulate my plan of attack for September! That is if the kids, selling the house, and all the other things which rush in to fill my life when I am theoretically on holiday don't completely scupper my good intentions.  Thing 5 is reflective practise - some thing I think I am ok at to the extent that I spend too long examining my own navel rather than getting anything concrete done! Like most things it is all a matter of balance. Although I came back from Umbrella all fired up about Twitter and Facebook, I am still quite a long way from feeling entirely comfortable in this world. RSS feeds is ok, I like reading blog posts from people who interest me (at the moment Alan Gibbons campaigning against library cuts is good to follow) I also like checking out how libraries use facebook (Swansea library is a superb example) but on Twitter I am a follower rather than a tweeter, unless something comes up I really want to retweet or shout about. I seem to be taking the road of following everyone in sight until I realise that many are really not saying anything interesting anyway. Hopefully by a process of selection and judicious pruning I will end up with a list of tweets that is interesting and illuminating. I don't particularly like facebook for my own use but quite a few friends have twigged that I am on it and keep sending me loads of junk I don't really want. I will be interested to see if Google plus is any easier to control with it's groups and circles, although I have seen quite a few comments which indicate it might not be. At least I can choose my friends on facebook even if I don't really need to know what they had for dinner.  Sorry, not so much reflection as mindless rambling, it is the sun, I'm not used to it.

Why I am doing this

I have loved reading ever since I discovered that words in picture books could make sense and there was more to Janet and John than a series of nice pictures I could colour in or scribble on. I was pre-school and my Mum was bored and her sister in law was a primary teacher and sent her some school materials, so she decided to teach me to read. It was like giving a kid a box of matches, once I had lit one and been dazzled by the magical brightness, I had to light another and another, even if I occasionally burnt my fingers. One of the local libraries she took me to was based in an old hall of medieval origin full of dark wood and odd little corners, I wouldn’t have been surprised it there had been secret passages. It had a magical atmosphere; I remember a set of beautifully illustrated fairy books. They seemed to fit in to that library as if they had always been there.

 By the time I went to school I was annoyingly literate to the extent that I kept getting undeserved gold stars for reading the same books my Mum had introduced me to the year before. I do remember my Mum was horrified by the fact that my school had elected to use ITA and I was being taught how not to spell. She trotted up to school and complained resulting in me being taken out of that class. I had no idea what was going on, I thought the weird words were rather interesting. Anyway I have strong memories of being an early book addict, sneaking books and reading them under the desk during maths and French lessons, an eclectic mix of fantasy and animal books, a guilty pleasure.

 One of the first books I got out of a public library myself was Born Free by Joy Adamson. I think I was attracted by the photographic plates (black and white unfortunately) I loved the lions and my earliest ambition was to be a wildlife ranger in Kenya. I read it and the sequels even though I probably didn't understand a lot of it. I got the excitement of living in a camp in the African bush and the character of Elsa and the passion for wildlife of the Adamson’s. I was fortunate in being able to roam freely and not be restricted to the children’s section. And I do remember finding a rather gruesome book on pet first aid with rather graphic  advice. I also remember Orlando the Marmalade Cat from that period and I read the Narnia books, although the spiritual significance of them was lost on me at the time. I think I was about 8, and the library was a place of many treasures.

I never thought I would work in a library, I was going to save lions and tigers and camp in dangerous places. I was fascinated by the world, how it worked, the physical framework of the planet, I remember being introduced to the theory of plate tectonics, then quite a new and novel idea in schools. So I became a geographer and  went on to take a degree in geography at the only place I could find that would accept my rather arty A Levels on a course which would allow me to study physical geography as well as the rather tedious sociologically based human geography. I thoroughly enjoyed the course although I had no real idea of what I would do with it. My dream was to become a writer and create the magical worlds I had enjoyed in books, but I was and am a realist and knew the chances of that dream being fulfilled are remote. However, although I found  human geography tedious, I was interested in the nature of human communities, especially urban communities and somehow wound up doing a master’s degree in town planning at Oxford Polytechnic. I completed it and worked in housing for the next four years in an old coal mining community in Northumberland.

Then we moved south and while going through the roller coaster of infertility treatment, I took a step back to my degree subject and became an environmental science lecturer at the local FE college. I did this for 6 enjoyable years part time while adjusting to the consequences of successful IVF. I trained as teacher at this time and took my PGCE.

 Yes, I am an eternal student, I love to study and absorb information. When, after a career break,  I took a job in a library I felt as if I had come home. I have worked as a library assistant in a sixth form college library for the last five years. As I consider this to be where I belong I started looking into my status as a library professional. No one I worked with had any librarianship qualifications and although we were encouraged to look out for professional development (cost permitting) I had very little guidance as to what I should be doing to further my career.  After talking to the Cilip I was informed that because of my experience and past qualifications, I should be able to register for chartership .  I got myself a mentor in a local FE college and we have met twice. I also attended a portfolio building workshop in Cambridge last May and was fortunate enough to attend Umbrella 2011 courtesy of a sponsored place from the affiliates group. All in all I have had a busy year and if anyone out there is thinking about building up their career, being acknowledged and respected for what you already do and expanding your skills, meeting like minded people, don't hesitate. All being well I should submit my portfolio next September.