Option 1: Merging the Public & MBSS Library (at the Public Library)
PROS:
- Saves on space at the main MBSS campus
- May save on budget items – books, computers, staffing
CONS:
- MBSS Library is not on site (out of site-out of mind) – less student use, less project use, less leisure reading circulation
- How will our students get to the Public Library?
o Crossing a main road – liability issues
o Driving – liability issues
o Winter conditions – much worse that accessing a Portable – time to get winter clothing, ice issues
- Who will our students meet at the Public Library?
o Grade 9 students mixing with the homeless men who use the Library as a drop-in and napping place (unless they are all over at the MBSS cafeteria having coffee with our students there)
o Preschool children coming to the Public Library for Storytime will get to meet our 50 to 60 students doing their adolescent thing in a relatively small space
- Who will supervise and help our students do research at the Public Library?
o Public Librarians won’t know our students, won’t be aware of the curriculum, won’t have any authority or experience in controlling/disciplining our students and may or may not be backed up by classroom teachers who may or may not accompany their students to the Library. The planning committee may be unaware of the control necessary to keep a good school library functioning successfully. It involves more than opening the door in the morning.
o The Public Library is not designed for 50 students arriving at one time to work on one project in a fairly noisy atmosphere. Their mandate is to serve the entire community largely on a one-to-one basis
Option 2: MBSS Library in the MBSS Building
PROS:
- Active fiction reading, book circulation, actual promotion of LITERACY, a stated goal of the Ministry of Education
- The Library in the actual school provides another supervised Safe Place for one segment of our school population – this is why the current Library, like the Gym or the Music Room, is filled with students before school and at lunch. It is their Place of Peace.
- A school library provides a facility designed to be an integral part of the SCHOOL – suitable for large group work, individual research, leisure reading, stations projects, computer use and lots more. If there is no easy access to this facility students won’t come and the library program will soon die. Not unlike moving the Drama program, the Foods program, the P.E program or the Music program to the College of the Rockies.
- At present the Library provides supervised access to most of the student use computers in the school. This function will obviously change within the 50 year timeline we are being asked to consider when planning our new school. Twenty years ago we depended on books and magazines for research. I don’t have a clue what will be ‘The Thing’ in 50 years – but where there are students there should be books and libraries and supervised places to do research. Some things you just need to have inside the school – washrooms too! I don’t want to be running over to the mall all the time just so we can save space!
CONS:
- Takes up space the MBSS
- May require more budget for books, resources and staffing.
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YOUR OWN IDEAS: some things to think about
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YOUR OWN IDEAS: some things to think about
For each item, circle your preferred choice, scratch what you don’t want, indicate details or better alternatives in the space provided.
Highlight the really vital stuff. Need more room? Create your own document!
OPTION 1: keeping the library in the building
Pros | Cons |
- easier access, even on the spur of the moment - our own space, designed for our students first and foremost - easier interactions between teacher-librarian and colleagues - teachers and students will use it more - best way to defend books against digital sources | - will take a lot of space and money, when there is a similar facility 2 blocks away |
WHAT WOULD MAKE IT WORK:
1. The room
Furniture: Counter / Tables and chairs / Couches / Armchairs / shelves
LOTS of space to put all that stuff and keep the place pleasant
Office space:
Computer lab(s) or stations
Storage:
Windows: yes big / small blinds:
Special doors?
Sink / kitchen?
Meeting rooms
Particular security features?
2. Technology:
video projector / TV / smartscreen
computers: laptops desktops PC / Mac
other items:
3. Location:
ground level / first floor / second floor
near department(s)
central: yes / no / whatever
near admin: yes / no / whatever
near counselling: yes / no / whatever
near computer lab: yes / no / whatever
near exit: yes / no / whatever
near washrooms: yes / no / whatever
4. Other:
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OPTION 2: merging our library with the public library
Pros | Cons |
- more space and money for something else - more interactions with the community - our students increasingly resist using books, we might as well embrace the trend and favour newer technologies: will we even have books in 2025? Are they worth defending? | - would teachers take their classes 2 blocks away? - more time wasted moving around, more lates - more attendance issues: some kids would get “lost” between buildings - the more kids have to walk across those streets, the more chances we take with traffic... especially when they’re gonna run late - some students would simply never go: computer labs will be so much more convenient! - would we still have a teacher-librarian? - would we ever see that poor soul? |
WHAT WOULD MAKE IT WORK:
Necessary modifications to the public library
Different use of staff
Removing the Library from the building is not a good idea. I'm all for partnerships with the community where practical/feasible but I have to temper my response to this idea. I thought the idea of the "Community of Learning was to bring people into the building, not ship the students out of the building. At the present time our school libraryoften has up to 3 full classes in it during some blocks. This is in addition to the students who are doing distributed learning courses and those finishing class projects. The numbers tell us that there are often upwards of 60 students in the library. No public facility wants/can hold 60+ of our students in addition to their regular clients. Our students are not always on their best behaviour, this can and will be more of a problem with this format. When the weather gets warmer less and less students will make the 2 block hike to the library;unless we make them hold hands or herd them with border collies.
ReplyDeleteI didn't write the comment from Anonymous 7:57, but I certainly agree with the content!
ReplyDeleteWe all knwo what it's like to get a group of schoolers to walk a few blocks away. If we want a Library to be weidely used, we need to have it in the school
ReplyDeleteI totally think the library should stay in Baker, Its common ground for all my friends
ReplyDeleteif the library was merged with the public one, some people would defiontly wander off and go do their own thing
ReplyDeleteand some students can be VERY noisy, which would disturb other people
(it's annoying enough as is, with other students just hanging out in the library and chatting so loudly that i cant get any work done)
The library should definitely stay in the school.
ReplyDeleteHere are some suggestions for the new MBSS Library from last year:
ReplyDeleteLibrary Requirements for the New School March 2009
1) SPACE – who knows what the demands of the future will be – you can rebuild/ re-organize just about anything – but you can rarely get more SQUARE FOOTAGE!!!!
2) Wireless Internet access throughout and multiple power points for people to plug in their laptops and other devices.
3) Lots of Individual Study Carrols throughout the Library for individual quiet student use – wired to allow for laptop use.
4) Large Table seating area for class use with large screen TV, movie screen, White Board wall clearly visible from all tables.
5) Comfortable seating area separated from large table area with small tables, soft chairs, magazines, fiction book display, wireless internet and floor power points.
6) Several banks of computers on tables in the Library proper separating Large Table area from Comfortable Seating area.
7) An area for Reference Books and Non-Fiction stacks (for now, at least)
8) Docking/Charging stations for Portable Laptop Carts.
9) Natural Light – WINDOWS – are important.
10) Two or Three adjoining rooms similar in size to our current Seminar Room to allow for multiple class use. Clear sight lines into these rooms are very important. These rooms could be used for group meetings, as computer labs, even as places for Distributed Learning students to work. Ideally there would be two or three rooms as large as our current Seminar Room and one at least as large as the current Career Centre. Placement needs to allow for Emergency Exit as well as clear visibility from the Library proper. If the Library is located at the end of a hallway it could provide secondary access to (and supervision of) the two rooms on either side of the hall before the Library entrance.
11) Office and Storage Area – this doesn’t have to be huge but should be right by the Circulation Desk with lots of windows.
12) COFFEE BAR adjoining the Library to provide coffee (and maybe biscotti!) for students working in the Library Comfortable Seating Area. Work Experience students can run the Coffee Bar and money can be generated through coffee sales.
*** Library / Resource Centre/ Media Centre / Presentation Centre – it may be called many things and the uses will definitely change in the coming years. Portable laptops and/or reading devices (like the Kindle) may replace the books. Main thing is the Library needs to be BIG and WIRED with multiple power points.
The library is often used as a public gathering place and where teachers meet for the staff meetings and other important information gatherings. The library should be the heart of the school - I agree that it is a "safe place" for students - it is the most widely used space in the school, for instruction and general student, staff and community use. Taking it away is not a good idea.
ReplyDeleteI definitly think that we should have our own library in the school. I think the public one would be so much of a hastle
ReplyDeletethe library should stay within the school. The library is good for students to get information from. The library should bigger with more computers for the classes within the school.
ReplyDeleteI absolutely agree with all previous positive comments! A school library is ESSENTIAL and should NEVER BE OMITTED from a plan. Natural light, comfortable, easy seating, room to think, lab kiosks, large tabletop spaces, wired for any and all future needs, enough computers for large class sizes with no waiting . . . an easy-access facility full of endless knowledge, catering to the young, hungry minds that consider it "their library".
ReplyDeleteI think that (if my kids are an indication) the bulk of the reading that kids do now are on computers and hand held devices. I firmly believe that the traditional library will in the very near future go the way of the dinosaur. I have been in our public library on two occasions recently and could not see any more than ten people on either occasion. I think that it would be very short sighted to include another traditional library with thousands of books and have our students doing all of their reading on their I-Pads while all of the books take up space and gather dust. Lets move our kids into the future (or at least the present)and give them the tools to survive in a rapidly changing techno world.I say give our kids a modern up to date technology driven research centre and do away with the library that I graduated from.Accept it people in the words of an icon from the baby boomer high school era (which has not taken hold here in Cranbrook)The times they are a changing. Lets allow our kids to change with them
ReplyDeleteThe thought of schools without libraries is very scary to me as both a parent of small children and as a teacher! And not just because they wouldn't be properly supervised while going off school property - that is besides the point...
ReplyDeleteMaybe every book doesn't get pulled off the shelf in a year - but the fact that they are readily available, RELIABLE sources of information is what's important. I love seeing kids take books out of the library and READ - shutting off their phones/computers/ipads/ipods and actually enjoy reading anywhere/anytime - Not just skimming/scrolling/googling the answer to a question in 1 minute instead of finding it by reading through information. There is a time and place for that.
The school library can change and "stay with the times" by adapting and having more computers/laptops etc... But eliminating it and putting that responsibility on the Public Library seems rediculous. It is true that a lot of research is done via internet now... but I don't think we will see in our lifetime a world without books so why take them away from our teens now?