Management Matters. Losing Readers Is Worse than Losing Books

Equity remains one of the most significant concepts when deciding how to develop library procedures and manage resources. In addition to our many hats, we are now called upon to be equity warriors. We hold the perfect position to welcome all students into a safe learning environment that supports them in their personal growth and academic development. It is our charge to provide equal access to books and other resources to support our students in their personal growth and academic development. The discussions taking place around equity usually lead us to a central theme of diversity in our collections. However, as we consider our role as librarians we must also connect book selection and choice as equity issues.

At a recent professional development session, we asked librarians to name their most important role. Unanimously they felt that getting the right books into students' hands is one of our highest priorities. So, what stops that from happening? Are there practices in our libraries that prevent that from happening? What happens in school libraries to prevent students from getting books?

Do we have students who are

• living between two homes,
• living with several other families,
• voracious readers,
• struggling with executive functioning skills,
• involved in several after-school activities, or
• required to babysit younger siblings after school?

We never know everything that our students are going through outside the school walls. We need to consider how library practices affect individual students. What message are we sending by limiting the number of book checkouts with random criteria like grade or genre section? Turning students away at the circulation desk, or worse, calling them out in front of the class because they haven't returned a book for whatever reason, sends the message that the rules are more important than the students.

Teaching Responsibility

Many library programs indicate that they charge fines to teach children responsibility. But, our question is whose job is it to teach responsibility? Along the same lines, who learns responsibility when we charge fines to people who don't work? We can benefit from the research of the public library systems who have considered or are considering the elimination of late fines. The San Diego Public Library has come to realize that fines become a barrier to library patron access. While patrons will still have to pay for damaged materials or long overdues, the library is proud to provide renewed access to almost 40% of underprivileged patrons by removing overdue fees and forgiving fines (https://www.sandiego.gov/nolatefees).

As we have come to realize in our schools, the practices that are designed to promote responsibility often hurt the students who need library access the most. The more crucial impact may be damaging the relationship with students and their perception of the library— both of which might have a lifelong impact. We want to encourage book checkout and free choice reading which have been shown to promote children's literacy growth. Limiting the number and types of books students may select and applying fines for overdues take away the free choice that we can give our students.

Keeping Them as Readers

In our observations, as students' progress through school, they have less and less teacher-scheduled library time. Students who have poor experiences in the library in their early years decide not to go there of their own volition when they are older. They won't check out books or ask for help finding resources. They won't come to the library if they aren't scheduled with their teachers. Because we realize that everyone needs library access regardless of their educational stage, or home situation, we must work to build the relationships that will make access a reality for all students. One way to keep students as readers is to examine our library practices and spaces. The library is one of a very few places that students can come to exercise their decision-making skills by selecting books they want, deciding where to sit, or choosing what they want to learn. We have to provide this space for them at all costs.

Building positive relationships in student-centered environments is vital to keeping students. Now is the time to challenge our own ideas of what a library program should be. This might mean that the policies and rules need to be changed. We can reimagine the library as a place that meets the needs of our current students. This might mean that the practices and rules need to be changed. As librarians, we are the people who can say YES! As we examine our practices for communicating with students, let's use an equity lens and decide that we will be gateways for students to access the materials and information they need. We can also choose to create environments that attract students so that they will want to come and access the most important resource in their school libraries—YOU!