Beyond the Frontline:
Activating New Partnerships in Support of School Libraries


Ray Doiron, Ph. D.

University of Prince Edward Island

February, 1998

Introduction
Similar Roles in Different Contexts
Unique Opportunities to Support the Frontline
New and Emerging Partnerships
Conclusion
References

Introduction
In the daily efforts of developing school library programs, there is no one better able to bring about change than a teacher-librarian working in partnership with administrators, classroom teachers and students. The frontline is where the goals of school library policies and programs are realized. At the same time, there are other players "beyond the frontline", who have key roles to play in facilitating that change, in supporting school-based efforts and in championing the integrated school library program. My colleague, Judy Davies, and I spent over twenty years on the frontline as teacher-librarians in two successful elementary school library resource centres in Prince Edward Island. During the past few years, we have left those frontline positions and accepted new positions --- Judy, as a consultant with the Department of Education and me, as a teacher educator at the University of Prince Edward Island. Throughout our transition from "being" a teacher-librarian to facilitating the role of  teacher-librarians, we have been struck by the similarities in the work we do now and what we did as teacher-librarians. This article outlines some of the similarities in the role of the teacher-librarian, curriculum consultants, teacher educators, and administrators in general, and then describes new partnerships that can be nurtured when frontline teacher-librarians move into other educational roles in the system.

Similar Roles in Different Contexts
Teacher-librarians have four major components to the roles they play in the development of a school library program. They act as instructional leaders; they work in partnership with classroom teachers to develop curriculum; they champion the cause of school libraries through various advocacy programs; and they manage a budget, a support staff  and a set of learning resources. Curriculum consultants, teacher educators and administrators can be seen as playing much the same role, but at different levels of the system and within different contexts. A few examples will help clarify the point.

Instructional Leadership

1. Teacher-librarians work with a team of teachers in the school to actively create resource-based learning activities. They use a variety of teaching methods that integrate school library program goals; they lead the development of the school library program which include a plan for information skills development and a school library mission statement.
2. Consultants work with a team of colleagues to lead the development of new teaching strategies one of which includes resource-based learning. They work with district or provincial committees to make connections in curriculum development that include the goals of an integrated school library program. They run pilot projects that demonstrate how resource-based learning works; and they work to develop new programs and policies at the board or Department level.
3. Teacher educators work with a team of colleagues to teach pre-service teachers new teaching strategies that incorporate resource-based learning and the role of the school library. They lead the development of a Faculty-wide view of information literacy; they teach courses using resource-based learning strategies and teaching methods common to school library programs; and they provide advice and input in new policy and program development by the Department of Education.

Curriculum Development

1. Teacher-librarians work in collaboration with a school staff to design, implement and evaluate a plan for teaching information skills and strategies within the overall school curriculum. They use cooperative  planning and teaching to develop the curriculum; they sit on school committees in the areas of technology and new programs; and they collaborate in research projects.
2. Consultants work in collaboration with Department colleagues to integrate school library program goals across the curriculum. They develop resource-based learning projects that demonstrate how it works and what it "looks" like; they work on curriculum committees to develop new programs and initiatives; and they collaborate in research projects.
3. Teacher educators work in collaboration with Faculty colleagues to integrate school library goals into the teacher education program. They work with their colleagues to refine the teacher education curriculum to include a more visible role for school libraries and resource-based learning. They become involved in Department of Education curriculum committees deciding on new programs and new curriculum initiatives; and they collaborate with teachers, teacher-librarians and consultants in research projects.

Advocacy

1. Teacher-librarians communicate news about the school library program through library newsletters, websites, Home and School notices and parent memos. They keep principals and teachers up-to-date on school library issues; they promote various school library activities and special projects; they mount displays of work students have completed; they hold author visits, Library Week activities and other promotional activities; and they lead professional development activities with staff and fellow teacher-librarians.
2. Consultants communicate across the school system through newsletters, teacher networks, listservs and other electronic routes. They keep the message front and centre for administrators in schools and in the Department of Education. They share with other consultants examples of "best practice"; they promote school library issues by sharing articles and current information on resource-based learning; they lead professional development activities; and they make presentations at local and national conferences.
3. Teacher educators also communicate through local newsletters, electronic networks and national and international journals. They advocate across the Faculty for the role of the school library in teacher education; they incorporate resource-based learning projects/assignments into course work and share those with other Faculty members and students. They make presentations at conferences and professional organization meetings and they disseminate research results.

Management

1. Teacher-librarians manage collection development, circulation, maintenance and inventory of wide range of print, non-print and electronic learning resources. They manage the school library facility on a daily basis; they manage the human resources that support the school library program; and they manage a budget for resources and the operation of the program.
2. Consultants maintain a district or province-wide perspective on learning resources and examine where and how they are accessed. They identify ways that resources can be shared; they identify what resources will be needed to support newly implemented programs; they make suggestions to other consultants for professional development and new resources; and they gather information on the state of collections and resources across the school system.
3. Teacher educators manage in-service course offerings for teachers that reflect their professional needs and interests. They examine resource issues through their research projects; they identify what resources will be needed to mount and maintain course offerings; they select resources for teacher education programs; and they develop awareness among pre-service teachers that all teachers need resources and that the school library and a teacher-librarian are crucial to the success of their classroom programs.

When looking at these four areas, it is obvious there are similarities in what teacher-librarians do and in what consultants and teacher educators do. In fact, the management, organizational and pedagogical skills honed as teacher-librarians working on the frontline provide an excellent base from which to work in other areas of the system. These skills transfer easily to many other instructional and administrative positions in the system. In fact, leadership, knowledge of curriculum, a commitment to advocate for change and sound manage skills are essential for all successful roles in the school system.

Unique Opportunities to Support the Frontline
As well as sharing many similar characteristics in the nature of their work and the skills needed to do that work well, consultants and teacher educators who have been on the frontline of school librarianship have many unique opportunities to support and facilitate the integration of school library programs across the system. Their new work puts them in a unique position to affect change across the school system in a variety of ways.

Holistic Perspective
One of the first things you notice when moving from a teacher-librarian or classroom position into a consultant or teacher educator position is that your focus changes. Instead of being primarily concerned with the needs of your single school library, you take a more holistic view of the entire district or provincial system. You step back from the frontline and see the whole system and the set of issues facing all administrators, teacher-librarians and classroom teachers. You see that, while some of your problems were unique, they are very similar to what others are facing. You are able to bring the first-hand experience of handling your own school library program to the wide-angled view provided from this shift in work. Your experience on the frontline gives you great credibility among your new colleagues and allows you to go back to the schools and speak with the authority of someone who has “been there” and knows what it is like slugging it out on the frontline. Consultants visit schools across the system and work with administrators and classroom teachers, while teacher educators work with pre-service and in-service teachers from all aspects of the system. In both positions, you are able to see how problems may be unique to one type of situation, such as small schools trying to bring about the goals of an integrated school library program, and you learn that all educators are struggling with many of the same issues like how to we bring about the change needed to fully realize our goals.

Research
As a teacher-librarian, you work many hours with teachers and students as they research topics of interest chosen from the curriculum. In some cases, teacher-librarians even conduct small research projects in their own school library related to the use of resources or the development of information skills. When you become a consultant or teacher educator, the opportunities for professional research really open up and really become essential to your new work. In our former positions, we have developed a sound understanding of the research process by teaching others how to activate it and fully use it to solve information problems. In our new positions, this helps us understand more clearly the issues and problems that face teacher-librarians. You start to develop a research agenda that involves teacher-librarians in the process and that provides them with research findings that enhance and support what they do on a daily basis.

Doiron and Davies (1996) recently completed a province-wide study of the impact of the Prince Edward Island School Library Policy on school library programs in the province. All teacher-librarians and administrators were involved in the research process which included an extensive survey, 48 research interviews and two days of professional development where the research findings and recommendations were presented and discussed. This study involved teacher-librarians in a very real way in determining what issues needed to be addressed and how best we could accomplish our goals. It helped clarify for consultants what needs to be done and facilitated a process in which all levels of the education system can come to terms with issues in school librarianship in our province.

Teacher Education
Teacher-librarians are involved in many ways with "teacher education". They lead professional development activities at their schools and provide leadership in bringing about some of the major curriculum changes underway today. However, most of their teaching time is spent with students who are looking for reading materials or who are actively involved with the information problem-solving process as part of their learning. Consultants and teacher educators at universities, on the other hand, work mostly with teachers and administrators. Since you come from the frontline of school librarianship, you have a unique opportunity to develop in all educators a clearer understanding of information literacy, resource-based learning, the role of the teacher-librarian and how crucial school libraries are to achieving the learning outcomes set for all students.

As a consultant or university-based teacher educator, you become involved in setting short and long-term in-service goals for teachers and administrators. You design professional development workshops, as well as credit and non-credit courses, summer institutes and distance learning activities. While all of these undertakings may not centre on school libraries, they provide useful opportunities to include the role of the teacher-librarian and the school library program in any course outline or in-service workshop. Consultants and teacher educators work with teachers and administrators in understanding new theory and acquiring new pedagogy and they use their previous classroom or school library experience to lend credibility and authority to what they do. The same thing holds in work with pre-service teachers who are often seen as the hope for the future or the new energy source needed to bring about change in the system. Having had frontline experience in the classroom or the school library, you are able to make connections for new teachers and show them how the goals of an integrated school library program will help them develop richer and more effective programs for their students. The benefits are not immediate, but long-term change will definitely happen, if we spend time teaching new teachers the importance of resource-based learning and school library programs.

Inclusion
While working on the frontline, teacher-librarians are often frustrated by the way they are excluded from decision-making that directly affects their daily jobs. New curriculum is brought in without any thought for the resources needed to support its full implementation; teacher-librarian positions are cut in a time when information literacy and the use of information technologies are paramount; and vast sets of learning outcomes are developed for schools with little evidence of the many information skills that learners will need for their future. Once you move to a consultant or teacher educator position, you find you suddenly have many opportunities to have the role of school libraries and teacher-librarians included at the level where decisions are made. Consultants can lobby to have a teacher-librarian included on any curriculum committee; they can see that information literacy is included as a broad strand in any curriculum development; and they can find many subtle ways to have the role of the school library resource centre included in all levels of their work. Teacher educators can see that resource-based learning, integrated school library programs and the role of teacher-librarians is included in any courses they teach and they can lobby to make these educational concepts pervasive across the Faculty of Education in which they work.

These efforts to include school libraries at the decision-making level are really attempts to infiltrate the system and change concepts many people have of the school library. Instead of being conceptualized as having only a peripheral role to play in education, former teacher-librarians can help eductors understand the school library as part of our curriculum and as essential to achieving the ambitious sets of learning outcomes expected by today’s education system. Teacher-librarians on the frontline will have to continue their individual efforts to lobby for change in their school, but with more former teacher-librarians moving into administrative, consultant or teacher educator positions, we should be able to have the school library included more fully so that we make sound educational decisions that will ensure that students develop the lifelong learning skills said to be crucial to their full literacy development.

New and Emerging Partnerships
A reflection on these examples of the similarities between the work of teacher-librarians on the frontline of school librarianship and those who have moved beyond the frontline to take consultant or teacher educator positions, as well as the examination of the unique opportunities offered by these positions to further the goals of school librarianship suggest that we need to recognize and celebrate several new and emerging partnerships that hold the potential of forging real change across the system. These new partnerships reflect a growing awareness by administrators, trustees, parents and governments that we have to find new solutions to the problems inhibiting the realization of the fullest potential for our education system.

Curriculum Partnership Around Information Literacy
The concept of information literacy is one that is quickly becoming a rallying point for many different groups within the education system. Information literacy is defined as “the ability to acquire, critically evaluate, select, use, create and communicate information in ways that lead to knowledge and wisdom. It encompasses all other forms of literacy.... .” (Ontario Ministry of Education, 1995). Core curriculum documents developed in several regions of the country give information literacy a central role in the curriculum programs of the future. Technology innovators are recognizing that this concept needs to be integrated into their goals of having learners use technology in more meaningful ways. Teacher-librarians are very comfortable with the concept of information literacy and recognize it as a natural progression in our understanding of resource-based learning, research and information skills. As consultants or teacher educators, we are gravitating to this concept as well, since it embraces several areas such as curriculum development, technology, lifelong learning and the development of skills related to learning “how to learn”. This seems to suggest that information literacy may be a unifying concept that can brings us all together to form a curriculum partnership in which consultants, administrators, teacher-educators, teacher-librarians and classroom teachers can work together for a common set of learning outcomes. In this way, one part of the system is not in competition with the other for value and support; all partners have a role and a place in the overall plan.

Department of Education/Faculty of Education Partnerships
For many years these two components of the education system ib PEI have operated at arms-length from each other. However, the experiences we have shared suggest that there is much that consultants at the Department or Ministry of Education and teacher educators in universities can do to work together and forge improvements in the programs and services available for students and teachers. Research partnerships are one of the more obvious connections. The school system is often criticized for making decisions that are not rooted in sound or relevant research, while  university researchers are criticized for conducting studies that fail to consider the reality or context of classrooms and school libraries. Clearly it is a win-win situation when consultants and university personnel work together to develop research agendas that further our understanding of learning and pedagogy. In fact when we stop to consider the idea, there are many opportunities for all educators to come together and develop research that truly informs our work.

In addition to research, more communication is needed among  faculties of education and departments of education, school districts and teacher organizations to develop better professional development programs for all educators. Whether the delivery is handled through credit or non-credit courses, workshops or distance learning, all players need input into designing and presenting the program. Faculty can also partner with consultants and frontline teacher-librarians to make presentations and to develop various professional development activities.

New Partnerships Around Learning Resources
There is plenty of evidence that all players in education are forced to do more with less. It has become increasingly difficult to find the resources we need to deliver all the programs and services we have established. New solutions to the problems of resource provision need to be found. When you work in a school library, you see the immediate benefits to building a central resource collection that can be shared and used to the maximum by all students and teachers. This point is driven home even more emphatically when you move beyond that frontline and start working at the district, provincial or university level. In the past, curriculum initiatives were often started without any evidence for what existing resources would be available or useful to support the program. As well, programs were implemented with a core set of materials, but without a clear plan for providing additional resources or maintaining any losses or destruction of materials. It seems duplication, inefficiency and inconsistency abound and when you have worked in a school library you become very frustrated when no collection development plans seem to exist at the district or provincial level to ensure that selection of resources is well done or that an efficient system is in place for acquiring resources and placing them in schools.

It is obvious there is need for improvement in this whole area. New programs today are more likely to include a greater variety of learning resources in several formats. Publishers promote these as “resource-based”, but this type of programming leads to several questions that still need to be addressed. Does every classroom require all available resources? Is it possible to centralize some of these in school or district collections? Is it possible to order some resources centrally and house them in school libraries? The point is that when curriculum is in the developmental stage, the use of teacher-librarians is essential. Consultants who have worked in school libraries can take a leadership role here and show how centralized selection, ordering and delivery of resources makes sound economic and pedagogical sense. Luckily, there are ways technology can bring people together to streamline the whole resource management system. There are examples of several provinces in Canada who are developing integrated library systems where resources in public, school, academic and specialized libraries are accessible to everyone through union catalogues and electronic networks. It makes all kinds of sense for people to work together to remove the duplication of effort and the waste of limited funding so that we get the most "bang-per-buck" and learn to share resources in new ways that are more effective and efficient.

New Partnerships Around the Integration of Technology
Technology innovators are aggressive in their desire to make technology a priority across the school system. Business interests also want to see more attention and time given to teaching students how to use all types of instructional technologies. Educators at all levels of the system are spending great efforts to learn about new technologies and to find ways to integrate them into their teaching. School libraries are taking a leadership role here by recognizing the value of information technologies and by embracing their use in their management and instructional responsibilities. This interest by so many players in using new technologies presents us with the unique chance to come together and combine our efforts and make real change happen.

Everyone needs to be talking about technology as an integrated part of curriculum. We need to keep the curriculum message loud and clear so that we link our use of technology with our expected learning outcomes. We want to be sure that educators use technology as part of the instructional program and not as something to learn for its own sake. We want to place technology within a holistic view of our system. This will mean bringing the players together and creating a partnership around technology where we work together and achieve common goals.

Conclusion
It could be said, “Once a teacher-librarian, always a teacher-librarian.” It seems that no matter what position you take in our education system, once you have worked as a teacher-librarian to develop an integrated school library program, you learn valuable lessons about collaboration, resource management, instructional leadership, resource-based learning, integrating technology and lifelong learning. These experiences form the foundation for your future work. Moving beyond the frontline is not abandoning the cause of school librarianship or cutting your connections with your teacher-librarian colleagues. It means you can bring to administrators, consultants and teacher educators all of the positive energy you used to develop your school library program and you can take a new leadership role transferring the concepts inherent in the vision of an integrated school library program to a wider context and to all educators, which will help those ideas become pervasive throughout the entire education system.

References
Doiron, Ray and Davies, Judy. (1996). Reflection and Renewal in PEI School
     Library Programs. A research report prepared for the PEI Department
     of Education.

Ontario Ministry of Education and Training. (1995). Information Literacy
     and Equitable Access: A Framework for Change. A draft document for
     discussion and response. Toronto: Ontario Ministry of Education and
     Training.

Dr. Ray Doiron has been a primary school teacher, an administrator and a teacher-librarian. He is presently an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Prince Edward Island, Canada. He teaches courses in the Faculty’s ten-course Diploma in School Librarianship Program, as well as courses for pre-service teachers in general methods, literacy in the primary grades and instructional communications. His research interests include school library policy, instructional uses of information technology and children’s nonfiction trade books. Ray may be contacted at raydoiron@upei.ca for your reactions to this paper.