Summer Reading; or, It’s Not About the Books

Today, I held my first-ever Summer Reading Book Fair. Also, Seth Godin said something about libraries. At the beginning of the day, I did not think these two events would be related, but I wouldn’t be true to my English major roots if I wasn’t able to draw connections between seemingly unrelated events.

I announced the Summer Reading list during a all-school assembly last Friday (and this year the video played with sound, which was exciting) :

You can see my entire Summer Reading webpage here: Summer Reading 2011
(Have I ever mentioned that Summer Reading is one of my favorite parts of my job? If not, I’m mentioning it now. If I have, I’m mentioning it again.)

formanlibrary - summerreading2011 via kwout

This year I’m working with our local independent bookstore to help students order the books they want to read and have them before they go home for the summer. And so I organized a Summer Reading book fair where students could come check out the books on the list and get help deciding which books they might want to read.

Eighteen students showed up--and I know 18 doesn’t sound like a lot, but trust me, it is. My school only has approximately 180 students, and about 50 of those are seniors. Which means about 14% of the students who will be participating in the Summer Reading program showed up (unless I’m doing the math wrong, which is possible, but I’m generally pretty good at percentages).

But more than the number of students who showed up, it was which students showed up. There were a lot of students there who not self-identify as avid readers--or even as readers. But they came and they wanted to know about the books. Some spent very little time, but several spent a long time--asking questions, debating between different books, and sometimes demanding I tell them which book they’d like better. One student came with his own personal short list of books he’d come up with after reviewing the list on the website. And students were talking with one another--recommending books and deciding on which books they both should read.

And this all got me thinking about Seth Godin’s post and Buffy Hamilton's amazing response to it and the bits and pieces of discussion I was able to follow on Twitter today.

The book fair was not a success because I had the books on display, or had computers set up for students to look up more info on the books, or because there was a Google form embedded on the page for me to gather feedback from students. It was a success because it brought people together in a particular time and space to talk about and get excited about books and reading.

If librarianship, in your mind, is about things (whether those things be books or computers or e-readers or the next shiny new toy), you’re doing it wrong. Librarianship is about people, and it’s about ideas, and it’s about bringing ideas and people together.

I admit to not having been as fully immersed as I am used to being (and would usually like to be) in the larger professional conversations that are happening lately; part of it is the time of year and the many projects I have going on, and part of it is that some of these discussions suck the energy right out of me, and I need all the energy I can hold on to in order to work on all these projects.

I know how important those larger conversations are, but they do often happen in an echo chamber where we argue about the trees while those outside are unaware of the forest (to brutally mix a metaphor). As Melissa Corey very eloquently pointed out, the changes we’re talking about need to be happening everywhere, not just in some libraries. But these changes do happen one library at a time. And right now I’m focusing on making those changes in my library.

I know that the teachers I work with have a different ideas about libraries and librarians after working with me. And I know the students I work with have different ideas about libraries and librarians after working with me. Everything I do is about changing expectations about what librarians can do and what libraries can be. And it’s not about the books, or the computers, or the physical space I work in. It’s about connections. It’s about people.

New year, new blog post

I have several half-started (but nowhere near half-finished) blog posts that I haven’t gotten around to actually writing and posting; now is the time of year when I switch from not posting regularly because not much is going on, to not posting regularly because too much is going on. As a reader, your experience is pretty much the same. I’m all about consistency.

I’ve been back for over three weeks now (two weeks of an intensive Professional Development Institute, and then the regular week-long inservice), but today the new students arrived, making it feel like a real “first day of school.” More significantly, it is the first day of my fourth year at this school. Which is, for the record, the longest I’ve worked anywhere. Which is both exciting and kind of weird. Don’t get me wrong--I love working here, which is why I’m still here, and I’m really excited about many of the changes that are taking place, and the ways in which my job is developing. And I really like the idea of being somewhere for a length of time--establishing myself, building a program, becoming the person that can answer the new teachers’ questions.

Also, this year’s four-year seniors have never known another librarian at this school. I still can’t quite wrap my head around that.

Many exciting things on the horizon for this year (I’m aware that I keep using the word “exciting.” I do know other words, but they are stored in the less tired parts of my brain, to which I do not currently have access). My big goal for this year is to write a real, actual curriculum--beyond the big ideas of what students learn, to a year-by-year, “when and where” do they learn it plan. On one level it seems straightforward, and on another there are too many pieces for me to wrap my head around. But realizing that this year’s seniors have only had me as a librarian has lit a fire in me in terms of really taking ownership for the long-term shape of the information literacy curriculum.

We’re also doing a big push with assistive technology this year, taking what we’ve been doing and making sure it’s implemented consistently across the disciplines. This has, for a while, seemed to be a Sisyphean task (yes, I can come up with “Sisyphean,” but not a synonym for “exciting”), but momentum has finally gotten to the point where real, school-wide change is almost inevitable. I’m psyched and overwhelmed; AT is one of those things where I feel like I know enough to know what I don’t know. But I’m working with a great team of people, and we have built connections to experts who can help.

We’ve switched to a new website portal. . . thing (not to get too technical), and the state of the library website is sort of in limbo. I still have the wikispaces site I’ve had for the past three years, but at some point the library will get folded into the larger school site, which is exciting. I’ve always been a bit frustrated with the wikispaces site; I love that it makes it possible for me to have an easily editable website, but I hate that it’s not really that professional looking. It feels separate from the rest of the school website. Probably because it is. However, that integration hasn’t happened yet, so I’m kind of in between the old site and. . . something new. I don’t know what it will look like or what I’ll be able to do. I am using this experience for building my “making peace with uncertainty” skills.

In a related story, regular readers (hi Mom!) will recall that I had gotten some. . . less than enthusiastic feedback on the summer reading program. Well. In the past few weeks I’ve gotten several e-mails from students who are excited about the books that they’ve read, and are asking good questions about the summer reading projects. And they are doing some cool projects. I can’t wait to see them. In fact, one student showed me his book trailer for Carl Hiassen’s Flush this afternoon, and it was obvious (underneath his “too cool for school” exterior) that he was proud of what he’d created--and he is not the type of student I would have necessarily expected that from. I know there will still be grumbling, and I know that every student didn’t necessarily buy in, but just based on the initial feedback I’m thinking that this new program was a success. So there.

I also did a new student orientation today, which went well, but I’m not really thrilled with what I did. I’m not sure what I would have changed (if I knew, I would have fixed it beforehand); it just seemed lacking in some way. But, one of the prefects did introduce me to a new student as “the coolest librarian you’ll ever meet.” So, I got that going for me.

For the record, "How's your summer been?" would have been a better way to start that conversation

To paraphrase Charlie Brown, nothing takes the taste out of your veggie burger quite like being told that "every" student thinks the Summer Reading program you spent hours and hours and hours on is a joke.

I don't want to be as bothered by this as I am, 'cause I know how students are, but it just completely deflated me.

This information was given to me by a colleague at a cookout this afternoon--a cookout I was hoping to enjoy, as it would be an opportunity to catch up with some colleagues I hadn't seen all summer. According to her, students think the Summer Reading program is a joke because English teachers "never" follow up on it or collect the essays or anything. Which I know isn't true, but I also know isn't completely false. And, apparently, unless there's a test or paper or something, what's the point of reading a book? I did point out to my colleague that the Summer Reading assessment had changed this year, and students would need to show up with a completed project. That did not seem to matter.

Part of me wants to say, "Fine then. We'll make it super rigorous and give a test and make you write a super long essay. Happy now?" Part of me wants to passive-aggressively "apologize" to these kids for trying to make the Summer Reading program enjoyable. Part of me wants to tell the English department that if they're not going do the follow up on Summer Reading in the fall, then I'm not going to put so much work into developing and promoting it. Part of me feels super depressed at the idea of having spent three years trying to change the Summer Reading program into something that is less about work and more about enjoying reading, and seeing I haven't made a dent. Part of me is even more depressed that there seems to be a significant population of students for whom the idea of "reading for pleasure" is, essentially, meaningless.

It's a lot of parts. But all of them kind of want to cry.

~~~~~
ETA: Just to be 100% clear--I am in no way mad at or frustrated with anyone in the English department, regardless of how they've handled Summer Reading in the past. The whole idea is that it's not assessment intensive. I'm just feeling frustrated and deflated.