Advocacy
Course
The Importance of Advocacy [13:51]
- Learn the definition of advocacy and why it is a crucial part of achieving your library's goals.
- Learn to understand the values of your audience.
- Learn more about advocacy through a case study involving MAME.
Advocacy is not something we do once or even just as the need arises. It's something that we need to do on an ongoing basis. Why is that? Because it's all about building partnerships, and that's not something you do overnight, occasionally, or when the mood strikes you, but something you must build over time and work to sustain. If you've ever collaborated with another educator in your building, you know that it takes time to get to know your colleagues and develop the trust you need to work with them, even if they jump at the chance to work with you right off the bat. The more you work with them, get to know them, understand their needs, values and approaches, the more effective and meaningful your collaborations will become. That's because strong relationships are a factor of trust, and although there are many ways to develop and demonstrate trust. According to a 2003 study, the importance of personal connections that develop over time cannot be understated.
The next part of the AASL definition of advocacy is the phrase "so that others will act for and with you." The goal in advocacy is not about informing people what you have to offer. It's about encouraging them to support you. Whether it's supporting you to grow the program, to speak against cuts to the library, or to request funding or resources for a particular goal. When you are advocating, you're asking for others to act. You are, as it says at the end of the AASL definition, "turning passive support into educated action." This is the part that most separates advocacy from marketing. Public relations and marketing are focused on encouraging people to want to use your resources and services in a school library that can certainly involve the development of relationships and be ongoing. But that's where the overlap ends.
One more thing. There's a misconception out there that to be a good advocate, you must be outgoing. Although you certainly do need to be able to communicate effectively, you do not need to be a socialite to be a successful advocate. Just like teaching and running a library, advocacy involves a set of skills that can be learned. There are many kinds of librarians out there—outgoing, introverted, shy, boisterous, quiet and loud—and they can all be successful librarians. The same is true for advocacy. Personality is not what matters, it's all about communication.
Let's discuss one of the most overlooked dimensions of the advocacy process: influence. To be an effective advocate, you must be able to influence your decision makers. That is, you must be able to convince them that your ask is worth their time and effort. Later we'll talk about how to identify your decision makers and developing your message. But for now, say you'd like the money to diversify the library collection. Whether your budget is set by your administrator, your school board, or your PTA, how do you convince that party that additional funding will benefit the library and by extension, the entire school community?
It's simple to say the best argument wins. Yet people do not make decisions based on logic alone. As Sloman and Fernbach explain in The Knowledge Illusion, "instead of appreciating complexity, people tend to affiliate with one or another social dogma because our knowledge is enmeshed with that of others. The community shapes our beliefs and attitudes. It is so hard to reject an opinion shared by our peers that too often we don't even try to evaluate claims based on their merits. We let our group do our thinking for us."
So how do you counter that groupthink? How do you counter cognitive bias? The fact that people tend to only accept facts that align with their existing beliefs. How do you influence someone who comes to the table with opposite views? It all comes down to understanding their values and then using a variety of approaches data, stories, emotional appeals to connect their values to your goal. Let me give you an example.
An elementary school librarian weeds their library. It's something we all need to do once in a while to maintain a robust, up to date collection that will meet the needs of the school community. But this school probably hadn't been weeded in over 20 years, and it showed as they started to remove the books. One of the teachers asked why we would get rid of all those wonderful books. After explaining the purpose of weeding and showing the type of books being removed (books that were falling apart, hadn't been used in decades were out of date), I came to realize that this was not an argument to be won by logic. I began to understand that she held a value, that books were sacred. Physical books, no matter their condition or content, were to be valued. To turn her into a supporter of the library. I needed to change my approach. The next time her class came to the library, I handed her a cart full of books I had removed from the collection. Of course, I did not give her anything that was out of date or biased or too badly damaged—mold is bad no matter where it is—but I did give her a set of books that she could use. However she wanted to. In her classroom. Library I pointed out the new book I had just read to the kids that day that they all loved and said, "the library is overflowing. I'd really like to make room on the shelves for wonderful new books like the one we read today. I'd like to make sure our learners can see and find them easily. So they will continue to love books and reading. Could you take these other books off my hands so we can make room?"
Not only did I appeal to her love of books as objects to be loved and appreciated, but I called on her to help me in my mission (even if that help wasn't really needed). This allowed her to feel like she was rescuing these books and supporting the library to.
Influence is not about winning and it's not about convincing someone else they are wrong. And you are right. You won't get far if that's how you think. Instead, it's about how showing them that their support of your cause aligns with their values. The trick is to find the connection.
Let's take a few minutes and look at a case study in advocacy involving the Michigan Association for media and education, or MAMA.
The Michigan Association for Media and Education is the professional organization for school librarians. In 2016, the Michigan legislature passed a third grade reading bill that specified that students not reading on grade level at the end of the third grade would begin being held back at the end of the 2019-2020 school year. MAME was concerned that students did not have the services they needed to become successful, since in 2020 according to Lester, at the time, only 8% of Michigan schools employed a full-time certified school librarian, and approximately 65% of Michigan schools had no library staff.
Under the leadership of Kathy Lester, the MAME advocacy committee began a campaign to combat this issue. They began and continue to work building partnerships in their state with decision makers such as state legislators, superintendents and school administrators. They develop general talking points that advocates could use in their communications.
In an email conversation with Kathy Lester, she shared that depending on their audience, they might reorder their talking points or put emphasis on one element over another. For example, with high school principals, they might emphasize college and career readiness, whereas with elementary school principals, they might emphasize reading achievement.
Just as important as the message was listening to the audience. Listening is crucial to building relationships. It tells your audience that you care about them and what they have to say. It helps you learn what your audience values and what's important to them. And you may receive suggestions or ideas that you wouldn't have otherwise if you weren't open to listening. To continue reading this case study, complete the activity included with this lesson.
Remember, advocacy is not a specific goal, it's an ongoing journey. MAME did not get their 2018 legislation passed, but statistics show that the numbers of media specialists in Michigan was raising slightly each year until the pandemic. Even if MAME had been successful in passing their proposed legislation in 2018, that would not have been the end of the journey. Next, they would have needed to help educate school leaders about what that legislation meant, or how school librarians could be a part of school success. Advocacy may be ongoing, but don't forget to mark those milestones and celebrate those successes. You deserve it.
To truly engage in advocacy, you must go beyond program promotion and work to change others perceptions of the school library and the school librarian. You must educate your stakeholders and decision makers so that they will support the library, not just with kind words or feelings, but with action. To do this, you must engage in consistent, deliberate relationship building. These are not straightforward activities. You will experience twists and turns. New people will come into decision making roles. And people you have worked with to develop relationships will depart. There will be strides forward and sometimes steps back. You can't always know what you say or did affected someone, but what you can know is that if you are persistent and patient and find opportunities in the circumstances around you, your efforts will be rewarded.
Advocacy is something that we need to do on an ongoing basis; it is all about building relationships and encouraging those relationships to support you in your goal. The first step in your advocacy journey is identifying your advocacy goal and how it will benefit your community. Reach for the stars with your advocacy goal and then, after working with your supporters and decision makers, fine tune as needed to best reach your audience.
To start your advocacy journey, you must first know what you are advocating for! The more specific you can be, the easier it will be to develop an advocacy plan, because specificity will allow you to focus your energies on the people and organizations that can influence your desired result. Using the chart on page 2 of the Course Packet (found in the Resources above), begin to identify your advocacy goal and explain why it's important to your community.
MLA Citation
Rinio, Deborah. "Advocacy: Identify Your Advocacy Goal." School Library Connection, December 2022, schoollibraryconnection.com/Content/Course/2293915?learningModuleId=2293921&topicCenterId=2247902.
Entry ID: 2293922
In this lesson, we looked at a case study involving the Michigan Association for Media in Education and their work to advocate against a third grade reading bill that was passed by the Michigan legislature stating that at the end of third grade, children not reading at grade level would be held back. MAME worked under the leadership of Kathy Lester and the MAME Advocacy Committee to battle this issue. Kathy shares many ways to advocate for your library and work with your decision makers.
Advocacy is not a straight forward journey. After reading more about this case study on page 3 of the Course Packet (found on page 3 of the Resources above) and looking at the relationships that Kathy and the advocacy committee formed throughout their battle, use the chart provided on page 3 to reflect on your relationships and if there are any branches leading to new relationships to be formed to help further your advocacy goal. The more relationships you can build from existing relationships, the further your message is spread--and hopefully supported.
MLA Citation
Rinio, Deborah. "Advocacy: Relationship Building." School Library Connection, December 2022, schoollibraryconnection.com/Content/Course/2293915?learningModuleId=2293921&topicCenterId=2247902.
Entry ID: 2295444
Additional Resources
About the Author
MLA Citation
Rinio, Deborah. "Advocacy. The Importance of Advocacy [13:51]." School Library Connection, ABC-CLIO, December 2022, schoollibraryconnection.com/Content/Course/2293915?learningModuleId=2293921&topicCenterId=2247902.
https://schoollibraryconnection.com/Content/Course/2293915?learningModuleId=2293921&topicCenterId=2247902
Entry ID: 2293915