|
|
National Guidelines Contents
Library Bill of Rights The American Library Association affirms that all libraries are forums for information and ideas, and that the following basic policies should guide their services.
Adopted June 18, 1948. Amended February 2, 1961, and January 23, 1980, by the ALA Council. "Library Bill of Rights." American Library Association. 2006. © Copyright 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 American Library Association. This document may be reprinted and distributed for non-commercial and educational purposes only, and not for resale. No resale use may be made of material on this web site at any time. All other rights reserved. Access to Resources and Services in the School Library Media Program: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of RightsThe school library media program plays a unique role in promoting intellectual freedom. It serves as a point of voluntary access to information and ideas and as a learning laboratory for students as they acquire critical thinking and problem-solving skills needed in a pluralistic society. Although the educational level and program of the school necessarily shapes the resources and services of a school library media program, the principles of the Library Bill of Rights apply equally to all libraries, including school library media programs. School library media specialists assume a leadership role in promoting the principles of intellectual freedom within the school by providing resources and services that create and sustain an atmosphere of free inquiry. School library media specialists work closely with teachers to integrate instructional activities in classroom units designed to equip students to locate, evaluate, and use a broad range of ideas effectively. Through resources, programming, and educational processes, students and teachers experience the free and robust debate characteristic of a democratic society. School library media specialists cooperate with other individuals in building collections of resources appropriate to the needs and to the developmental and maturity levels of students. These collections provide resources that support the mission of the school district and are consistent with its philosophy, goals, and objectives. Resources in school library media collections are an integral component of the curriculum and represent diverse points of view on both current and historical issues. These resources include materials that support the intellectual growth, personal development, individual interests, and recreational needs of students. While English is, by history and tradition, the customary language of the United States, the languages in use in any given community may vary. Schools serving communities in which other languages are used make efforts to accommodate the needs of students for whom English is a second language. To support these efforts, and to ensure equal access to resources and services, the school library media program provides resources that reflect the linguistic pluralism of the community. Members of the school community involved in the collection development process employ educational criteria to select resources unfettered by their personal, political, social, or religious views. Students and educators served by the school library media program have access to resources and services free of constraints resulting from personal, partisan, or doctrinal disapproval. School library media specialists resist efforts by individuals or groups to define what is appropriate for all students or teachers to read, view, hear, or access via electronic means. Major barriers between students and resources include but are not limited to imposing age or grade level restrictions on the use of resources; limiting the use of interlibrary loan and access to electronic information; charging fees for information in specific formats; requiring permission from parents or teachers; establishing restricted shelves or closed collections; and labeling. Policies, procedures, and rules related to the use of resources and services support free and open access to information. The school board adopts policies that guarantee students access to a broad range of ideas. These include policies on collection development and procedures for the review of resources about which concerns have been raised. Such policies, developed by persons in the school community, provide for a timely and fair hearing and assure that procedures are applied equitably to all expressions of concern. School library media specialists implement district policies and procedures in the school.
Adopted July 2, 1986, by the ALA Council; amended January 10, 1990; July 12, 2000; January 19, 2005. [ISBN 8389-7053-2]
"Access to Resources and Services in the School Library Media Program." American Library Association. 2006. © Copyright 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 American Library Association. This document may be reprinted and distributed for non-commercial and educational purposes only, and not for resale. No resale use may be made of material on this web site at any time. All other rights reserved. AASL Position Statement on Confidentiality of Library Records The members of the American Library Association,* recognizing the right to privacy of library users, believe that records held in libraries which connect specific individuals with specific resources, programs or services, are confidential and not to be used for purposes other than routine record keeping: i.e., to maintain access to resources, to assure that resources are available to users who need them, to arrange facilities, to provide resources for the comfort and safety of patrons, or to accomplish the purposes of the program or service. The library community recognizes that children and youth have the same rights to privacy as adults. Libraries whose record keeping systems reveal the names of users would be in violation of the confidentiality of library record laws adopted in many states. School library media specialists are advised to seek the advice of counsel if in doubt about whether their record keeping systems violate the specific laws in their states. Efforts must be made within the reasonable constraints of budgets and school management procedures to eliminate such records as soon as reasonably possible. With or without specific legislation, school library media specialists are urged to respect the rights of children and youth by adhering to the tenets expressed in the Confidentiality of Library Records Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights and the ALA Code of Ethics. *ALA Policy 52.4, 54.16 Revised July 1999
"AASL Position Statement on the Role of the School Library Media Program." American Library Association. 2006. © Copyright 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 American Library Association. This document may be reprinted and distributed for non-commercial and educational purposes only, and not for resale. No resale use may be made of material on this web site at any time. All other rights reserved. The Freedom to Read StatementThe freedom to read is essential to our democracy. It is continuously under attack. Private groups and public authorities in various parts of the country are working to remove or limit access to reading materials, to censor content in schools, to label "controversial" views, to distribute lists of "objectionable" books or authors, and to purge libraries. These actions apparently rise from a view that our national tradition of free expression is no longer valid; that censorship and suppression are needed to counter threats to safety or national security, as well as to avoid the subversion of politics and the corruption of morals. We, as individuals devoted to reading and as librarians and publishers responsible for disseminating ideas, wish to assert the public interest in the preservation of the freedom to read. Most attempts at suppression rest on a denial of the fundamental premise of democracy: that the ordinary individual, by exercising critical judgment, will select the good and reject the bad. We trust Americans to recognize propaganda and misinformation, and to make their own decisions about what they read and believe. We do not believe they are prepared to sacrifice their heritage of a free press in order to be "protected" against what others think may be bad for them. We believe they still favor free enterprise in ideas and expression. These efforts at suppression are related to a larger pattern of pressures being brought against education, the press, art and images, films, broadcast media, and the Internet. The problem is not only one of actual censorship. The shadow of fear cast by these pressures leads, we suspect, to an even larger voluntary curtailment of expression by those who seek to avoid controversy or unwelcome scrutiny by government officials. Such pressure toward conformity is perhaps natural to a time of accelerated change. And yet suppression is never more dangerous than in such a time of social tension. Freedom has given the United States the elasticity to endure strain. Freedom keeps open the path of novel and creative solutions, and enables change to come by choice. Every silencing of a heresy, every enforcement of an orthodoxy, diminishes the toughness and resilience of our society and leaves it the less able to deal with controversy and difference. Now as always in our history, reading is among our greatest freedoms. The freedom to read and write is almost the only means for making generally available ideas or manners of expression that can initially command only a small audience. The written word is the natural medium for the new idea and the untried voice from which come the original contributions to social growth. It is essential to the extended discussion that serious thought requires, and to the accumulation of knowledge and ideas into organized collections. We believe that free communication is essential to the preservation of a free society and a creative culture. We believe that these pressures toward conformity present the danger of limiting the range and variety of inquiry and expression on which our democracy and our culture depend. We believe that every American community must jealously guard the freedom to publish and to circulate, in order to preserve its own freedom to read. We believe that publishers and librarians have a profound responsibility to give validity to that freedom to read by making it possible for the readers to choose freely from a variety of offerings. The freedom to read is guaranteed by the Constitution. Those with faith in free people will stand firm on these constitutional guarantees of essential rights and will exercise the responsibilities that accompany these rights. We therefore affirm these propositions:
Creative thought is by definition new, and what is new is different. The bearer of every new thought is a rebel until that idea is refined and tested. Totalitarian systems attempt to maintain themselves in power by the ruthless suppression of any concept that challenges the established orthodoxy. The power of a democratic system to adapt to change is vastly strengthened by the freedom of its citizens to choose widely from among conflicting opinions offered freely to them. To stifle every nonconformist idea at birth would mark the end of the democratic process. Furthermore, only through the constant activity of weighing and selecting can the democratic mind attain the strength demanded by times like these. We need to know not only what we believe but why we believe it.
Publishers and librarians serve the educational process by helping to make available knowledge and ideas required for the growth of the mind and the increase of learning. They do not foster education by imposing as mentors the patterns of their own thought. The people should have the freedom to read and consider a broader range of ideas than those that may be held by any single librarian or publisher or government or church. It is wrong that what one can read should be confined to what another thinks proper.
No art or literature can flourish if it is to be measured by the political views or private lives of its creators. No society of free people can flourish that draws up lists of writers to whom it will not listen, whatever they may have to say.
To some, much of modern expression is shocking. But is not much of life itself shocking? We cut off literature at the source if we prevent writers from dealing with the stuff of life. Parents and teachers have a responsibility to prepare the young to meet the diversity of experiences in life to which they will be exposed, as they have a responsibility to help them learn to think critically for themselves. These are affirmative responsibilities, not to be discharged simply by preventing them from reading works for which they are not yet prepared. In these matters values differ, and values cannot be legislated; nor can machinery be devised that will suit the demands of one group without limiting the freedom of others.
The ideal of labeling presupposes the existence of individuals or groups with wisdom to determine by authority what is good or bad for others. It presupposes that individuals must be directed in making up their minds about the ideas they examine. But Americans do not need others to do their thinking for them.
It is inevitable in the give and take of the democratic process that the political, the moral, or the aesthetic concepts of an individual or group will occasionally collide with those of another individual or group. In a free society individuals are free to determine for themselves what they wish to read, and each group is free to determine what it will recommend to its freely associated members. But no group has the right to take the law into its own hands, and to impose its own concept of politics or morality upon other members of a democratic society. Freedom is no freedom if it is accorded only to the accepted and the inoffensive. Further, democratic societies are more safe, free, and creative when the free flow of public information is not restricted by governmental prerogative or self-censorship.
The freedom to read is of little consequence when the reader cannot obtain matter fit for that reader's purpose. What is needed is not only the absence of restraint, but the positive provision of opportunity for the people to read the best that has been thought and said. Books are the major channel by which the intellectual inheritance is handed down, and the principal means of its testing and growth. The defense of the freedom to read requires of all publishers and librarians the utmost of their faculties, and deserves of all Americans the fullest of their support. We state these propositions neither lightly nor as easy generalizations. We here stake out a lofty claim for the value of the written word. We do so because we believe that it is possessed of enormous variety and usefulness, worthy of cherishing and keeping free. We realize that the application of these propositions may mean the dissemination of ideas and manners of expression that are repugnant to many persons. We do not state these propositions in the comfortable belief that what people read is unimportant. We believe rather that what people read is deeply important; that ideas can be dangerous; but that the suppression of ideas is fatal to a democratic society. Freedom itself is a dangerous way of life, but it is ours. This statement was originally issued in May of 1953 by the Westchester Conference of the American Library Association and the American Book Publishers Council, which in 1970 consolidated with the American Educational Publishers Institute to become the Association of American Publishers. Adopted June 25, 1953, by the ALA Council and the AAP Freedom to Read Committee; amended January 28, 1972; January 16, 1991; July 12, 2000; June 30, 2004. A Joint Statement by: American Library Association Subsequently endorsed by: American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression
"Freedom to Read Statement." American Library Association. 2006. © Copyright 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 American Library Association. This document may be reprinted and distributed for non-commercial and educational purposes only, and not for resale. No resale use may be made of material on this web site at any time. All other rights reserved. Young Adults Deserve the Best: Competencies for Librarians Serving Youth According to a 1995 Department of Education report, public high school enrollment was expected to increase by 13% between 1997 and 2007. This increase will have a great impact on all types of libraries that serve young adults, ages 12 through 18. The need for more librarians to serve young adults is obvious. The best libraries will seize the opportunity to cultivate the increasing numbers of young adults as lifelong library partners and users. The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), has developed a set of competencies for librarians serving young adults. Individuals who demonstrate the knowledge and skills required by the competencies will be able to provide quality library service in collaboration with teenagers. Institutions adopting these competencies will necessarily improve overall service capacities and increase public value to their respective communities. These competencies were developed in 1981, revised in 1998, and again in 2003 to include principles of positive youth development as they promote developmentally significant assets through excellent library service. Directors and trainers use them as a basis for staff development opportunities. They can also be used by school administrators and human resources directors to create evaluation instruments, determine staffing needs, and develop job descriptions. The audiences for the competencies include:
Area I - Leadership and Professionalism The librarian will be able to: 1. Develop and demonstrate leadership skills in identifying the unique needs of young adults and advocating for service excellence, including equitable funding and staffing levels relative to those provided adults and children 2. Exhibit planning and evaluating skills in the development of a comprehensive program for and with young adults. 3. Develop and demonstrate a commitment to professionalism.
4. Plan for personal and professional growth and career development through active participation in professional associations and continuing education. 5. Develop and demonstrate a strong commitment to the right of young adults to have physical and intellectual access to information that is consistent with the American Library Association's Library Bill of Rights. 6. Demonstrate an understanding of and a respect for diverse cultural and ethnic values. 7. Encourage young adults to become lifelong library users by helping them to discover what libraries offer, how to use library resources, and how libraries can assist them in actualization of their overall growth and development. 8. Develop and supervise formal youth participation, such as a teen advisory groups, recruitment of teen volunteers, and opportunities for employment. 9. Affirm and reinforce the role of library school training to expose new professionals to the practices and skills of serving young adults. 10. Model commitment to building assets in youth in order to develop healthy, successful young adults.
Area II - Knowledge of Client Group The librarian will be able to: 1. Design and implement programs and build collections appropriate to the needs of young adults. 2. Acquire and apply factual and interpretative information on youth development, developmental assets, and popular culture in planning for materials, services and programs for young adults. 3. Acquire and apply knowledge of adolescent literacy, aliteracy (the choice not to read) and of types of reading problems in the development of collections and programs for young adults. 4. Develop services based on sound models of youth participation and development. 5. Develop programs that create community among young adults, allow for social interaction, and give young adults a sense of belonging and bonding to libraries.
Area III - Communication The librarian will be able to: 1. Form appropriate professional relationships with young adults, providing them with the assets, inputs and resiliency factors that they need to develop into caring, competent adults. 2. Demonstrate effective interpersonal relations with young adults, administrators, other professionals who work with young adults, and the community at large by:
3. Be a positive advocate for young adults before library administration and the community, promoting the need to acknowledge and honor the rights of young adults to receive quality and respectful library service at all levels. 4. Effectively promote the role of the library in serving young adults; that the provision of services to this group can help young adults build assets, achieve success, and in turn, create a stronger community. 5. Develop effective methods of internal communication to increase awareness of young adult services.
Area IV – Administration A. PLANNING The librarian will be able to: 1. Develop a strategic plan for library service with young adults based on their unique needs.
2. Design, implement, and evaluate ongoing public relations and report programs directed toward young adults, administrators, boards, staff, other agencies serving young adults, and the community at large. 3. Identify and cooperate with other youth serving agencies in networking arrangements that will benefit young adult users. 4. Develop, justify, administer, and evaluate a budget for young adult services. 5. Develop physical facilities dedicated to the achievement of young adult service goals. 6. Develop written policies that mandate the rights of young adults to equitable library service. B. MANAGING The librarian will be able to: 1. Contribute to the orientation, training, supervision and evaluation of other staff members in implementing excellent customer service practices. 2. Design, implement and evaluate an ongoing program of professional development for all staff, to encourage and inspire continual excellence in service to young adults. 3. Develop policies and procedures based upon and reflective of the needs and rights of young adults for the efficient operation of all technical functions, including acquisition, processing, circulation, collection maintenance, equipment supervision, and scheduling of young adult programs. 4. Identify and seek external sources of support for young adult services. 5. Monitor and disseminate professional literature pertinent to young adults, especially material impacting youth rights. 6. Demonstrate the capacity to articulate relationships between young adult services and the parent institution’s core goals and mission. 7. Exhibit creativity and resourcefulness when identifying or defending resources to improve library service to young adults, be they human resources, material, facility, or fiscal. This may include identifying and advocating for the inclusion of interested paraprofessionals into the direct service mix. 8. Document program experience and learning so as to contribute to institutional and professional memory. 9. Implement mentoring methods to attract, develop, and train staff working with young adults. 10. Promote awareness of young adult services strategic plan, goals, programs and services among other library staff and in the community. 11. Develop and manage services that utilize the skills, talents and resources of young adults in the school or community.
Area V - Knowledge of Materials The librarian will be able to: 1. Insure that the parent institution’s materials policies and procedures support and integrate principles of excellent young adult service. 2. In collaboration with young adults, formulate collection development, selection, and weeding policies for all young adult materials, as well as other materials of interest to young adults. 3. Employing a broad range of selection sources, develop a collection of materials with young adults that encompasses all appropriate formats, including materials in emerging technologies, languages other than English, and at a variety of reading skill levels. 4. Demonstrate a knowledge and appreciation of literature for and by young adults. 5. Identify current reading, viewing, and listening interests of young adults and incorporate these findings into collection development strategies as well as events and programs. 6. Design and produce materials (such as finding aids and other formats) to expand access to collections. 7. Maintain awareness of ongoing technological advances and develop a facility with electronic resources. 8. Serve as a resource expert and a consultant when teachers are making the transition from textbook-centered instruction to resource-based instruction.
Area VI - Access to Information The librarian will be able to: 1. Assess the developmental needs and interests of young adults in the community in order to provide the most appropriate resources and services. 2. Organize collections to maximize easy, equitable, and independent access to information by young adults. 3. Use current standard methods of cataloging and classification, as well as incorporate the newest and creative means of access to information. 4. Create an environment that attracts and invites young adults to use the collection. 5. Develop special tools that maximize access to information not readily available, (e.g., community resources, special collections, youth-produced literature, and links to useful websites). 6. Employ promotional methods and techniques that will increase access and generate collection usage. 7. Through formal and informal instruction, ensure that young adults gain the skills they need to find, evaluate, and use information effectively. 8. Create an environment that guarantees equal access to buildings, resources, programs and services for young adults. 9. Develop and use effective measures to manage internet and other electronic resources that provide young adults with equal access. 10. Develop and maintain collections that follow the best practices of merchandising.
Area VII - Services The librarian will be able to: 1. Together with young adults, design, implement and evaluate programs and services within the framework of the strategic plan and based on the developmental needs of young adults and the public assets libraries represent. 2. Utilize a variety of relevant and appropriate techniques (e.g., booktalking, discussion groups, etc.) to encourage young adult use of all types of materials. 3. Provide opportunities for young adults to direct their own personal growth and development. 4. Identify and plan services with young adults in non-traditional settings, such as hospitals, home-school settings, alternative education and foster care programs, and detention facilities. 5. Provide librarian-assisted and independent reference service to assist young adults in finding and using information. 6. Provide a variety of informational and recreational services to meet the diverse needs and interests of young adults. 7. Instruct young adults in basic information gathering and research skills. These should include the skills necessary to use, evaluate, and apply electronic information sources to insure current and future information literacy. 8. Promote activities that increasingly build strengthen information literacy skills, and develop life-long learning habits. 9. Actively involve young adults in planning and implementing services and programs for their age group through advisory boards, task forces, and by less formal means (i.e., surveys, one-on-one discussion, focus groups, etc.) 10. Develop partnerships and collaborations with other organizations that serve young adults. 11. Implement customer service practices that encourage and nurture positive relationships between young adults, the library, staff and administration. Approved by the Young Adult Library Services Association Board of Directors, June, 1981. Revised January, 1998, and October 2003. "Competencies for Serving Young Adults." American Library Association. 2006. http://www.ala.org/ala/yalsa/profdev/yacompetencies/competencies.htm (Accessed 29 Nov, 2006) © Copyright 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 American Library Association. This document may be reprinted and distributed for non-commercial and educational purposes only, and not for resale. No resale use may be made of material on this web site at any time. All other rights reserved.
|
Site maintained by:
Ginger Carter & Ramona Guth
Updated July 9, 2007