Vision & Philosophy 

Library Media Center Mission Statement:

The mission of the school library media center is to support the educational goals of the school, establish the foundation for a lifelong love of reading, and ensure that students and faculty are effective users of ideas, information, and technology.

Library Media Center Vision & Philosophy:

The school library media center should commit to providing an inviting environment in which students may develop their knowledge, abilities, and interests through access to diverse resources, experiences, and perspectives.  The media center program should strive to be the foundation of the total school program by serving as the central location for teaching and learning.  Collaborative planning should be regularly practiced in order to effectively integrate technology and information literacy skills into meaningful contexts within the curriculum. The media center should be well-organized according to standard accepted practice and adequate space should be designated to allow for individuals, small groups, and large groups to work simultaneously.

The library media specialist should model and promote intellectual freedom, patron privacy, and adherance to copyright laws.  She should recommend and select appropriate print, nonprint, and electronic materials based on patron requests and curriculum needs.  Collection analysis data should also be analyzed to ensure that the media center collection is balanced in format and content to reflect multicultural influences.  She should work to remove all barriers to equitable access of the center's materials and services by embracing policies that support flexible scheduling and inter-library loans.  Central to her role should be the responsibility to use a variety of strategies to promote leisure reading. The library media specialist should model her own personal enjoyment of reading in order to promote a contagious enthusiasm for literacy within the entire learning community.

Library Media Center Goals:

The following general goals will provide focus for the library media center program in order to support the mission, vision, and philosophy: 

• maintain an attractive, intellectually stimulating media center atmosphere.
• regularly attend faculty and grade level meetings to work towards aligning information literacy standards with the school's goals and objectives.
• partner with other teachers and educators to co-plan, co-teach, and co-assess information skills instruction.
• model and teach technology integrated lessons to faculty, staff, and students.
• advocate for inter-shelving of all student resources according to the Dewey Decimal System.
• develop a media center floor plan that allows for individuals, small groups, and whole classes to work side by side.
• model and teach ethical and legal practices in regards to copyright, privacy, and intellectual freedom of ideas and property.
• develop and maintain a manageable method of compiling materials to be considered for purchase.
• develop and maintain a current program development and evaluation plan to regularly analyze program policy, procedure, and operation effectiveness.
• use collection analysis circulation system features to assess collection balance in regards to diversity of format, content, perspectives, and multiculturalism.
• proactively seek out barriers to information and/or service access and investigate ways to eliminate them with colleagues and fellow educators.
• educate school personnel on the benefits of flexible scheduling and demonstrate its effectiveness towards enhancing student achievement.
• advocate for county wide resource sharing between schools and the local public library.
• join GLMA and ALA and attend available media/technology conferences to stay abreast of new trends in literature, teaching, program practices, and technology.
•  incorporate GPSs for each grade level into information literacy lessons, collaborative units, and "story-times" whenever applicable.
• continually model personal love for reading through media center policies, practices, and programs.
  

Educational Philosophy:

I believe that all children can learn and experience academic success regardless of their gender, race, culture, country of origin, abilities, disabilities, or socio-economic status.  It is up to us as educators, to meet students wherever they are educationally and provide the scaffolding and support they need to reach their highest potential.  I believe the differences between students should be embraced rather than conformed to meet unrealistic ideals.  We must differentiate our instructional strategies and work to give every child what "they" need to succeed!

I believe that educators should prepare students to become life-long learners and help them to realize that learning doesn't have to stop when they step off the bus, graduate from high school, or graduate from college the first time.  Thousands of non-traditional students like me are perfect examples for the lesson that learning and growing academically doesn't have to end.  Empowering them to take their life into their own hands and make changes to the parts they don't like rather than blaming their situation or parents.  Educators should model and emphasize personal goal-setting and career planning from primary school to high school to help students aspire to accomplish more than the generations before them.  Daring them to make their dreams a reality through hard work, discipline, and the love and support of those around them!

Finally, I believe that in this electronic age of twenty-four hour cartoon channels, televisions in every bedroom, DVD players inside every vehicle, and video games in every hand, it is more important *now* than ever before that educators teach students how to enjoy the simple pleasures of reading!  We need to teach students to make pictures in their minds rather than watching them on a screen.  We must model and promote good reading habits constantly in order for students to consider discussing a good novel with friends as normal as sending a text message or playing their game cube.   I believe that too often today, too much emphasis is put on assessing what students "got" out of what they read instead of celebrating how a book simply made them "feel!" 

Program Goals and Objectives:

When I was accepted to the school library media master's program in the summer of 2003, my main goal was to obtain the master's degree necessary to become a media specialist.  I desperately needed to get out of a job I was burned out doing (self-contained elementary school classroom teacher) and into the career I had always dreamed of having (school library media specialist)!  It simply seemed to me at the time, that by working as a media specialist, I would be able to to continue doing the things I loved (teaching, reading books to children, organizing things, using technology) while eliminating the things I hated (grading papers, writing lesson plans, conferencing with parents).  Also, having worked with three different elementary school media specialists over the years, I had often looked at their jobs from afar and thought about things I would have liked to have done differently had I been them;-).  I found out very quickly however, that there was a lot more to a media specialist's job than I had ever imagined (I also found out that I would still have to write lesson plans;(!  

The UGA school library media program has taught me that running a successful elementary school LMC takes much, *much* more than putting great books that I like to read in the hands of children with a smile!  I have learned that it takes balancing the roles of teacher, instructional partner, information specialist, and program administrator with the behind the scenes jobs of careful cataloger, equipment repairman, unit designer, and education researcher (just to name a few).  After almost four years in the SLM program, I have finally accomplished my goal of becoming a "real" school library media specialist and am about to graduate with a master's degree from my alma mater, UGA!  Along the way, with the patient support of many wonderful professors, I have grown to understand, appreciate, and adore, the career I always knew I wanted.  Although, it's much more diverse and challenging than I expected when I started out, I have quickly realized that it's "the toughest job I'll ever love!"