Standard 5: Program Management and Administration
5.3.3. Personnel, Funding, and Facilities: Candidates develop, implement, and evaluate policies and procedures that support teaching and learning in school libraries.
Artifact:
Collaborative Wiki
Two weeks of my life are a blur. I’m not talking about the two weeks before my wedding, nor am I referring to my last two weeks of college. These two hazy weeks occurred last February 2011 when five other School Library Administration students and I created our Collaborative Wiki. The Collaborative Wiki was by far the most challenging assignment I have had to complete as a graduate student. Every time I look back through what we accomplished, I am in awe. I do not know where the time went during those two weeks, but I do know that within those two weeks, I learned more about the school library profession than I had in any other class.
As we collaborated to create our wiki, we evaluated current school library policies and procedures and developed new ones, hybrids from those in Carroll, Howard, and Frederick counties. The policies and procedures we examined and developed directly or indirectly support the library’s role as an instructional hub with the school librarian at the center of the teaching and learning.
In order to collaborate on this wiki, we first needed to evaluate the policies and procedures in our respective counties. What made our group so solid was that two of us teach in Frederick County, two in Howard County, and two in Carroll County. Therefore much of the workload was shared both in our whole group and among the partners in the individual counties. Evaluation of policies and procedures occurred first because we needed to determine how to organize each of the pages in our wiki. Our professor had recommended some of the pages we should include (Operation and Borrowing Procedures, for example), but she had also made it clear that we as a group must also integrate policies and procedures we deemed important or essential. Thus, in order to determine what to include, we needed to read through current county procedures. Most of the policies and procedures for each of the three counties were located in the counties’ school library media handbooks.
For example, on our Evaluations page, we linked to a school librarian self-evaluation form, but also included the procedures for administrative evaluations from all three counties. In order to describe the standard procedures on our wiki, we had to examine the three counties’ documents and annotate the information. We did not combine the three into one because they were different enough to warrant the inclusion of all three. However, all three recognized the policy regarding school librarians developing a professional development plan. The expectation for these professional development plans was and is that the school librarian enhances his or her media instruction by focusing on specific areas of the research process. Another area we individually evaluated was how school library curriculum is identified and shared in each county. Again, because the curriculums (both general and school library media) vary from county to county, we chose to include all. However we first prefaced the three with a development of best practices for a school librarian to consider when adapting his or collection to meet the needs of all curricula and thus ensure quality instruction.
Once we evaluated the counties’ policies and procedures, we made collective decisions on whether to leave some of the wiki pages divided into the three counties or combine the ideas into newly-developed policies and procedures specific to our group’s wiki. One area where we developed procedures was the library Operation and Borrowing page. On it, we included three subheadings: school year opening and closing procedures, borrowing procedures, and resource sharing. In these three sections, we combined what we thought were either the best practices from the three counties or procedures that were repeated throughout the three counties – obviously repetition indicates importance and emphasis, right? Similarly, we developed ideas for our stakeholders’ page in order to identify how to best make connections with our stakeholders (students, teachers, parents, administrators, community members, and legislators) and address their issues, concerns, priorities, and needs. We developed these lists from AASL's "School Library Program Health and Wellness Toolkit.” For example, we recognized that both parents and students need their school librarians to help prepare them for college, from résumé and cover letter development to in-depth instruction on research skills.
One page we realized was necessary to include in our wiki (and one that was developed towards the end of the two weeks) was an Intellectual Freedom page. This page included direct references to the counties’ policies on copyright infringement, reconsideration of texts, plagiarism, and fair use guidelines. And while we did include what we thought were the best representations of these four issues from the counties’ handbooks, we also integrated other important documents that pertain directly to the topic of the wiki page: AASL’s Freedom to Read, The Intellectual Freedom Award, and an annotation of an article from Knowledge Quest, “Join the Copyright Compliance Team.”
While much of my implementation of these policies and procedures will not occur until I am standing behind my own circulation desk, I have had the opportunity to implement some of them alongside my mentors this semester during my internship. For example, in regards to book purchasing, I recently helped my middle school mentor order books to support an integrated studies unit on hobbies (including kickboxing, surfing, and parcour – extreme walking). Many applicable books available through jobbers such as Mackin or Follett lack two reviews; thus, we are not able to order them. This policy of having two positive reviews in order to purchase a book was a policy we identified in our wiki as being the same throughout all three counties. In addition to this and other policies, during August and September, I had the opportunity to observe my high school mentor go through the beginning-of-the-year procedures, including checking-in new items, attending curriculum meetings, distributing AV equipment, and surveying staff for ordering requests.
One would think that the incredible amount of work I (and my group mates) had to dedicate to this wiki would leave no room for learning and growth. Not true. I studied many county-specific policies and procedures, but I also learned how to critically evaluate these policies and procedures so as to determine which ones were in the best interest of student learning. And while it may not seem as deep or philosophical as the aforementioned growth, I learned how to use a wikispace: the perfect venue for sharing among educational professionals!
At the beginning of the Collaborative Wiki project, I don’t think any of us really understood the purpose or goal of the assignment. Two weeks later, we had developed a comprehensive digital handbook for any school librarian entering the field in Carroll, Frederick, or Howard County. I received an email three days ago from wikispaces informing me that someone had modified our wiki. I really like our wiki, but I haven’t wanted to touch it since that subliminal Sunday in February when we dropped the link into the Blackboard drop box. Which one of my five group mates did? I sauntered on into the wiki, only to discover that my current internship supervisor had copied the front page. I do not know why she wanted it or what she plans to do with it. All I know is she is the former Frederick County curriculum specialist for school library media, and I am honored. She recognized how comprehensive our wiki truly is in presenting policies and procedures that support teaching and learning.
As we collaborated to create our wiki, we evaluated current school library policies and procedures and developed new ones, hybrids from those in Carroll, Howard, and Frederick counties. The policies and procedures we examined and developed directly or indirectly support the library’s role as an instructional hub with the school librarian at the center of the teaching and learning.
In order to collaborate on this wiki, we first needed to evaluate the policies and procedures in our respective counties. What made our group so solid was that two of us teach in Frederick County, two in Howard County, and two in Carroll County. Therefore much of the workload was shared both in our whole group and among the partners in the individual counties. Evaluation of policies and procedures occurred first because we needed to determine how to organize each of the pages in our wiki. Our professor had recommended some of the pages we should include (Operation and Borrowing Procedures, for example), but she had also made it clear that we as a group must also integrate policies and procedures we deemed important or essential. Thus, in order to determine what to include, we needed to read through current county procedures. Most of the policies and procedures for each of the three counties were located in the counties’ school library media handbooks.
For example, on our Evaluations page, we linked to a school librarian self-evaluation form, but also included the procedures for administrative evaluations from all three counties. In order to describe the standard procedures on our wiki, we had to examine the three counties’ documents and annotate the information. We did not combine the three into one because they were different enough to warrant the inclusion of all three. However, all three recognized the policy regarding school librarians developing a professional development plan. The expectation for these professional development plans was and is that the school librarian enhances his or her media instruction by focusing on specific areas of the research process. Another area we individually evaluated was how school library curriculum is identified and shared in each county. Again, because the curriculums (both general and school library media) vary from county to county, we chose to include all. However we first prefaced the three with a development of best practices for a school librarian to consider when adapting his or collection to meet the needs of all curricula and thus ensure quality instruction.
Once we evaluated the counties’ policies and procedures, we made collective decisions on whether to leave some of the wiki pages divided into the three counties or combine the ideas into newly-developed policies and procedures specific to our group’s wiki. One area where we developed procedures was the library Operation and Borrowing page. On it, we included three subheadings: school year opening and closing procedures, borrowing procedures, and resource sharing. In these three sections, we combined what we thought were either the best practices from the three counties or procedures that were repeated throughout the three counties – obviously repetition indicates importance and emphasis, right? Similarly, we developed ideas for our stakeholders’ page in order to identify how to best make connections with our stakeholders (students, teachers, parents, administrators, community members, and legislators) and address their issues, concerns, priorities, and needs. We developed these lists from AASL's "School Library Program Health and Wellness Toolkit.” For example, we recognized that both parents and students need their school librarians to help prepare them for college, from résumé and cover letter development to in-depth instruction on research skills.
One page we realized was necessary to include in our wiki (and one that was developed towards the end of the two weeks) was an Intellectual Freedom page. This page included direct references to the counties’ policies on copyright infringement, reconsideration of texts, plagiarism, and fair use guidelines. And while we did include what we thought were the best representations of these four issues from the counties’ handbooks, we also integrated other important documents that pertain directly to the topic of the wiki page: AASL’s Freedom to Read, The Intellectual Freedom Award, and an annotation of an article from Knowledge Quest, “Join the Copyright Compliance Team.”
While much of my implementation of these policies and procedures will not occur until I am standing behind my own circulation desk, I have had the opportunity to implement some of them alongside my mentors this semester during my internship. For example, in regards to book purchasing, I recently helped my middle school mentor order books to support an integrated studies unit on hobbies (including kickboxing, surfing, and parcour – extreme walking). Many applicable books available through jobbers such as Mackin or Follett lack two reviews; thus, we are not able to order them. This policy of having two positive reviews in order to purchase a book was a policy we identified in our wiki as being the same throughout all three counties. In addition to this and other policies, during August and September, I had the opportunity to observe my high school mentor go through the beginning-of-the-year procedures, including checking-in new items, attending curriculum meetings, distributing AV equipment, and surveying staff for ordering requests.
One would think that the incredible amount of work I (and my group mates) had to dedicate to this wiki would leave no room for learning and growth. Not true. I studied many county-specific policies and procedures, but I also learned how to critically evaluate these policies and procedures so as to determine which ones were in the best interest of student learning. And while it may not seem as deep or philosophical as the aforementioned growth, I learned how to use a wikispace: the perfect venue for sharing among educational professionals!
At the beginning of the Collaborative Wiki project, I don’t think any of us really understood the purpose or goal of the assignment. Two weeks later, we had developed a comprehensive digital handbook for any school librarian entering the field in Carroll, Frederick, or Howard County. I received an email three days ago from wikispaces informing me that someone had modified our wiki. I really like our wiki, but I haven’t wanted to touch it since that subliminal Sunday in February when we dropped the link into the Blackboard drop box. Which one of my five group mates did? I sauntered on into the wiki, only to discover that my current internship supervisor had copied the front page. I do not know why she wanted it or what she plans to do with it. All I know is she is the former Frederick County curriculum specialist for school library media, and I am honored. She recognized how comprehensive our wiki truly is in presenting policies and procedures that support teaching and learning.