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Reviews for the school librarian
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From: Maggi <librarymaggi_at_gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 2009 12:06:41 -0500
I'm spellbound by this discussion on reviews and reviewing! Thank you to everyone for your thoughtful responses.
I used to be a public librarian, but now I'm in the schools. It's a whole different world. We have no budget for periodicals other than what we allocate from our general book budget. This year we have 20 elementary school librarians in my district, each of whom have chosen to buy one periodical, and we share them amongst one another. I can't tell you how many months have gone by since I've actually had time to sit down and read a professional periodical. Too many times, I receive them in the mail and they get shelved in my office. It galls me, but I scarcely have time to read the books I buy for my students; given the choice between books I could buy and books I have right now, I usually pick the latter.
Even if I had time to read all the wonderful review periodicals, I have hardly any money to buy the books they review. We get about $10.50 per year per student for books and AV materials, far below the mean reported in the SLJ 2007 Spending Survey (http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6403260.html ). With frugal practices and added funds from Parent Council, I can buy about two new books per pupil each year.
The result is that I often find myself reading free, digital review sources. Anything I can RSS feed to my email box is far more likely to get looked at. Blogs, group reviews, online journals and awards lists make up the majority of my advance review media. I use Titlewave and our public library's catalog to access reviews of materials already published to make collection development decisions, and, yes, I mostly look for books with more than 3 reviews. Blogging has helped me delve into the world of ARCs. I hope to review for journals someday.
I imagine our small school collection budgets don't make much of a drop in the bucket compared to public institutions, but I do appreciate consideration from professional review periodicals for the difficult circumstances of teacher librarians.
Maggi Idzikowski Media Specialist Allen Elementary School, Ann Arbor, MI librarymaggi_at_gmail.com Blogging with my 3-year-old at http://mamalibrarian.blogspot.com/
Received on Mon 16 Nov 2009 12:06:41 PM CST
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 2009 12:06:41 -0500
I'm spellbound by this discussion on reviews and reviewing! Thank you to everyone for your thoughtful responses.
I used to be a public librarian, but now I'm in the schools. It's a whole different world. We have no budget for periodicals other than what we allocate from our general book budget. This year we have 20 elementary school librarians in my district, each of whom have chosen to buy one periodical, and we share them amongst one another. I can't tell you how many months have gone by since I've actually had time to sit down and read a professional periodical. Too many times, I receive them in the mail and they get shelved in my office. It galls me, but I scarcely have time to read the books I buy for my students; given the choice between books I could buy and books I have right now, I usually pick the latter.
Even if I had time to read all the wonderful review periodicals, I have hardly any money to buy the books they review. We get about $10.50 per year per student for books and AV materials, far below the mean reported in the SLJ 2007 Spending Survey (http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6403260.html ). With frugal practices and added funds from Parent Council, I can buy about two new books per pupil each year.
The result is that I often find myself reading free, digital review sources. Anything I can RSS feed to my email box is far more likely to get looked at. Blogs, group reviews, online journals and awards lists make up the majority of my advance review media. I use Titlewave and our public library's catalog to access reviews of materials already published to make collection development decisions, and, yes, I mostly look for books with more than 3 reviews. Blogging has helped me delve into the world of ARCs. I hope to review for journals someday.
I imagine our small school collection budgets don't make much of a drop in the bucket compared to public institutions, but I do appreciate consideration from professional review periodicals for the difficult circumstances of teacher librarians.
Maggi Idzikowski Media Specialist Allen Elementary School, Ann Arbor, MI librarymaggi_at_gmail.com Blogging with my 3-year-old at http://mamalibrarian.blogspot.com/
Received on Mon 16 Nov 2009 12:06:41 PM CST
