Refusing to Share
Recently I’ve been examining the hierarchy of librarians within school districts in my area and I’ve discovered an interesting thing. Many of the larger school districts with several schools and a District Librarian to coordinate their programs seem to keep to themselves. In other words, I don’t see a “web or print presence” among the individual school librarians on many of the listservs or in the professional journals. (Although I often see their District Librarians monitoring and contributing insights and ideas.) Rather than sharing some of the great projects that these individual librarians are working on, providing others with their professional insights and great ideas, or asking questions about particular situations, these individual librarians seem to work autonomously but within their districts. They never interact with others outside their district and their valuable work is often never seen. I know that they are doing great things (as I’ve noticed some individual librarians who have made presentations during our state’s library conferences) but otherwise, we might we working side-by-side within a regional area and never know that the librarians in the district just 10 miles down the road are integrating technology into the curriculum through a multi-million dollar grant project that they received and carefully hid from the rest of the world.
I’m not sure if this is being stingy…or just being strange. However, I do know that one of the points in the ALA Code of Ethics requires that:
“We strive for excellence in the profession by maintaining and enhancing our own knowledge and skills, by encouraging the professional development of co-workers, and by fostering the aspirations of potential members of the profession. ”
In my opinion, that would mean that we are supposed to share our work with others, mentor those entering the field, and provide insights into new theories, ideas, projects, and programs to our colleagues. However, I find that in my “corner of the world” few districts are sharing and even fewer individual librarians are showcasing their talents. Am I missing something?
After working in a few larger districts that had District Librarians who supervised the entire library program and the work being done at each campus library within the district, I sensed a level of intimidation by those DL who did not want individual librarians within the district to “break-out” of their isolation and become a part of the main-stream. In fact, I watched one DL become frustrated with my ”professional independence” because I shared new instructional content lessons that I learned from listservs with the other librarians within my district. This DL sent me an email reprimanding me for sending the information to the librarians as this individual felt it was the responsibility of the District Librarian to send out information to the librarians within the district, should that information be considered valuable for their use. (Hello?)
So, then, are some District Librarians on a “power-trip” to control the thoughts, minds, and actions of the librarians that they supervise? Are young librarians moving into larger districts easily swayed into believing that they do not have a voice and cannot have an original idea or share information with others outside of the district. Are they even aware that they need to be working to become a part of the profession ”outside of the district” for which they work? Are they discouraged from participating in listservs because it will “take too much of their valuable time”….? Are some librarians even aware of what is happening outside of their own districts?
All of these questions then lead me to wonder if some District Librarians are intimidated by the wealth of knowledge, skill, and abilities that their young, enthusiastic, and often, fresh-faced campus librarians exhibit. Do these DL ”encourage” their campus librarians to only share their ideas, projects, or resources with the colleagues within their district and not share them with the outside world? What happens to those ideas once the librarian leaves the District? Do “outsiders” ever see their work….What are we missing? What are they missing?
Obviously, not all DLs behave like this —and it’s very obvious because we see their district’s “power and presence” everywhere within the literature (and online). However, I still wonder with all of these larger school districts in my state, why it is that we (outside of the district) never hear about the wonderful library projects or the fantastic librarians working in those districts? Why is it that these districts refuse to share with others?
