The Big D

You may wonder about this crowing about the "great new resources." You see, even though I am in a poor school district, have a low budget, and no help, I do, now, have one thing that other schools like mine unfortunately do not have.

A collection.

When I arrived a little over two years ago, most of the collection was from the 1940s to 60s. I ran into my fifth grade teacher last week who is now eighty five and SHE was a student at my school. There were books there from HER time! There were some real gems (please note sarcasm here): Ceylons, the two Vietnams, and my personal favorite: The Clever Hands of the American Negro. Also a book called About Phobias, which basically claimed that girls develop phobias because of an Electra Complex. The teacher who filled in the year before (the school didn't have a librarian for several years) had wisely discarded even more. For a school of about 1,200 kids, we had maybe 20 books on animals, many of them to hard for our kids to read.

Anyway, the year before my arrival, several local organizations working with a bookseller resulted in a donation of 2,000 new books. That was the year before I arrived. But there was no one with professional collection development training to pick then--from what I understand the bookseller made most of the choices in the end and so it was a mixed bag in terms of quality, interest, and connection to curriculum. Then they promised 2,000 more the following year. By then I'd been hired so I got to compile the wish list (after consulting with teachers, students and the curriculum, of course). They sent about seventy percent of what I asked for. Not bad. Then then pledged a final 5,000 more. Again, I got to pick. One adminstrator (who has since left) complained I spent so much time choosing-claiming that she could have done it in a week. Right. I just love people who think they can do your job. Anyway, it was a big job, many long nights, but we now have a fabulous collection. And a professional collection as well. I now have many, many resources for my own teaching. I rebuilt this library for our school community and I'm proud of the job I've done thus far. I just hope they acknowledge that when it's time to give me tenure.