2010 Library Media Center Self-Evaluation Summary

Overall, the media center at *********** does an exceptional job in meeting the needs

of the students, teachers, and community it serves. When completing the self-evaluation rubric,

the school’s media center received an “exemplary” rating in regard to its staffing, access, and

resources. The media center is adequately staffed, with a full-time media specialist and para-

professional, and operates on a flexible schedule that allows students and teachers constant

access to the library’s many resources. Also, the technology and resources, both print and non-

print, are presented to the student body in such a way that they are easily accessible. Because the

library media center meets all of these indicators, it is rated as “exemplary” in these areas.

Not only does the media center score well in regards to staffing and resources, but it also

received marks of “proficiency” in several areas. Overall, in the areas of student instruction,

facilities, administrative support, and staff development, the media center meets the needs of

those it serves at a proficient level. The media specialist does a good job of collaborating with

classroom teachers so that information literacy standards are addressed simultaneously with

classroom content standards. Also, the media center, which is large enough to accommodate full

classes, small groups, and individuals simultaneously, houses an abundance of resources that are

linked directly to content area standards. The media specialist makes all teachers aware of the

resources available, and helps them implement these resources to meet their standards. In regards

to administrative support, the library receives adequate funding, at both the state and local level,

to ensure that students have the resources necessary to master information literacy and content

area skills. The district also has consistent media policies and a media contact person, who

disseminates all updates and technology-centered information to all local media specialists. And

finally, in regards to staff development, the media specialist is constantly expanding her

knowledge of technology skills, as to best meet the needs of those she serves. Also, she works

closely with the staff, both in informal collaborative meetings and formal staff development

meetings, to ensure they have a working knowledge of the technologies available for instruction.

Even though the school ranks as “exemplary” or “proficient” on the majority of the

indicators provided on the self-evaluation rubric, there are some areas where improvement is

needed. These areas, where the media center ranks as “basic,” are passively addressed in the

media center, but should receive more attention to best meet the needs of the students and faculty

at the school. The school ranked as “basic” in three areas. These areas are addressed below.

The first area where the media center was ranked as having “basic” proficiency is the use

of displays and bulletin boards to promote leisure reading and address curriculum standards

through resources in the media center. Very rarely are there displays in the media center to

promote any of its resources. There is one main display area when students enter the facility, but

it is seldom changed or redone. Also, excerpts from resources inside the media center are

displayed on outside windows, but again, these are constant and not changed. Therefore, the

media center should drive to set up displays, which change frequently, to encourage student

reading and interaction with resources in the media center. Because this is a high school media

center, this aspect is more commonly overlooked. Displays are generally associated with

elementary media centers, but should be a part of media centers at all levels. Therefore, action

should be taken to incorporate displays within the media center. One plan for this would be to

change out the main display at the front of the media center monthly. The media specialist could

have school clubs or classes become involved with this project, so that it would not become an

overwhelming project for her. Clubs could sign up to promote their causes in the display area, by

finding resources in the media center that address their cause. Classes could showcase their

current projects by displaying resources that assisted them in the learning process. Teachers

could even offer students extra credit for being involved with the creation of the media center’s

display. And a final suggestion would be to split up the months between the departments at the

high school, so that every month a new content area is responsible for creating the display. For

example, on month the English department creates the display, the next month the Science

department does, and so on. The implementation of this plan for incorporating displays in the

media center would help increase student involvement, knowledge of resources, and traffic in the

media center.

The next area that the media center scored “basic” on is the fact that classroom teachers

are always responsible for assessment. The media specialist never assesses the students’

information literacy skills. Instead these skills are assessed in conjunction with the content area

skills by written assessments and culminating activities in the teacher’s individual classrooms.

By implementing assessments in the media center, the media specialist would have a better idea

of areas that the students need work on. These media center assessments don’t necessarily have

to be “tests.” Informal assessments can take place. For example, keeping a chart of how many

students found the assigned number of sources using Galileo during a class period, or having

students complete a ticket out of the door summarizer when leaving the media center would

prove to be extremely beneficial for the media program. In order to incorporate assessments

more efficiently, the media specialist could set the standard that she completes one assessment

for every class that enters her media center. These assessments could be simple

thumbs-up/thumbs-down responses or charts of student progress, or they could be more involved

assessments like the presentation of information found in their research or active participation in

a blog covering their current content area topic. Whatever the assessment, the media specialist

could include the results of the assessment in the monthly report for the principal, and provide

teachers with the results for use in their classrooms. By assessing each class in the media center,

the media specialist better determines the skills her students have mastered and the ones that

need more of her time.

The final area of “basic” proficiency for the media center is in regards to the school and

system media committees and their active involvement in the media center. While both the

school and system have such a committee, it sometimes only meets once a year. Policies are not

addressed annually, and many of the “duties” of these committees fall onto the individual school

media specialists, leading to the un-uniform implementation of policies and ideas amongst the

various schools. To correct this problem, the school and system media committees should have

three scheduled meetings a year. These meetings should be built into the school system’s

calendar, so that they are set well in advance. The meetings should be mandatory for all members

of the committee, and would occur during pre-planning, the beginning of the second semester,

and during post-planning. The meeting that occurs during post-planning should be primarily to

evaluate the policies and how they were implemented during the previous school year, and then

address any needed changes to the policies for the next school year. By having mandatory

meetings that are scheduled in advance, the success and consistency of the system wide media

programs should increase.

And finally, in addition to addressing areas of “basic” proficiency, the media center

should strive to be “exemplary” in all areas. This can be achieved by looking at areas where the

media center is ranked as “proficient,” and creating an action plan to move the program to

“exemplary.” The best area to begin striving for “exemplary” status would be an increase in

collaboration; and not only that more collaboration occurs, but it occurs with more teachers, to

meet the needs of more students. The best way to begin this push for collaboration would be for

the media specialist to attend every department meeting. She can listen to what’s ahead in each

of the content areas, and then offer ways that she and the media center can help make the lessons

and units more meaningful to students. To prepare for the meetings, the media specialist should

email the department heads a week before the scheduled meetings to see what’s on the agenda.

That way, she can come to the meeting prepared to show teachers how she can help them meet

their content area standards. She will explain that her goal is to help the teacher’s meet the

Georgia Performance Standards by implementing meaningful resources out of the library into

their instruction. The department meetings are a good place for this increase in collaboration to

begin, because they occur monthly. Therefore, they are regularly scheduled and the teachers, as a

result, have regular meetings with the media specialist. Also, the goal is that these department

meetings are the beginning of many other collaboration meetings the teachers will schedule with

the media specialist. The collaboration between the media specialist and teachers will grow and

develop with time, until she ultimately plans with them to meet the diverse needs of all students

and takes an active role in the assessment of the students. Therefore, making collaboration

“exemplary” at the school will make a variety of other areas in the media center and school

“exemplary” as well.