Staying positive–offer a suggestion
Jun 1st, 2010 by Cathy Jo Nelson
Okay, so after a year of working in my current position–and high school being a new animal for me, I decided to go with the flow –the status quo for library rules and expectations. I observed many things I did not necessarily like, but my principal wanted me and my colibrarian, both new to high school, to be more of an observer before we made any significant changes. (Well I had one year under my belt from several years ago, but it was a significantly smaller school.) So here is the proposed changes that I want to make into a poster to create for orientation and to display in the library. The goal is to be positive, while leaving room for students to make choices concerning their behaviors, particularly online. The fine print defines specifics that I can pull students into lowkey conversations about less than desirable behavior. We are open in the morning and at lunch, and allow students to “get online” in a supervised space when we have the room (i.e. no classes competing for computers.) We only have forty workstations, so more often than not, lunchtime has very few computers available. But on the positive side, the number available is a manageable number to supervise by me, my colibrarian, or our assistant. So I offer them for your perusal and am open for suggestions.
1) Enjoy the clean, quiet, and friendly environment of the library.
- No food, drinks, or loud talking.
2) Use the books and computers to do your best school work and earn great grades.
- The library’s resources are available for school related purposes.
- Any other activity may result in denial or restricted use.
- Students may checkout up to five books for three weeks.
- Overdue books result in fines (ten cents a day.)
3) Help keep shelves orderly and tidy.
- Books pulled from the shelves but not checked out should be placed in the drop box at the circulation desk.
4) Visitors are welcome in the library between the hours of 7:30 AM and 4 PM daily.
- Students will need a pass at all times except after school.
- Morning and lunch passes are available from an administrator on the diamond in front of the cafeteria
- Upon entering the library during classes, students must present a pass and sign in at the circulation desk. Sign out when leaving.
- If a computer is needed when visiting from a class, the pass must indicate the need. No unsupervised internet activity allowed.
- Visits are limited to 20 minutes (unless otherwise arranged with the librarians by the classroom teacher.)
- No more than two students per class may visit the library during class (unless otherwise arranged with the librarians by the classroom teacher.)
I’m interested in part (4) – there’s an awful lot of rules. Do you find that your time gets drained a little by bailing up every student who enters the library, checking that they have a pass, that they’re not there for more than 20 minutes, that there’s only two from each class, etc. How do teaching staff feel about these rules, and do you find that they’re either pushing for more or fewer rules, when it comes to providing library access to their students?
Part 4 – it is necessary as with 2600 students and 150 teachers, we could potentially have 300 students at a time even with the limit of 2. Around nine weeks and semester exam time, we have kids who regularly think because they are exempting these assessments they can hang around in the library for their ninety minute block. We have seen that idle hands can be problematic too. Along the same lines these timeframes are very popular for projects or for students needing to finish research papers, so usually with only 40 workstations we do not have enough room for extra students. We do not say no to everyone. All we ask is that teachers arrange for students to be in here for any extended amount of time beyond the twenty minutes. Also the library draws students in, and so we get a mixture of cutting kids in here too. These “rules” are school policy–non negotiable according to the principal. With three staffing the library, and everyone on the same page about expectations, we think these will make for a more positive experience in the library. Keep in mind that morning and lunch are very flexible for students to use as needed (or even wanted-like surfing the Internet. But it is supervised flexible use.)
I’ve tried combining and rewording #4 to make the list shorter and a little more “palatable” to the teenage psyche. Hope this helps!
Morning and lunch passes are available from an administrator on the diamond in front of the cafeteria.
Passes are needed at all times except after school. The pass should indicate your need: reading or computer use.
Please sign in AND out at the circulation desk. This is for your own safety in an emergency.
Two students per class may visit the library for 20 minutes during class(unless otherwise arranged with the librarians by the classroom teacher.)
Love how you start with a positive and then the “restrictions.” I agree with Jacquie Henry’s revised #4 – less is more! I think I may be “borrowing” your sign for next year.
One thing with #3 I wonder if there is a way to further encourage students not to re-shelve books themselves by saying something like – help us know which books are most useful by placing books you used but didn’t check out in our circulation drop box. I usually just ask kids to leave them on the tables and I go around and pick them up after the class leaves. When I’ve told kids not to re-shelve books, some get huffy with me thinking I’m saying they don’t know how to put them back correctly. I tell them this helps me know which books get the most use & lets me know which ones I need to order more of and then they aren’t angry at me anymore.
Perhaps I should say “Help our stats by dropping “in-library” used books in the drop box!” You are right that the wording could be viewed as an insult.
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When I was a middle school librarian, I had only one rule that covered just about any behavior the kids could come up with:
Consider others.
I did not know your school was so large. We are in a similar situation – 3200 students. We like to be open and friendly and are maybe even a little bit more lenient than you are – we don’t require lunch passes and we allow 4 students from a teacher at one time. But otherwise very similar situation. Your “rules” are awesome and I will copy them and use them.
I came from elementary school to high school about 4 years ago, so I could not handle “rules” very well at all. After about 6 months of tense situations (including one clerk deciding to leave) we hit the ground running and the library now feels very open and friendly and I like being there. I am lucky to work with two like-minded library media specialists (Hello, Emilie and Donna!) who want manageable structure but not rigid rules.
They are high school students, after all….and we do love them to love our library.
Late to the conversation here, but wanted to let you know that I like several things about your rules:
1. There are only four (even with details below, there are only four!)
2. You begin with a positive statement – user friendly and welcoming
3. You seem to cover all the bases!
I like Jacquie’s shortening of #4 also.
I believe I will liberally borrow from your rules to recreate our rules. Thanks for sharing!
I like your rules. I graduated from DHS before it was demolished and turned into a Home Depot and Walmart. I did some student teaching at the new campus during my undergraduate studies and I totally understand why you need to have these rules. I believe I will be adapting them for my middle school next year
Lorena you make me laugh!! I should say, don’t you mean Dorman University (as my husband mockingly says all the time?) Yeah, I like the advice I’ve gotten from some of the other folks who have commented too. I think next year with a little more consistency and all on the same page rule wise for the library, we’ll have more success and I’ll be happier. Of course a friend is trying to lure me to Charleston. I told her I’m oh so trying to end this hobby called job hunting.