by Judy Bauman, LRC Director Tate Woods Elementary School

At the December 4, 2009 MLS School Librarians’ Holiday Program, the theme focused on partnerships between School and Public Library Youth Service departments.  One of the district partnership highlighted was from the Lisle School District 202 (http://www.lisle202.org), lead by LRC Director Judy Bauman at Tate Woods Elementary School.

The following article highlights Judy and her school library staffs’ efforts on how they “toot their own horn” through a press release from their recent school board presentation (http://www.mls.lib.il.us/consulting/pdf/lisledistrict202pressrelease.pdf) and a write-up on the district’s recent publicity placing 3rd in DuPage county for their 3rd grad reading scores.  (http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=332757 Daily Herald, October 30, 2009)

Note not only did the school board presentation include the school library staff: Judy Bauman, Tate Woods; Sue Jakalski, Schiesher; Rich Marx, Lisle Junior High; and Laura Conroy, Lisle Senior High, but Lindsey Dorfman, Youth Services Director from the Lisle Public Library.

Judy shares how her Library Resource Center programs and services lay the foundation in the early grades to enhance reading for the students in Lisle District #202.

The library at Tate Woods Elmentary offers an open and flexible schedule, encouraging students to visit the library daily and to check out at least 2 books.  The library staff promotes a PTO sponsored Used Book Exchange where students bring 5 books from their homes and get to take 4 books from the library.  Even preschoolers participate in weekly story time and book check out.

Yearly circulation has increased from 19,992 in the year 2000 to 42,006 items in 2008.

Several school wide activities and events support the library including PTO sponsored book fairs, faculty and student book talks, a teacher book club, and student participation in state-wide reading programs such as Monarch Award voting and the Reading Makes Cents Program.  Yearly author visit are also held and there is active cooperation between the schools and the local public library.

The administration supports the library with an increased book budget within the past four years, a large library support staff made up of one clerical, one tech support, one computer instructor, and 30 parent volunteers, and an LRC Director who attends conferences so that the highest quality titles are chosen.  The LRC Director also collaborate through curricular “Connections” thematic units that stress genres and location in library with students. She also meets with the other school library directors to coordinate district wide goals and programs. 

Assessments such as STAR and MAP are conducted so that student reading levels are known, and student’s ability to locate print materials independently is periodically assessed.  The school also support an active Accelerated Reader program.

Questions about this article can be emailed to the MLS Consultants at constulants@mls.lib.il.us.

Published January 6, 2009, in vol. 4, iss. 1 [View]