It is finished!

Today was my last day at my secondary fieldwork school.  The time really flew by!  The days were not as structured as my time at the elementary site, but I feel like I was able to significantly impact the library, particularly the collection, in my time there.  The fiction section is now near the nonfiction "stacks," and students are already paying more attention to the nonfiction collection since they have to go to that area to find fiction titles. 

The reference section--wow.  There were over 2,576 titles in Lynbrook's reference collection, and the average age was 24.  I weeded over 350 titles and brought the average age up to 22--not huge, but better than it was.  Additional titles are being moved from reference to a "reserve" collection, because the library specialists had been putting anything they didn't want to circulate in the reference collection whether it was a reference book or not.  Some titles will also move to the circulating collection.

I am really surprised by how much my supervisor allowed me to do with weeding.  The library specialists (there are 2 who share the job) only objected to two titles I chose to weed, and when I showed them the more current titles that remained in the collection they backed down.  One of the LS's asked about a book that was written in 1992.  I said, "It's 20 years old, and things have changed since then.  We have a better, more current title."  She hadn't really thought about the fact that 1992 was 20 years ago because to her, it didn't seem that long ago.  I guess people just need a reminder now and again.

I really started to get annoyed today, because people treat libraries like dumping grounds for any book they don't want/need, and then get upset when the library can't use their old outdated books.  I'm also starting to notice that no one cares about the books in the library until you start to get rid of them.  I noticed a teacher looking over some of the discards today.  I can guarantee you that neither that teacher nor her students have ever used the titles she might come back to get for her classroom (where they will gather dust and never be used), but once you move them off the (very) dusty shelves and discard them suddenly they are precious gems.  Libraries are not storehouses or archives.  Yes, those old books look "neat."  But they don't belong in a vibrant school library that is here to serve the students.

Well, that was a little side rant.  Now back to my point--I made a dent in the reference section and hope that my supervisor can continue to weed the collection so that students might actually utilize the good resources that are hiding in amongst the 60-year-old books.  (I wish I was kidding about that.)

I also realized that libraries must be the dustiest places in the world, and that you shouldn't work in them if you have asthma or shoulder issues.  I got quite a work out moving all those books today!  I also got to learn how to delete batches of books from the catalog, which was cool.  I appreciate how much I got to know the catalog system and how to run various reports.  Data is our friend!

And now for some of the pictures I didn't get to include last time:

Short shelves were reference, tall shelves are nonfiction, and blue shelves around the perimeter now hold fiction.

 The center section of the library consists of these tables for student work.  There is a projector in the ceiling and a screen you can kind of see in this picture.  Teachers can bring students to the library for class time using the tables (with laptops, if desired) or the desktop computers around this area, and they can use the projector and screen.  The other side is identical.

The "reading" room, that used to house half the fiction collection (shown in this photo). 

The "study" room, that used to house the other half of the fiction collection.  This is where we moved the reference collection.

A weird "help desk" area that goes largely unused.  My supervisor and I were trying to figure out the best use of this space.  We moved the professional development titles to the shelves here, but don't really have a use for this space yet.

The circulation desk.

The library has two "sun rooms" that students can reserve for group projects/meetings.  Sometimes they are used for testing, or teachers use them as offices when they share classrooms.