The statement is the culmination of two months of ALA’s intensive review and research, and forms ALA’s official response to the FCC’s notice of proposed rulemaking that aims to overhaul the E-rate program, the most comprehensive proceeding since the program’s 1997 inception. The statement, the ALA notes, is in line with with President Obama’s ConnectED goal for access to high-speed broadband and wireless for all America’s students through libraries and schools within five years.

“The nation is facing a sea change in what robust technology infrastructure can enable, and libraries are perfectly positioned to light the way forward and ensure no one is excluded from digital opportunity,” says ALA President Barbara Stripling. “America’s libraries must move from basic connectivity to high-capacity broadband so our students and our communities can compete globally. The E-rate program is essential for fulfilling this digital promise.”

America’s 16,417 public libraries serve more than 77 million computer users each year, yet only half of these multi-user outlets offer Internet speeds above the FCC’s home broadband recommendation of 4 Mbps. Through these Internet connections, libraries support the education, employment and e-government resources and services all increasingly moving to “the cloud,” ALA notes.

The ALA calls for new E-rate funding to jumpstart and sustain high-capacity and high-speed Internet connections that support digital learning and economic development through libraries and schools. The current funding cap on the program consistently falls far short of meeting basic demand for Internet-enabled education and learning services, and technology trends clearly show needs and future capabilities only are growing, ALA notes.

To address this, ALA says it supports a two-pronged approach: 1) New temporary funding to support the build-out of high-capacity broadband networks and provide increased support for libraries with the lowest levels of broadband connectivity. 2) A permanent increase in funding.

“Current funding does not reflect the economic reality faced by libraries and schools as they try to upgrade their broadband services,” says Emily Sheketoff, director of ALA’s Washington office. “This FCC proceeding provides an important opportunity to add more funding to the program and increase the value of the program to libraries, schools and our communities.”

ALA also urges the FCC to provide additional E-rate discounts for remote rural libraries, streamline the E-rate’s application review process; replace E-rate procurement rules with those of the applicable locality or state; lower barriers to deployment of dark and lit fiber and ownership of wide area networks when they are the most cost-effective ways to deliver broadband; work with libraries and schools to develop “scalable” bandwidth targets and benchmarks for measuring progress against these targets; and allow applicants to file an “evergreen” form for multi-year contracts.

“We commend the FCC Commissioners on their thoughtful and thorough invitation to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the E-rate program,” adds Marijke Visser, assistant director of the ALA Office for Information Technology Policy. “[ALA's] filing is clearly only the first step to an E-rate 2.0, and we look forward to engaging in the process over the coming months.”

Mahnaz Dar, Associate Editor, Library Journal

This week, I’m reading Kids These Days by Drew Perry (Algonquin). This novel about a couple awaiting their first child reminds me a bit of the indie film Away We Go, also about a rootless expectant thirtysomething pair. After Walt loses his job and Alice gives up hers, the couple move to Florida, where Walt will work for Alice’s brother-in-law, Mid. Sounds simple, but there’s already a strain of quirkiness running through this one (Mid just handed Walt a check for 30 grand to cover him and Alice for the next few months in lieu of a traditional paycheck and told him that part of his job entails checking up on a self-serve ice station once or twice a week).

From the SLJ and LJ archives, the varied list below includes recent feature articles, recommended book lists, and recommended digital resources on the history of September 11 for all ages (including books on helping young children explore hard topics), plus resources that explore the political landscape since that day for adults.

FOR CHILDREN

Not Fade Away: Ten years after 9/11
By Frances Harris. August 1, 2011. SLJ.
How do you teach kids about a tragedy they can’t remember?

Ten Years After: Interview with Don Brown
By Rocco Staino. September 7, 2011. SLJ.
SLJ talks to author-illustrator Don Brown about America Is Under Attack (Roaring Brook, 2011).

FOR ALL AGES

Straight to the Source
By Frances Harris. July 26, 2011. SLJ.
A collection of 9/11 resources for all ages, including official sites and archives.

FOR OLDER TEENS AND ADULTS

Pictures of 9/11
By Martha Cornog. August 17, 2011. LJ.
A dozen graphic novels exploring memories of the day, from a variety of viewpoints.

9/11 Resources
By Joyce Valenza. August 25, 2011. SLJ.
In this NeverEnding Search blog post, Valenza offers a host of digital resources.

Internet Archive Launches Site Dedicated to 9/11 TV News Coverage
By David Rapp. August 25, 2011. LJ.
“Understanding 9/11: A Television News Archive” offers television programming from that fateful day.

9/11 Ten Years On: 15 Titles
By Elizabeth R. Hayford. August 4, 2011. LJ.
This book list offers memoirs and other titles that look back on that fateful day and the years since.

For more, visit our September 11 resources page.

All of the TSLAC grants—a total of 70 for this fiscal year being given to public libraries, institutions of higher education, and related nonprofit organizations and programs—are funded by the federal Library Services and Technology Act via the Institute of Museum and Library Services in Washington, D.C. The grant period runs from September 1, 2013, to August 31, 2014.

“These grants will help improve library programs and services in communities and institutions all over Texas,” says TSLAC Interim Director and Librarian Edward Seidenberg. “These federal dollars augment local funds and help local libraries fulfill their roles as valuable community resources.”

Several of the awards will fund digitization, community reading, and family and early childhood literacy projects, while others will enhance access to information and services.

Two of the largest awards are a $75,000 Library Cooperation Grant to the University of North Texas for its Denton for Inquiry 4 Lifelong Learning (DI4LL) program, which will focus on information literacy skills of pre-kindergarten through graduate school learners, and the grant to the Round Rock system.

Round Rock’s planned Innovation Station will be a collaborative effort between the city of Round Rock, its local school district, and a local nonprofit.

Nearly 10,000 students at 20 local schools now have access to The Indianapolis Public Library’s collection of nearly two million items as part of the Library’s growing Shared System, an interlibrary collaboration that provides online circulation services and joint access to the catalogs and collections of member institutions.

[Clip]

Begun in 1995, the Shared System allows students to use their library cards to request materials from the Indy Library’s online catalog and from their own school library collections, and provides a delivery system that transports items between Indy Library branches and the schools. The Library also performs processing and cataloging services for the cooperative. It is the only such system in the United States that uses this cooperative model between schools and public libraries.

The Shared System includes a combination of private, public and charter schools along with a state school (Indiana School for the Deaf), and two local art museums (Eiteljorg Museum and the Indianapolis Museum of Art).

“This is a unique partnership that helps the Library support Marion County students by giving them more tools to access information and the resources they need,” said Sarah Batt, the Library’s Shared System Manager. “Schools can leverage their scarce resources by sharing the materials they purchase with each other.”

See Also: A History of the Shared System (via IPL)

See Also: Shared System Info Page (via IPL)

Meanwhile down in San Antonio, TX, at LoneStarCon 3, the 71st World Science Fiction  Convention, John Scalzi and Branden Sanderson were honored with 2013 Hugo Awards, one of sf’s most recognizable and prestigious literary prizes. The rocket ship trophy for Best Novel went to Scalzi’s Red Shirts: A Novel with Three Codas, a satirical look at  a certain 1960s TV sf show, on which the lower-ranking crewmen of a particular starship always died on away missions. And Sanderson’s The Emperor’s Soul, a standalone fantasy set in the same world depicted in Elantris, was named Best Novella. Newcomer Mur Lafferty (The Shambling Guide to New York City) received the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Author.

If the Nobel Prize for Literature committee’s picks are criticized for being too obscure and elitist, the Hugo Awards have the opposite problem: they are—gasp— too populist. Unlike the other sf awards, like the Arthur C Clarke award, the Campbell Awards, and the Kitschies, which are decided by an appointed jury, the Hugos are voted on by WorldCon attendees. And that’s the rub. The Guardian blogger David Barnett reports that few awards divide opinion as much as the Hugos, which come under fire from critics every year both for its quasi-democratic voting system and  its winners. Too often these winners, critics say, are  “The Usual Suspects”: the biggest-selling names with the biggest fans.

Still despite the criticism, the Hugos have also recognized standout titles of strong literary merit (Paolo Bacigalup’s The WindUp  Girl; Jo Walton’s Among Others) And Barnett argues that these awards still serve a vital function in a genre often overlooked by  more mainstream critics and readers. “Personally, I’ve always liked the Hugos, purely because they do follow the populist line. The sf world is richly represented by awards that honor different works for different reasons. The Clarkes go for the big, cerebral sf novels of the year. The Kitschies give a nod to the edgy and unconventional. The Hugos celebrate the popular. In a genre whose fanbase is often seen as elitist, this is a very good thing—especially when it comes to perhaps opening it up to a wider, mainstream audience.”

Six weeks after cautioning it could shutter 22 public libraries, Miami-Dade County has found a way to keep all 49 facilities open at least some of the time, offering stripped-down services.

In all, 169 librarians would lose their jobs by Oct. 1, and libraries would operate about three-quarters of the hours they do now, Mayor Carlos Gimenez informed county commissioners late Friday

More in the Complete Article

UPDATE: The Miami Herald has published an op/ed by the Mayor of Miami-Dade, Carlos Gimenez.

Here’s what he has to say about libraries.

All libraries will remain open: We finalized a two-year plan that will keep all libraries open. Additionally, we have reduced the number of layoffs from 251 to 169. However, there will be reduced staffing and fewer service hours — 1,624 per week versus 2,016. To move toward a sustainable library system, we must take a transformative look at how our system operates and is funded. Dissolving the current restrictive library tax district to provide for countywide funding would allow for the flexibility needed to respond to the entire community’s priorities. We will work with community partners to study and assess our options.

We need to learn more details about precisely which jobs will be cut.

Does librarian mean professional librarian with MLS/MLIS degrees or all library employees. Regardless, while the number of people losing jobs has been reduced to 169 from 251 it’s still quite disturbing on multiple levels.

We shared some comments about school librarians losing jobs in Harrisburg, PA (all librarians let go) and NYC (reduction in the number of librarians in schools) in this post.

Is a public or school library really a public or school library without professionals building collections (print and ebooks for adults and children), selecting electronic services (from research databases to 3D scanners), training library users (e.g. digital literacy, web search), etc.

As we pointed out a few weeks ago on infoDOCKET, the library community has done a poor job of explaining what librarians do (both in and out of the library facility) and why they are more valuable today than ever before.

We must do a better job marketing ourselves and promoting our skills and abilities and demonstrating (this is key) why they are important. If we don’t do this no one else will. This needs to be done in a community wide-effort (regardless of library type) but also by each one of us, individually, with those we come in contact with including both friends and family.

More about this in a future post.

From 10TV.com:

On the same day the state released school report card data, the Columbus Metropolitan Libraries announced a new position designed to “help ensure that students have the resources to succeed outside of the classroom.”

CML officials announced Thursday the creation of the position of Director of Education and Partnerships.

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The libraries also will be reallocating a member of senior-level staff to focus entirely on advancing initiatives aimed at pre-K literacy as Director of Early Childhood Literacy.

Read the Complete Article

From a Columbus Metropolitan Library News Release:

The Director of Education and Partnerships will collaborate directly with public, private and charter schools to ensure that students have the resources they need to succeed outside of the classroom. “CML is uniquely poised to work with students during out-of-school time – preschool, after school and summer,” said CEO Patrick Losinski.

CML is also working to implement two new initiatives later this fall in the Whitehall City and Groveport Madison school districts that will assist students and educators. They are:

1.     A school delivery service.  CML will deliver library materials directly to elementary schools in these two districts to ensure books are in the hands of our school children.

2.     A special Kids Card. A new “Kids Card” will be given to all elementary school students in the two districts, granting them the ability to check out three children’s books without incurring fines or needing a parent signature.

CML plans to expand these services to eight other districts in Franklin County in the next year.

These changes come as the district faced a $304 million shortfall in its budget for the 2013–2014 school year. The city agreed to borrow $50 million just to get schools open as Superintendent William R. Hite had threatened to delay their opening without those funds.

In addition, the Philadelphia School Reform Commission (SRC) passed a measure [PDF] during a contentious meeting on August 16 allowing principals to hire back staff based on the needs of the school—and not based on seniority. Parents and educators both voiced opposition to the measure by the SRC, which replaced the school board in 2001 with appointees from the governor and the mayor.

“I am heartbroken that we are having a conversation today because our government has abandoned an investment in public education,” says Daren Spielman, president and CEO of the non-profit Philadelphia Education Fund, who gave his comments during the meeting.

How school librarians may fare in the coming days is unclear. At least one school librarian whose position was transferred from an elementary school to a high school was told librarians may be hired back should the $50 million came through. Still, this is in a district that saw assistant principals, secretaries, school nurses, and guidance counselors—among other staffers—laid off at the end of the 2012–2013 school year.

“Apparently, they pretty much let principals decide how funds will be allocated in each building,” says Deb Kachel, co-chairperson of the legislation committee for the Pennsylvania School Librarians Association (PSLA). “So it’s very uneven which schools will have librarians and which won’t.”

Pennsylvania saw a 6 percent decrease from the number of school librarians working in K–12 schools between the 2011–2012 and 2012–2013 school years, according to statistics from the PSLA. For example, Harrisburg, PA, which had eliminated its certified school librarians for the 2012–2013 school year, has now eliminated all library staff as well—and is hoping to use volunteers to run its school libraries for the new school year.

Each year, PSLA runs a staffing survey across its 500 school districts starting in the fall. Eileen Kern, PSLA president, says she does not have a feeling how the numbers will come out this year. But while she sees urban areas, including Philadelphia, losing school librarian positions, other areas are also suffering, with 62 percent of school librarians in the state serving more than one school.

“That’s pretty alarming to me,” says Kerns, who nonetheless sees the urban school districts being hit the hardest. “I know it’s a drastic situation in Philadelphia.”

Carol Heinsdorf agrees. As former president of the Association of Philadelphia School Librarians and a national board certified teacher, she is watching the situation unfold in her city wondering how these changes will, in the end, affect the 136,000 school children set to head to classes next month.

She adds, “The ability of school librarians in Philadelphia to work effectively to promote academic achievement is wiped out.”

The union—the United Federation of Teachers (UFT)—and the New York Library Association (NYLA) both say they strongly oppose the DOE’s  variance request, which, if the state approved it, would allow NYC schools “to provide equivalent library services to students at secondary schools in alternative ways,” according to a copy of the request obtained by School Library Journal.

“’Equivalent library services’ is really slippery. It’s the most dangerous action a district could take,” says librarian Sara Kelly Johns, NYLA’s president-elect. ”It is not equitable,” she tells SLJ. “We can’t set aside the requirements for school librarians. Not as policy.”

Tom Dunn, director of communications for NYSED, confirms that the state received the DOE’s request, but says the state would not comment until it had prepared its response to the city.

Rumors in recent weeks that the DOE’s request might be forthcoming have spurred NYC library advocates to rally around this issue, according to Alison Gendar, a media rep for UFT. Gendar shared with SLJ a weekly bulletin to city principals, dated mid-June, in which Richard Hasenyager, the city DOE’s director of library services, asked principals to provide information that would help the city department put together its waiver/variance request to the state.

The DOE’s request to NYSED. (Image links to PDF of full document.)

Hasenyager declined to speak to SLJ  for this article, but Gendar notes that the UFT, upon seeing the principals’ bulletin, was initially “surprised that the DOE would seek to institutionalize” its chronic librarian understaffing rather than attempt to strategize solutions to the situation.

The UFT has been waiting for months for a response from State Commissioner Dr. John King on the second of its petitions, which it filed late last year in hopes that the state would be able to enforce the city’s compliance with Commissioner’s Regulation 91.2. The rule stipulates that all NYC secondary schools must employ at least a part-time certified school library media specialist, and schools with more than 700 students must employ a full-time media specialist. According to the UFT, city officials admit that more than half of the city’s secondary schools are in violation of this mandate.

One of the biggest challenges in enforcing Regulation 91.2, Gendar says, is that the Commissioner typically issues his decision after the end of the school year, making it moot. This time around, however, “we are considering our legal options to make the Commissioner rule in time for it to be meaningful,” Gendar says. “We have to wait for the state to come back with some kind of decision and then…that will clear the roadway for going to the (state) Supreme Court with this.”

In the meantime, NYLA is joining forces with other advocacy groups—including Urban Librarians Unite (ULU), the Alliance for a Quality Education (AQE), and Make the Road New York—in endorsing a planned local rally for parents and community members tomorrow, August 21, at 10 a.m. The event, organized by New Yorkers for Great Public Schools, will be a parental “Read In” on the steps of NYC’s Department of Education headquarters. In addition, NYLA has prepared its own opposition statement [PDF] addressed directly to Commissioner King, while Christian Zabriskie, ULU founder—and 2012 Library Journal  Mover & Shaker—has created a MoveOn.org petition for the cause, also addressed to Dr. King. And AQE has created its own petition to drum up more opposition among local advocates.

On the national level, the American Association of School Librarians, the American Library Association’s school library division, is standing by to offer support, according to its president, Gail Dickinson. Dickinson adds that she wonders how NYC teachers will meet the new Common Core State Standards without librarians. “[It] will be extremely difficult,” she tells SLJ. “Because of technology, we can take students to higher levels of digitally literacy than we ever could before, and they can search out so much more information, but along with that, the need for them to be able to filter that information—make judgments about that information—to create new knowledge is astounding.”

She adds, “Without school librarians, I worry about the digital divide between those students who arrive at college having had a school librarian who [taught] them the skills that they need, and those college freshman who have not had access to those skills. I suspect we’ll see them floundering.”

NYLA’s Sara Kelly Johns agrees. In NYC, she notes, “there’s not equitable access to librarians who can provide high quality research working collaboratively with teachers to meet the resource and instructional needs of students. [There’s] not an equitable approach to developing college and career ready students in every school. Students know how to search but not to research. It’s just not fair. NYC students deserve and need a certified librarian in every school. NYC has work to do.”

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who last month warned that 22 of the county’s 49 public libraries could be shut down this fall due to deep budget cuts, announced Thursday that his administration now expects to shutter only four.

[Our emphasis]  The dramatic reduction, while welcome news to library supporters who have campaigned to keep the facilities open, still comes with plenty of pain. Libraries across the board will likely shorten their hours and be staffed by fewer librarians.

Though the number of closures has shrunk to less than 10 percent of the existing libraries — compared to nearly half under the worst-case scenario — the number of proposed layoffs has not gone down by the same proportion. The latest estimate has 192 library workers losing their jobs, down from 251.

[Clip]

The list won’t be finalized until commissioners vote on the 2013-14 budget after two public hearings in September.

Read the Complete Article

See Also: We posted earlier this week that the Harrisburg Public Schools no longer have librarians on staff and volunteers will trained to “check out and organize books and other materials.”

Will a similar scenario also be case in Miami-Dade? What about all of the other things librarians do in both school and public libraries? Additional comments here.

American Library Association

The ALA considers the document the cornerstone document of Stripling’s presidential initiative, “Libraries Change Lives,” which is designed to build sustained public support for America’s libraries of all types—school, public, academic and special.

“Libraries provide services that inspire and empower their users to change their lives through education,” says Stripling. “The Declaration will serve as an advocacy tool to help communities take action and illustrate the value of their libraries and library staff. Our hope is that library supporters will take advantage of this tool and present collected signatures to local leaders and legislators throughout the year.”

Kent Oliver, director of the Nashville Public Library, as well as Nashville library leaders and community members, joined Stripling at the event. All were among the first to sign the “Declaration,” which is intended to serve as a strong public statement about the value of libraries as institutions that empower individuals, strengthen families, build communities, and protect our right to know.

Signings are being organized at libraries and other locations throughout the nation. The petitions will be presented to Congress by library supporters during National Library Legislative Day activities from May 5 to 6, 2014. Online signing of the Declaration will be made available later this summer.

There is a clear link between the quality of school library programs and academic achievement, the ALA says, noting that more than 60 studies in 19 states show students in schools with school library programs staffed by qualified school librarians learn more, have higher academic achievement levels, and score higher on standardized tests than their peers in schools without such library programs.

The ALA also notes that public libraries are also critically important in our communities. According to the ALA’s “Public Library Funding and Technology Access Study,” an estimated 300,000 people a day receive job-seeking help at public libraries, and more than 65 percent of libraries are the only source of free public access to computers and the Internet in their communities.

In the next year, libraries of all types will hold signing ceremonies, during which community members can visibly declare their right to have vibrant libraries in their communities.

The hearing, “E-Rate 2.0: Connecting Every Child to the Transformative Power of Technology,” aimed to address issues on strengthening the program that provides discounted Internet access and telecommunications services to U.S. schools and libraries,  in response to the Obama Administration ‘s directive last month to fund access to broadband to nearly all students within the next five years.

“I’m old enough to remember when it took 20 minutes to establish a dial-up connection. Clearly we are in a different place today. So are our libraries,” Lord told the committee [PDF], which oversees the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), who administers E-Rate.

“In 1998, I could not have envisioned the programs libraries offer today. For instance, we are using interactive videoconferencing technology to connect rural Mainers with volunteer attorneys. One library serving a population of about 1,200 hosted elementary students to view a real-time program on flight from the Smithsonian. This would not have been possible even five years ago.”

Lord also cautioned the committee, however, that simply connecting libraries and schools is not enough to serve our students and families today. “We need high-speed, reliable connections like the one at the Omaha Public Library that ensured one patron could Skype into three interviews with Boeing before being offered a job,” she said. “We also need upload capabilities that rival download speeds for small businesses to upload large packets of information into the cloud.”

The hearing comes just ahead of a decision from the FCC on its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to modernize the E-rate program.

Says Barbara Stripling, American Library Association (ALA) president, “Whether you are a school librarian—as both Linda Lord and I have been—or a public librarian, you know that your Internet infrastructure can either enable or stifle innovation for our nation’s 55 million K12 students, more than 1.5 million home-school students and millions more pursuing their GED or distance learning.We simply cannot allow inadequate bandwidth to be the limiting factor for what our students and our nation can achieve. E-rate is fundamental to meeting this challenge.”

According to a 2013 Pew Internet Project report, the availability of computers and Internet access now rivals book lending and reference expertise as vital library services. Seventy-seven percent of Americans say free access to computers and the Internet is a “very important” service of libraries, compared with 80 percent who say borrowing books and access to reference librarians are “very important” services.

Paul Lee, a Highland Park scholar and former student at the high school, says he got the initial call about books being thrown away at 9 pm on June 20, and drove over to the school with a flashlight to investigate. “I had three friends with me and we spent two hours recovering as many books as we could,” Lee tells School Library Journal. “There were shattered monitors, glass everywhere, metal desks, broken pieces of wood. We crawled amongst all that.”

According to Lee—who was in the school as the collection was being built in the 1970s, when there was a push to include more black studies in schools—it included African American, African, and African Caribbean works. In later years, he helped build the AV portion of the collection, recommending VHS tapes, educational audio cassettes, and some slides, he says.

Although Lee says he found fewer than 1,000 books in the dumpster, he believes there were nearly 10,000 books in the school’s collection, including such titles as Mike Rowe’s Chicago Breakdown (Da Capo Press, 1973) and Bell Irvin Wiley’s The Life of Billy Yank (1952).

However, Donald Weatherspoon, the emergency manager for the Highland Park’s school district, says that by October of 2012, when he was appointed by Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, there were only about 2,500 books at the school—not 10,000. The school librarian had been laid off in 2009, he says, and so the “place had been lying fallow for all those years.” He doesn’t dispute that there may have once been 10,000 titles, but without a prior catalog, he has no way to verify that information.

Weatherspoon—who was appointed to bring financial solvency to the district, which is in receivership—admits that a cleaning crew was in the school the night Lee found the books in the dumpster, but insists the books in question were discarded in error. Titles had been inventoried, boxed, and then set aside, he says. “What happened is that the cleaning crew went into a room and removed everything when they should not have removed materials that had been identified,” he says. “It was a mistake.”

Now, Weatherspoon says, he is working to get records, yearbooks, and any other books that have some meaning and value to the school district to be set aside.

“There was never a plan to throw anything out that was of historical value,” he says.

But that doesn’t quell Marcia Cotton’s concerns. Cotton is a board member from the Highland Park Renaissance Academy Board of Directors, a board which represents the Leona Group, a charter school company which runs the district’s schools.

Cotton says she didn’t know about the books being removed until Lee and others came to protest at a recent board meeting. Her co-board member, Andre Davis, resigned soon after, frustrated.

Cotton has stayed on. But as a graduate herself of Highland Park High School (the school’s original name), and her daughter also a graduate, Cotton says would have liked to see some of the books herself —if she’d known they’d existed.  “Where were they being stored?” Cotton asks. “Were they on shelves? In boxes? Were they forgotten about? Were they even being used to educate the children?”

Weatherspoon says he had informed the Leona Group’s superintendent that cleaning crews would be in the building. He also says a new library is set to be built in the high school for the fall, and he offered some books to the charter school group, which he says “to the best of my knowledge…took some.”

He also says he understands that emotions run high around the books, but believes the concerns may be misplaced.

“Some of these books are so out of date they don’t have the significance that a lot of people are placing to them,” he says. “But that’s not for me to decide. We’re preserving what we have so hopefully we can give them back to the city and the city can decide to keep them in their own community.”

In the meantime, Lee says he is adamant that the books and audiovisual materials he found last month will not be handed back over to Weatherspoon or the district anytime soon.

“We’re not going to give them back to have them thrown out again,” he says.

From top, created by: Mellie Ryan; BGM;
and Hilde Kuyper.

As Johnson hoped, hundreds of visual responses poured in from fans—ranging from the intriguing to the hilarious—some of which were later hosted in a slideshow by The Huffington Post. “I was surprised at how many people appear to be good at Photoshop, and how quickly they could generate so many high-quality images. But I wasn’t surprised at the general wish to do so,” Johnson tells School Library Journal. “Once you look at the subject, it just starts to open up, like a weird flower.”

Johnson’s favorite overall response, she says, is from Jennifer Lynn Barnes, YA author and professor of psychology and YA literature. “This discussion led to her writing these amazing scientific pieces about gender, and how that might relate to some books become ‘big books,’” she says. “Finally, the science!”

Johnson was also pleased to see teachers and librarians getting in on the action, inviting their students to participate in the challenge and sparking additional discussion. “I was thrilled,” she says. “The Number One place for this to go is into the library and the classroom. It’s nice that there was a hullaballoo online, but there are always hullabaloos online, and they’re forgotten a week later. Teachers and librarians are the critical torchbearers for this.”

Johnson’s notion to raise the issue with fans struck her after yet another female author friend’s new book was assigned a decidedly “girly” cover by its publisher—and was promptly categorized as “chick lit” by reviewers despite its content, a pervasive and common occurrence for YA authors, Johnson says. “I was just looking at the radically different response it was getting to a similar book just released, one written by a guy,” she says. “What surprised me was the number of people who said, ‘Whoa. I never noticed that before.’ I’m glad it got around.”

Created by: Kuelthador; Miller; Mellie Ryan; and Brandy.
(All credits from left to right, top to bottom.)

What also surprised Johnson, she says, is the storm of media coverage that followed—especially in the UK—along with intense online discussion as fans and other bloggers who wanted to weigh in on these issues of publishing, culture, and gender sought to be heard. At the beginning, “I definitely didn’t think I was launching anything,” Johnson says. “It started with a simple tweet about the gendered nature of book covers. But it only takes one shot to start a battle, so it all kicked off.”

Did media outlets understand the type of conversation she was hoping to inspire, or did they miss the mark? “Some did, some didn’t,” Johnson says. “Strangely, the coverage really took off in England. It was all over the place there—The Telegraph, The Guardian, The Daily Mail. Even Jacqueline Wilson chimed in, which was amazing,” Johnson says.

Created by: Stephen Denes; Book Revels; slodwick; and Electric Sheep Comix.

“The problem was, a lot had headlines that basically said, ‘Look at these trashy girly chick lit covers!’ Which misses the entire and extremely subtle and prickly point of how we define ‘girly’—and why ‘girly’ also seems to lead to the default assumption that said books are light, breezy, and trashy, often of generally poor quality.”

This is the heart of the issue, Johnson notes.

“The term “chick lit” drives me absolutely insane, as it has no real, identifiable meaning except books by women, for women,” she explains.

“I’ve never seen ‘chick lit’ used in a positive critical light. It’s invariably something seen as lesser than literature. It’s wrong. The label gets slapped on things pretty indiscriminately. The only common factor is that the books are by and for women. Period. Easiest case in point: Jane Austen. I’ve seen so many people call Jane Austen ‘chick lit.’ It goes on and on.”

Created by: Hannah; Emily Rosenfield; Miller; and Monica.

But there are no easy solutions for solving the dilemma, Johnson admits. “This is a bigger and more complex problem,” Johnson says, noting that “publishers really just want to get the books out there. I can’t fault them for that.”

She adds, “Selling books is hard, and people are only trying their best to keep books in the marketplace. It just also happens to be true that some of the decisions made about how to present and package work end up influencing how we value certain stories over others.”

Created by: Rosianna; Gillian Berry; Autumn; and Ardawling.

This realization led Johnson to start putting together an “action plan” to help keep the conversation going. “Many teachers and librarians got into it right away, and their students started making amazing covers instantly,” Johnson says. “The kids got it within seconds. That was excellent to see.”

Johnson currently is considering creating a downloadable Coverflip lesson plan for educators, because, going forward, these teachers and librarians [will] “be the ones coming up with the solutions, not me,” she says. “But I’d be thrilled to have some of those discussions.”

The regulations update the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), launched by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in 1998. The amendments are meant to limit companies’ abilities to reach children under 13 online and to collect personal information about them without their parents’ permission, as SLJ reported in December.

Businesses will now have to obtain parental consent for kids to use their sites and apps and to gather personal data about their child users, in many cases. Acceptable proof of permission from a parent can include a signed form that is faxed, mailed, or emailed to a company; a credit card, debit card, or government ID; a call to a toll-free number, or a video conference.

The definition of a child’s “personal information” includes data such as “geolocation information, as well as photos, videos, and audio files that contain a child’s image or voice,” along with “persistent identifiers that can be used to recognize a user over time and across different websites or online services,” according to an FTC document.

Library sites are largely not impacted by the new rules, since they apply to commercial enterprises, says Deborah Caldwell-Stone, deputy director of the Office for Intellectual Freedom at the American Library Association (ALA). “You’re not selling data—that’s the last thing you’re doing as a library,” she says.

However, librarians should know whether their site uses a commercial widget or another tool that collects information about young patrons, she says. If so, librarians must “be aware of what it is doing with information.” In addition, Caldwell-Stone emphasizes, “you need to be aware of the law because you have parents asking you for information about it.”

Some youth librarians see more roadblocks than benefits in the new rules. “It’s hard to determine how this will play out until we see how sites respond to the COPPA revisions, but it’s likely that the updated regulations will impact mobile app use in K–12 learning,” says Michelle Luhtala, department chair at the New Canaan (CT) High School Library.

“Many apps don’t function properly without permission to access geolocation information, photographs, audio files, and videos,” adds Luhtala. “Schools that integrate mobile app use in the classroom often require students to download apps during the school day when parents are not available to grant permission. It’s possible that the new rules will create an age divide within schools—scaling back flexibility among the under-thirteens.”

In Caldwell-Stone’s view, the regulations may “become so onerous that it becomes a burden to young people who want to use the tools.” She adds, “parents will have to be there facilitating this, or else the kids will be shut out” of many online resources. Or children will “lie about their age.”

Luhtala says that when schools hire services to deploy mobile applications, “2013 COPPA will add an extra layer of permissions with which to wrestle.”

Gretchen Caserotti, library director of the Meridian (ID) Library District, notes that the amendments may hinder kids’ exploration and sharing of hobby apps.

“I do appreciate the effort to protect kids, but it seriously limits the possibilities that are so exciting in so many new tools,” says Caserotti, also chair of the ALSC (Association for Library Services to Children) Children and Technology Committee. “Imagine if your older child is really engaged in diy.org for kids, and could discover other maker kids in his or her city through the app. Just like libraries connect kids from different schools, neighborhoods, and life worlds, these tools can provide new ways for kids to connect with each other.”

Caserotti adds, “I’m personally incensed that it permits direct advertising.” Under the new rules, businesses will still be able to collect data without parental consent for some purposes—including limited advertising. “COPPA’s parental notice and consent requirements don’t kick in if the identifier is used solely to support the internal operations of the site or service,” according to COPPA documents. Such “internal operations” include “contextual advertising, frequency capping, legal compliance, site analysis, and network communications.”

Some data companies lobbied against the COPPA revisions, saying that the cost of enforcing them would be prohibitive and stifle innovation, as reported in The Hill and other outlets. Under the new rules, platforms like Google Play and the Apple App store will not be held liable if items sold on their sites are not COPPA-compliant.

How will COPPA play out? Caldwell-Stone notes that currently, “Parents are the greatest enablers of under-13 going on Facebook.” With the tighter rules, “We might see enforced verification of age in ways we don’t want to see.” She points to a scenario in which kids are “borrowing mom and dad’s wallet for a few minutes” to get the credit card verification they need to gain access to a site.

But overall, “the philosophy behind COPPA is not something we object to,” says Caldwell-Stone. “The controversy over the new regulations is that they’re much more stringent. I’ll be interested to see how these regulations actually shake out.”

The FTC issued two supporting documents to help consumers and companies understand them: a guide for parents, “Protecting your Child’s Privacy Online,” and a “Six-step Compliance Plan for your Business,” advising organizations how to abide by the rules. An FTC video, “Protecting Children’s Privacy under COPPA,” also outlines the amendments.

The report, “Younger Americans’ Library Habits and Expectations,” also finds that younger Americans—despite being heavy technology users overall—still believe, as do older adults, that print books should have a central place at libraries, with few young adult responders (only 23 percent) strongly supporting moving books out of public areas to create room for things such as technology centers, meeting rooms, and cultural events.

The report finds that—while nearly all of those surveyed aged 16–29 are actively online in their lives and are more likely than older patrons to use libraries’ computer and internet connections, access library websites, and use a library’s research databases—75 percent of young adults have read a printed book in the past year, compared with 64 percent for older adults.

Younger adults are also more likely than older adults to use libraries as quiet study spaces, and are just as likely as older adults to have visited libraries, borrowed print books, and browsed the stacks.

When it comes to new library services, young adults are more interested than older adults in technology-driven features, such as apps, for accessing library materials and for navigating library spaces, and in “Redbox”-style kiosks around town for convenient access to library materials. However, the report also shows that Americans under age 30 are strong supporters of traditional library services.

“Younger Americans’ reading habits and library use are still anchored by the printed page,” says Kathryn Zickuhr, research analyst at Pew’s nonprofit Internet & American Life Project and a co-author of the report. “Some of this stems from the demands of school or work, yet some likely lies in their current personal  preferences. And this group’s priorities and expectations for libraries likewise reflect a mix of traditional and technological services.”

Other major findings of the report:
• 85 percent of 16–17 year-olds read at least one print book in the past year, making them significantly more likely to have read a book in this format than any other age group.

• 60 percent of younger patrons say they go to the library to sit and read, study, or watch or listen to media, while only 45 percent of library visitors age 30 and older do this.

• 67 percent of younger Americans say they would be interested in a digital media lab for creating and uploading digital content; 27 percent say they would be “very likely” to use such a resource.

• 44 percent of library visitors under age 30 have used a library’s computers, internet, or a public WI-FI network, compared with just 27 percent of those age 30 and older.

When queried about what library services and resources are “very important” to offer:
• 80 percent of young Americans name librarians to help people find information they need
• 76 percent name research resources such as free databases
• 75 percent name free access to computers and the Internet
• 75 percent name books for people to borrow
• 72 percent name quiet study spaces
• 72 percent name programs and classes for children and teens
• 71 percent name job or career resources

Deb Delisle, Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education, U.S. Department of Education, and Richard Gonzales, Senior Advisor for Early Childhood Development, Department of Health and Human Services, joined Ralph Smith, Managing Director of the Campaign for Grade Level Reading, and Susan H. Hildreth, Director of IMLS, for a joint press event today highlighting the report.

“This report issues a call to action: Now is the time for policy makers and practitioners to fully use the capacity of libraries and museums in their early learning efforts,” says Hildreth in her introduction to the report. “Libraries and museums reach millions of children each year. It is exciting to bring that capacity into focus so that libraries and museums can more effectively engage in early learning strategies at the community, state, and national levels.”

For IMLS, the report is only the first step in a deeper and expanded commitment to the youngest and most at-risk children in the United States, Hildreth says. She notes, “We will be pursuing special efforts to assure that libraries and museums can reach under-served children and provide opportunities that can make a difference that will last a lifetime.”

According to the report, libraries and museums support learning are by increasing high-quality early learning experiences, engaging and supporting families as their child’s first teachers, supporting development of executive function and “deeper learning” through literacy and STEM-based experiences, creating seamless links across early learning and the early grades, positioning children for meeting expectations of the Common Core State Standards, addressing the summer slide, linking new digital technologies to learning, improving family health and nutrition, leveraging community partnerships, and adding capacity to early learning networks.

The report also outlined areas and questions that deserve further impact study, and specific recommendations for improving early learning outcomes and increasing school readiness through federal, state, and community efforts.

Federal policy makers, for example, should include museum/library grants in funding priorities, support research to identify best practices for early learning in museums and libraries, and invest in professional development for museum and library staff.

Communities, the report recommends, should include museums and libraries in initiatives designed to increase family engagement in school readiness, examine ways to help vulnerable, underserved families access museum and library services, and launch public information campaigns.

For districts and schools, the report calls for joint professional development to teachers and museum and library staff, and the establishment of partnerships between schools and local museums and libraries that support building content knowledge.

The report also highlights and details current successful programs in New York (the Children’s Museum of Manhattan); Idaho; Texas (Children’s Museum of Houston); Washington; Virginia (Richmond Public Library, Arlington County schools); Pennsylvania (the greater Pittsburgh region); Florida (Miami Science Museum); Massachusetts (Boston Children’s Museum); Maryland (city of Baltimore).

Follett Corporation today announced the establishment of the Follett Knowledge Fund, a capital funding source for new technologies that have the potential to improve and even disrupt the way educational content is delivered and consumed. Follett has committed $50 million to the fund, which complements and extends the company’s extensive portfolio of digital solutions and tools.

“Follett has a long track record of investing in and introducing new technologies to the education marketplace, whether it be in K-12 classrooms, on college campuses or wherever learning takes place,” said Mary Lee Schneider, President and CEO, Follett Corporation. “The Knowledge Fund will enable us to identify and invest in early-stage technologies that will make educational materials more accessible and affordable to students and educators alike.”

The fund will be co-managed by Atrium Capital, based in Menlo Park, Calif. Atrium will partner with Follett to identify, analyze and manage investment opportunities for the fund and serve as an adjunct to Follett’s business development activities in the emerging technology space.

Read the Complete Announcement

Direct to Follett Knowledge Fund Web Site

While ISTE applauds Obama for ConnectEd, which sets a goal of broadband access for nearly all U.S. students within the next five years, the organization stresses the same issue raised by the American Library Assocation: that E-Rate has been woefully underfunded since its inception.

ISTE also notes that the discrepancy between what schools and libraries need and what can be funded with E-Rate’s current budget has only grown wider over the years as technology has advanced.

“We forget that it was only in 2010 that the iPad has burst onto the scene. Our view of technology has shifted as it has become more ubiquitous in our lives, so access is critically important. Times have changed. Technology has changed,” ISTE CEO Brian Lewis says. “The issue of not only equity of access but efficiency of access and speed of access and functionality of access—these issues have evolved over the years, so the notion of what the president is doing makes sense.”

However, “the second half of the conversation is the resources,” Lewis says.

For 2013, school and libraries have requested nearly $5 billion from the E-Rate program—although the available funds in the program total only about half of that amount.

“If we’re going to set expectations on schools, and we recognize that educational technology is there to support learning, and we believe that there needs to be equity of access to high-speed internet, and we know that’s a critical tool…how do we as a society [do this],” Lewis says, “but by the same token…turn a blind eye to the $2.5 billion dollar demand that exceeds resources currently?”

Ultimately, it’s about political will, and that begins with the president, Lewis says, dismissing recent criticisms that Obama’s initiative does not go far enough because it lacks specific legislative directives for funding. “I think what the president is trying to do is…to push this issue, to shine a light on it, to share best practices, and call attention to the broader [concerns],” Lewis explains. “He can’t by the stroke of a pen raise the money to meet that $2.5-billion-dollar gap, but he’s doing all he can to call attention to the need in the way that he has authority [to do].”

The duty is now on others, Lewis says, to fully commit to equipping students with what they need at the same time they are demanding that schools be held accountable for meeting learning objectives. “It’s like telling a student, ‘we want you to go get an “A” on this test, but we’re not going to provide you with any resource materials, electronic or otherwise, to help you prepare for that test.’ It’s the same thing.”

Still, Lewis says ISTE is mindful of E-Rates many successes since the program was introduced in 1996. “The good news has been what E-Rate has accomplished over the years, in terms of providing equitable opportunities for each and every student,” he says.

Adds Lewis, “One of the things we know is that every district is different, and every formula needs to be tweaked—whether that’s the formula for pedagogy or technology or budgeting—and what’s great about what the president is doing is the administration is shining a spotlight on best practices where it is working. What can we learn from where it’s working?”

ISTE also remains hopeful of what’s to come, and plans to continue to work with the White House, the FCC, and other educational stakeholders in helping to guide the conversation at the same time it advocates for increased support in funding, Lewis says.

“It’s a combination,” Lewis says. “We want to do what the president is suggesting and support the development and promulgation of sharing of best practices and that’s great. That’s a lot of what ISTE is philosophically about—creating a space and time, virtual and real, where people share best practices. And that’s critical. But the other piece is, always, the issue of resources.

Adds Lewis, “We have to take advantage of the fact that the president made a very conscious choice to focus his attention on this issue that we all care about. Our job now is to take that opportunity and continue to work it, continue to push it, and argue successfully for the financial piece that’s necessary to finish this puzzle.”

Thus, defining the issue’s new “leverage points” in the face of ConnectEd is the organization’s next step, Lewis says, adding, “we’re still having that conversation.”

In the meantime, ISTE will be broaching the issue in full force at its annual conference and expo in San Antonio later this month, when FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel and Richard Culatta, acting director of the Office of Educational Technology for the Department of Education, will both be featured speakers. ISTE is also hosting a 12-minute “speed panel” on E-Rate, plus a sponsored “Advocacy Lounge” where attendees can write to their representatives, sign White House petitions, and learn more about standing up for students’ access to resources.