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SKILLs: Please call. It’s urgent!
When your BLGF (best library girlfriend) is worried, you pay attention. When that BLGF is also the president of AASL, you help her rally the troups. Immediately.
Sara Kelly Johns wants all of us to act on the SKILLs (Strengthening Kids’ Interest in Learning and Libraries) Act, to see that it is included as an amendment in the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind (NCLB).
SKILLs secures funding for elementary, middle, and high school libraries and will ensure that all students have the library resources and instruction they need to survive in the twenty-first century.
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The SKILLs Act
- Requires school districts, to the extent feasible, to ensure that every school within the district employs at least one state-certified school library media specialist in each school library;
- Establishes as a state goal that there be at least one state-certified school library media specialist in every public school no later than the beginning of the 2010-2011 school year;
- Broadens the focus of training, professional development, and recruitment activities to include school library media specialists;
- Ensures that funds will serve elementary, middle, and high school students;
- Requires books and materials to be appropriate for and engage the interest of students in all grade levels and students with special learning needs, including English language learners.
"This is urgent," said Sara. "We want people to call their Congresspeople. We need 400 co-sponsors of the SKILLs act from Congress by September 24th."
What would happen if we do not mobilize now? According to Sara, "The bill might be stuck in committee without anyone thinking it was important enough to get out of committee and on the floor for a vote."
She urges, "When you call, it is important to ask your Congressperson not only to support the bill–everyone supports libraries! Ask your Congressperson to sign on to co-sponsor the bill.
If you need a handy reference guide and contact information for your legislators, visit ALA’s Issues & Advocacy page. Enter your Zip code to locate contact information.
Sara advises that we call our legislators today.
"Two days later check on ALA Washington Office website to see if they responded by sponsoring the bill. (The site is updated daily.) If they did not, call them back. Call them back every two days until they do elect to sponsor."
For those of us who might be a little shy on the phone with our legislators, OELMA members, participating in an advocacy workshop facilitated by Deb Logan, created a helpful script. (Remember, ad libbing is also wonderful.)
The OELMA script:
Hi, my name is ________ and I am one of Congressperson’s _____ constituents. (Be prepared to give full name, address, and zip code.)
I am requesting that congressperson _____ sign on as a co-sponsor of the SKILLS Act. I am calling on behalf of the school children in his/her district.
The SKILLS Act will ensure that (name your state’s) students have access to libraries and the critical, unique learning experiences that only licensed school librarians can provide.
(If you have an anecdote(s) about student learning in your school library, be prepared to briefly share it, if you have the opportunity).
I am concerned that many of our state’s school children are not being taught essential skills.* And I know that you share my concern.
The SKILLS Act will address this problem. Please co-sponsor the SKILLS Act.
Please tell Congressperson ______ I appreciate his/her support.
Thank you!
(If asked for more, these specific skills are: finding, evaluating, using and synthesizing information).
Note: You might be asked questions. If you don’t know an answer, offer to find the answer and call back with the information.
Should you need further information on SKILLs, contact Sara Kelly Johns at: johns@northnet.org
Filed under: Uncategorized
About Joyce Valenza
Joyce is an Assistant Professor of Teaching at Rutgers University School of Information and Communication, a technology writer, speaker, blogger and learner. Follow her on Twitter: @joycevalenza
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