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Why I Am a Member of the Denton Inquiry 4 Lifelong Learning Project
By Judi Moreillon
I have been living in Denton since August 2009. I tweet @CactusWoman because my husband and my heart will always be in Tucson in the Sonoran Desert. I came to Texas to follow my passion, to have the opportunity to teach preservice school librarians and to positively influence the school library profession. When I came to teach at Texas Woman’s University, those options were not available to me in Arizona; they are still unavailable today.
I am passionate about libraries and literacy and other people’s children as well as my own. I believe that librarians have a unique leadership role to play in the life of the school that can make a tremendous difference in teaching and learning. I served as a school librarian at all three instructional levels in three different school districts in Tucson. The golden age of my building-level work was in the 1990s when I served in two different flexibly scheduled elementary school libraries where I contributed to students’ learning and to developing a culture of collaboration among my colleagues.
In all of my work as a librarian, I have been fortunate to have the opportunity to express my values and demonstrate my conviction that literacy gives people the skills they need to empower themselves, to reach their goals and dreams. Literacy expands people’s life choices. Literacy also gives us the potential of developing our hearts to enact positive progress in our own lives, the lives of our families, communities, nation, and world.
In Tucson Unified School District where there were one hundred and three full-time, paid, state-certified school librarians in 2003, the district only funded seven librarians in the 2013-2014 school year. Elementary and middle school principals had to reach into their site budgets if they wanted a professional librarian on their faculty. In another Arizona district, one of the elementary school librarians who field tested and published the results of coteaching a lesson from my first professional book was reassigned to the central office when all of the professional librarians were eliminated in her district. Today, instead of teaching full time and serving the needs of teachers and students in one building, she catalogs for thirty-two schools and supervises thirty-two library clerks. A library without a librarian is not a library.
Now in Texas, when I start each new semester with a class of preservice school librarians, or I sit with a group of practicing school librarians, I see something they may not see. Behind them, I see a train coming down the track. I can hear the whistle blowing. They may think I am an alarmist—that my passion to help them develop their practice of librarianship comes across as strident or impatient, or that I set the bar too high. They may think eliminating school librarian positions can’t happen here in Texas; that it can’t happen to them... I know it can.
If you are listening to this VoiceThread or reading this script, I want you to know many, many of my former school librarian colleagues and I were run over on the track and are no longer allowed to pursue our passion, our careers, or to make an impact on teaching and learning in the best way we know now -- as school librarians. It is my sincere desire that this does not happen to you, does not happen to the teachers and students in your school, your district, and here in the Lone Star State. This is why I serve with the Denton Inquiry 4 Lifelong Learning Committee. I am deeply invested in your success and committed to helping you ensure the future of our profession.
Judi Moreillon
Denton Inquiry 4 Lifelong Learning
Collaborator
Direct Link to VoiceThread
Why I Am a Member of the Denton Inquiry 4 Lifelong Learning Project
By Judi Moreillon
I have been living in Denton since August 2009. I tweet @CactusWoman because my husband and my heart will always be in Tucson in the Sonoran Desert. I came to Texas to follow my passion, to have the opportunity to teach preservice school librarians and to positively influence the school library profession. When I came to teach at Texas Woman’s University, those options were not available to me in Arizona; they are still unavailable today.
I am passionate about libraries and literacy and other people’s children as well as my own. I believe that librarians have a unique leadership role to play in the life of the school that can make a tremendous difference in teaching and learning. I served as a school librarian at all three instructional levels in three different school districts in Tucson. The golden age of my building-level work was in the 1990s when I served in two different flexibly scheduled elementary school libraries where I contributed to students’ learning and to developing a culture of collaboration among my colleagues.
In all of my work as a librarian, I have been fortunate to have the opportunity to express my values and demonstrate my conviction that literacy gives people the skills they need to empower themselves, to reach their goals and dreams. Literacy expands people’s life choices. Literacy also gives us the potential of developing our hearts to enact positive progress in our own lives, the lives of our families, communities, nation, and world.
In Tucson Unified School District where there were one hundred and three full-time, paid, state-certified school librarians in 2003, the district only funded seven librarians in the 2013-2014 school year. Elementary and middle school principals had to reach into their site budgets if they wanted a professional librarian on their faculty. In another Arizona district, one of the elementary school librarians who field tested and published the results of coteaching a lesson from my first professional book was reassigned to the central office when all of the professional librarians were eliminated in her district. Today, instead of teaching full time and serving the needs of teachers and students in one building, she catalogs for thirty-two schools and supervises thirty-two library clerks.
A library without a librarian is not a library.
Now in Texas, when I start each new semester with a class of preservice school librarians, or I sit with a group of practicing school librarians, I see something they may not see. Behind them, I see a train coming down the track. I can hear the whistle blowing. They may think I am an alarmist—that my passion to help them develop their practice of librarianship comes across as strident or impatient, or that I set the bar too high. They may think eliminating school librarian positions can’t happen here in Texas; that it can’t happen to them... I know it can.
If you are listening to this VoiceThread or reading this script, I want you to know many, many of my former school librarian colleagues and I were run over on the track and are no longer allowed to pursue our passion, our careers, or to make an impact on teaching and learning in the best way we know now -- as school librarians. It is my sincere desire that this does not happen to you, does not happen to the teachers and students in your school, your district, and here in the Lone Star State. This is why I serve with the Denton Inquiry 4 Lifelong Learning Committee. I am deeply invested in your success and committed to helping you ensure the future of our profession.
Recorded 5 November 2013 - Denton, Texas