— Spring 1997 —

The SIRS/ECIS Information Exchange Award

Once again this year, we were fortunate to be able to announce that SIRS will be sponsoring the SIRS/ECIS Information Exchange Award, a major professional development opportunity for library professionals and para-professionals in ECIS member schools. In years past, this award has enabled colleagues from Hungary, Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, and Zambia to spend two weeks in south Florida, as guests of SIRS. A special schedule of visits and activities is planned allowing the award recipient to spend time at the SIRS headquarters, and to visit area schools and libraries. All travel and accommodation arrangements are organized and paid for by SIRS, who will arrange the visit to fit the winner's professional needs and schedule.

To apply, please send a one page letter (via mail or fax) to Vivienne Locke, chair of the ECIS Committee on Library and Information Services (address below). Each letter of application should include the following:

• Your name, school, contact address, etc. (fax number, if possible).
• A statement that you are engaged in the provision of school library service in an ECIS member school.
• A brief description of what you would hope to gain from the Award.
• A brief statement of what you would be able to offer the Florida host-librarians.

The judging will be done by the members of the ECIS Committee on Library and Information Services, who will recommend the award-recipient to SIRS. The Committee, and SIRS, maintain the right not to make an award in any given year. All letters of application must be received no later than March 1st, 1997, and the winner will be announced in the Summer 1997 issue of The Link.

Remember, while there is no guarantee that yours will be the winning application, if you don't apply, you can't win! And if you do win, the real winners are the students and teachers who will benefit from the insight and wisdom that you gain!

Happy New Year!

A year-round celebration in multicultural, pluralist, internationally-minded schools

In New York City, they've recently erected a huge digital clock that counts down the days, hours, minutes, and seconds, until the millennium. Certainly, there will be much rejoicing in slightly over 1000 days from now (or 1365, depending on your point of view). There is no need, though, to wait that long, as 1997, like every calendar year, provides a variety of New Year celebrations, in addition to the January 1st pandemonium. Some, like Rosh ha-Shanah are major holy days for believers, others, like Ra's al'-Am, are relatively minor. They all, however, provide opportunities for our students (and ourselves!) to learn more about our global village. The following suggestions were supplied by the Religious News Service (via the New York Times, January 4th):

March 21st -- the date of the vernal equinox, marks the Feast of Naw-Ruz, the Baha'i New Year.

April 13th -- is celebrated in southern India as the New Year for Tamil Hinduism.

May 8th or 9th -- (depending on when the new moon is sighted) is Ra's al'-Am, the Muslim New Year, the first day of Muharram, the first month of the Islamic lunar calendar.

October 1st -- is the Jewish New Year, Rosh ha-Shanah. On this first day of Tishri, the seventh month of the Jewish lunar calendar, tradition has it that God created the universe.

October 31st -- this year, is Diwali, celebrated as New Year's Day by Hindus in most parts of India.

Gossip

The ECIS Annual Conference, held in November 1996 in Nice (France), continued the tradition of excellence established by previous conferences, especially in terms of useful, worthwhile workshops and sessions organized by and for librarians. The outside speakers Paul Janeczko and Carol Kuhithau were especially though-provoking, and the "buzz" surrounding Ken Vesey's session was that anyone who missed it really missed out on something special. Judging from the number of librarians spotted in the audience, Jim Cummins (about whom the word "legend" would not be too strong) had an appeal far beyond his ESL focus.

And, of course, France being France, food played an important part of the weekend s festivities. From the cozy camaraderie of the informal librarian's dinner in a small bistro in the old town, to the old-world splendor of the fabulous SIRS Dinner at the legendary Hotel Negresco, no one went home hungry!

Those in the know assure The Link that plans are well underway for another fantastic conference in November 1997, in The Hague, so start saving up your professional development pennies now. We also have news of a new award, in addition to the wonderful SIRS/ECIS Information Exchange Award (described above). Completely different in focus, the details, alas, were not ironed out in time for the publication deadline for this issue. Watch the next issue for details of this exciting opportunity!

Updates

Remember, dear readers, that The Link is a publication written by and for librarians in International Schools. Really effective communication is two-way communication. Help us to make The Link a forum for sharing amongst ourselves by keeping in touch or, even better, offering to write an article!

Richard Barter, Assistant Director
American School of Las Palmas
Apartado 15 Tafira Alta
35017 Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
Spain
Phone:(34) (28) 43 00 23
Fax: (34) (28) 43 00 17

News from the Chair

Information from the Committee includes details of a new member as Henry Parker, I.S. Copenhagen, has had to step down. Ken Vesey, St. John's I.S. (Waterloo, Belgium) was proposed at the OBM in Nice and has been duly accepted as a committee member. The ECIS Conference is in The Hague in 1997 and we are busy planning a proposed programme of speakers for the ECIS conference organisers. We are continuing the theme of moving forward in international school libraries, to continue to work for good library provision in literacy, service and technological expertise. As this is our twentieth year as a subject committee of ECIS, we are hoping to make the programme particularly memorable and pertinent to the world of international education in which we work.

Vivienne Locke
Curriculum Support Librarian
International School of the Hague
Theo Mann-Bouwmeesterlaan 75
2597 GV The Hague
(The Netherlands)
Phone: (31) (70) 328 14 50
Fax: (31) (70) 328 20 49

Looking for a change?
How about Israel for a year?

No matter how much you love your job, nor how many years you've been at a school, sometimes a change can be good. The Link has received this letter from a faithful reader, and we are happy to pass her query along to you: I'd be grateful if you would post a notice in the next LINK asking if anyone out there in ECIS Library-Land would be interested in a 1-year exchange of positions, for school year 1998-99. I am Director of Library-Media Services here at the American International School in Israel, a K-12 school, so we would need a person of administrative as well as student-contact and teaching experience. Anyone wishing further details can contact me at the following address or by e-mail: reinan@american.hasharon.k12.il.

Yours truly,

Reina Nuernberger
The Walworth Barbour American International School
P.O. Box 9005
Kfar Shmaryahu 46910
Israel
Phone: (972)(9)584225
Fax: (972)(9)582881

School Libraries

Fundraising: The International School Librarian's Dream ... or Nightmare

One School's Experience

The ISS newspaper NewsLinks ran a four part series last year on fundraising in International schools, drawing attention to what has become increasingly clear: man cannot live on tuition alone, so to speak. Why mention this in a newsletter by and for librarians? Because when belts get tighter, and budget cuts start to bite, school libraries, and school librarians are often amongst the first to suffer. Conversely, though, school libraries can also be uniquely effective as proactive partners in a school's fundraising efforts. Many parents who might find it galling to donate money towards teacher salaries or operating funds, or too abstract to contribute to an endowment fund, are more than happy to contribute to something concrete, which they know will benefit their children such as books and materials for the school library.

At the American School of Las Palmas, the library has been at the forefront of the school's fundraising activities. Yes, some of the activities are time-consuming, but the pay-off, in terms of better services to students have been worthwhile. We hold two major events a year. In December, we hold a Book Day, when students and parents are urged to "buy" a book to donate to the school library, from a selection of shelf-ready books that we have on display, inscribing a special bookplate in each donated book. Obviously, these materials were already budgeted and paid for. The money raised allows us to purchase additional materials later in the year. Perhaps some real numbers will help to put this in perspective. A resource-poor school with about 275 students, our budget for library books is roughly US$ 10,000. Book Day donations this year (about 25% of our students participated) raised $2000 more which inspired one wealthy family to make a matching gift of an additional $2000! And, unlike one of those commercial Book Clubs that many schools run, in exchange for all of the time and effort we put in, we got to keep all of the profit, not just a percentage of it! Of course, one advantage of those Book Clubs is that they get books into the hands of students when the school library is not available (notably Summer vacation). In June we hold our Buy Books With Books event, when students donate no-longer-wanted reading material in exchange for credits that can be used to buy other people s cast-offs. Our "profit" on this is not monetary -- it's seeing some child from a home without books turn four of Mom's discarded fashion mags into a tattered and torn, but treasured and loved, storybook or novel!

Bridging the Gap:

Information Rich, but Knowledge Poor
IASL-ATLC Conference
Vancouver, July 6-11, 1997

Sponsored jointly by the International Association of School Librarianship and the Association for Teacher-Librarianship in Canada, this conference, to be held in British Columbia this Summer, will explore the opportunities and challenges facing both schools and school libraries worldwide. It is worth noting, as well, that Vancouver is an ideal vacation destination as well as being an excellent location from which to begin a tour of British Columbia, a cruise to Alaska, or a visit to the Rockies. For further information, or to request a registration package, contact:

Lynne Lighthall, Conference Coordinator
4093 West 14th Avenue
Vancouver, BC V6R 2X3 (Canada)
Phone: (1) (604) 822-2704
Fax: (1) (604) 822-6006
e-mail: lynne.lighthall@ubc.ca

Other IASL News:

Ken Haycock, a well-known figure in the world of school librarianship, has been appointed Executive Director of IASL, succeeding Jean Lowrie, the first President and first Executive Secretary of the organization. Currently Director of the School of Library, Archival and Information Studies at the University of British Columbia, Dr. Haycock has won numerous awards and, in 1995, was the only non-American elected to the Council of the American Library Association. In 1996 he was elected president-elect of the American Association of School Librarians, and is also President of the Council for Canadian Learning Resources, in addition to being editor and publisher of Emergency Librarian, as well as author of several books and over a hundred articles and papers. The International Association of School Librarianship recently celebrated its 25th anniversary. With personal and association members from over 80 countries, IASL is committed to the improvement of school libraries and school library programs as vital components of education. For informational about membership and publications, contact:

IASL Secretariat
Box 34069, Department 300
Seattle, Washington 98124-1069 (USA)
Fax: (1) (604) 925-0566
e-mail: iasl@rockland.com.

The Feature Article

Building an Advocacy Network:
The Role of the Teacher-Librarian

A. James Jones, Facilitator, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) Teacher-Librarian Network (USA)

Building a network of advocates for the school library is a critical challenge which faces every teacher-librarian in schools around the world. School libraries are threatened and most teacher-librarians do not understand why. Some claim that technology is the problem. Others feel that technology can be the only solution. Problems are numerous and recommended solutions are many. What do we do to obtain the administrative and faculty support to make the library a central part of the school? I contend the answer lies in promoting a single focus student learning through the library.

If we keep discussions centered on helping students to become information literate, we must describe our vision of an information literate student to our peers, our administration, families of students and the communities that we serve. In an article done for School Library Media Quarterly (Summer 1996), David Loertscher describes the information literate student as one who is: an avid reader, a critical thinker, a creative thinker, an interested learner, an organized investigator, an effective communicator, a responsible user of information and a skilled user of technology. If our programs are described in the context of this learning, they will have a strong and common focus on students learning through the development of information technology literacy skills. Collaboratively developing lessons with other faculty while keeping a focus on these skills can produce measurable results.

I suggest four key activities for all teacher-librarians to develop greater support for their individual programs and the profession as a whole:

• Get involved Joining professional organizations and encouraging your peers to do so also helps turn a job into a profession. Do you and your colleagues belong to major professional organizations, e.g., ASCD, American Library Association, British Library Association, etc.? Do you participate? Membership and participation brings with it an increasing awareness of common problems and some "best practice" solutions. Membership in professional organizations also conveys the image of being a professional to your colleagues, your school, and the communities you serve.
• Highlight real not perceived needs Use documentation to support your claims. What is needed to support development of information literate students, why is it needed, and at what cost? How many schools have an information literacy curriculum prepared which details skills that can be integrated into any or all subject areas? Describe your needs in clearly defined bite-size pieces and feed them carefully to those who must digest the pieces as part of a decision making process.
• Be proactive Develop recommendations, plans, procedures, budgets and curriculums which inform your administration and assist the classroom teacher. Be involved with the total curriculum and total school so teachers recognize the importance of the library and the role you play in student learning. Don t wait for someone to ask. Take every opportunity to work at developing and promoting a shared vision of learning through the library.
• Expand your role Teacher-librarians in international schools present a diverse group of individuals who can bring a unique and much needed perspective to discussions on the future of the profession. ASCD Teacher-Librarian Network would value the opinions and perspectives of the international school teacher- librarian, for you can bring a taste of reality to some of the ongoing debates within the professional organizations in the United States. Having received a diploma in information studies from Leeds Metropolitan University in the UK, I realize full well that we do not all view the profession in the same way, nor should we.

The ASCD Teacher-Librarian network believes we can make a real difference in how and what our students learn. However, to encourage others to advocate an information-technology literacy program, we must first be advocates ourselves. We need to integrate ourselves into a school s instructional team, not remain separate from it. As enthusiastic users of information, we need to understand and promote by example learning and working in an information rich world.

To learn more about this ASCD network, contact:
A. James Jones, Director of Learning Technologies
Milton Hershey School
P. O. Box 830
Hershey, Pennsylvania 17033 (USA)

Milton Hershey School is an independent school serving financially and socially needy children from across the U.S. A co-educational, residential school (ages 4 to 19), it was founded by Milton and Catherine Hershey, founders of Hershey Foods.