Los Angeles laying off 85 librarians. Tells them they are not teachers.

[madfloridian]

Where I taught our librarian/media specialists had to have masters degrees. They had to be qualified to teach as well. So I gather this effectively means they are out of a job, instead of being allowed to use their experience to move into a classroom setting.

That's basically what the hearings were about recently, the ones in which librarians were interrogated by school lawyers with police standing by.

NPR has an article about the final decision.

L.A. School District Tells Librarians: You're Not Teachers


Reed Saxon/AP Teachers and librarians demonstrate against thousands of proposed job cuts in the Los Angeles Unified School District Tuesday.

The Los Angeles Unified School District plans to lay off thousands of employees, as it faces a budget shortfall of more than $640 million. The cuts include 85 school librarians — who have been told that they no longer count as teachers. The change in classification would make it easier for the school district to cut the jobs.

The librarians have been facing questions from the district's lawyers, as an administrative law judge seeks to determine if they should be considered as teachers.

See how easy that was? Just change their classification after they have spent years doing their job. Nothing to it. Just let the lawyers snap their fingers.

At KQED's California Report, Krissy Clark reports:

In the basement of a building in downtown L.A., there is a makeshift hearing room where school librarians have been quietly defending their jobs over the last few weeks.

One by one, librarians who got layoff notices this spring sat before a judge, while a school district attorney peppered them with questions about their abilities as teachers. "Do you know how to take attendance?" he'd ask. "How many weeks are in a school year?"

Librarian Allison Walker was shaking after she came off the stand.

"Basically, what he just tried to present was that I don't qualify as a teacher because I've been in the library," she said.

Walker went on to say that she taught every day — and that her classroom was different, containing 12,000 books.

From the comments at the I found the requirements to be a librarian there.

In order to become school librarians, a 30 unit teaching credential is required in addition to a 30 unit library credential. We have two credentials; classroom teachers have one, and we're not considered teachers?
Meredith Brace
Library Teacher, Santa Barbara

Another of the librarians who was questioned by district lawyers talked about it in her blog. I posted about it the other day. That librarian was in effect ridiculed at this forum for writing her blog and expecting it not to be printed off and used against her.

Few got the point or even cared. Why are librarians being subjected to all this in the first place? When did they become the enemy and why? I never knew a librarian who wasn't more qualified than I was to teach.

L.A. school lawyers printed off 90 pages of librarian's blog. Used it against her at hearing.

“I can observe on my right hand side the attorneys for United Teachers Los Angeles, who are the men that will make my case when the time comes. Their table is laden with binders nearly eight inches thick that are filled with the thousands of documents we teachers have entered into evidence. These are teaching credentials, lesson plans, and letters of recommendation, among other things.... On my left is the school district’s table of attorneys. They have a plastic cart filled with evidence binders and their own files of information collected on each of us in what I can only assume was a rather hurried manner....My employer has become my enemy.

..."Today I am furloughed. Tomorrow I go back to the hearings to plead my case. I do not want to. The next day I go back to school to prepare the library to be closed forever, or to be run a few hours a week by a reluctant clerk, or to be ransacked. The questions continue to pile up, but no answers are forthcoming. Stand by for further developments. Hurry up and wait.

At the bottom of all of this is a political reality that I find so daunting, so dark, that to enter into a discussion of it strikes fear in my heart and nausea in my belly. I believe that this is part of a larger movement in our city (and state, and finally, nation) towards a for-profit education model that takes pressure off of elected officials and puts money in the pockets of clever financiers.

Yes, it is part of a very powerful movement to privatize public education, and the reformers are ruthless enough to make teachers and librarians their targets.

They feel no shame about doing it. There is no need for them to worry, as no one is really making an effort to even slow them down.

It's easy to change public education into privately run schools that make profit for someone....especially when a nation no longer values those who are educated.

[pnwmom]

1. This is disgusting and unfair. n/t

[madfloridian]

4. Yes it is.

:-(

[LetTimmySmoke]

2. They're not bankers or CEOs or in the oil business

So yeah, they're expendable.

[RKP5637]

3. In a strange way maybe we will have a better society when none work, it will

become the norm and then force change on the carrot and stick model. Maybe it's time for a major shift in the risk/reward/work/greed paradigm.

[WinkyDink]

7. Yeah. Except for those pesky billionaires.

[RKP5637]

10. Damn, I forgot about them! Darn!!! n/t

[Initech]

74. Yeah they want a society that looks like this:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1193414

:scared:

[RKP5637]

76. Erie and soooo cold looking, reeking of regimentation and control freaks.

:scared:

[Initech]

77. Exactly.

[awoke_in_2003]

120. it always boggles my mind...

to see the streets of those big cities empty

[customerserviceguy]

5. I know some here won't like me saying this

but this is a sign of things to come. Libraries are not as essential in the 21st Century as they were before that.

[WinkyDink]

8. The reason is money-savings, not Kindle purchases.

[customerserviceguy]

15. And when governments look to save money

They find it easier to cut the obsolete things.

[MadHound]

31. Libraries are obsolete things?

Wow, spoken like one who either has no intellectual curiosity, one who lives a comfy life, or both.

Libraries are vital for preserving our history. There are millions of books, literally, that are not digitalized, and probably never will be. Yet these same books are vital to our understanding of history, our culture, our society, the human condition.

Furthermore, not everybody has the monetary means to purchase a book, much less a e-reader, and their only link for literature, research, etc. is the library.

Your comments only go to show up the shallowness of your own understanding and outlook on life.

[ohnoyoudidnt]

37. +1

There is so much wasteful spending in the government, but libraries are not on that list.

[boppers]

86. "There are millions of books, literally, that are not digitalized"

(Digitalized?)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Books

"In 2010 Google estimated that there are about 130 million unique books in the world (129,864,880 to be exact), and that it intends to scan all of them by the end of the decade.<11><12>On October 14, 2010 Google announced that the number of scanned books is over 15 million.<13> Most scanned works are no longer in print or commercially available.<14>"

Let me know if your local library has 15 million books, or the local librarian has read even 1% of them... because that sounds like an interesting place.

[leveymg]

52. Librarians and libraries are "obsolete things" in your book (Kindle)?

There is a dedicated corps of forward thinking posters on this board these days. You are a thought leader among your peers. Congratulations! Now, go out there and cut more obsolete things!

[madfloridian]

9. That is just not true. It's sad you think so.

[customerserviceguy]

16. When all human knowledge

can be accessed electronically, what use will books, the edifices that house them, and the people who file them back on the shelves be?

Some here have a romantic attachment to the concept of the book as they know it, but that information tool is irretrievably on the road to extinction, just as the clay tablets of the Babylonians were, and the scrolls of the Egyptians after that.

[madfloridian]

21. Guess what.

Not worth it.

[csziggy]

26. Librarians do far more than just take care of books

Especially those trained in the last twenty years. Many former "library science" schools now issue Information Science degrees that reflect the changes in the field.

When information is properly arranged on a web site to make it easier to access, thank a librarian. When search terms actually locate the information you are seeking, thank a librarian. Far too many people, especially children, have no idea how to create an effective search phrase - a librarian can help with than.

With the terrabytes of information being dumped onto the web every day, people who are capable organizing it and making it more accessible are needed more than ever. And people who can help the clueless find what they are looking for are needed even more.

Sorry but all "human knowledge" is of no use if the information is lost in the mix. And that is what librarians can do.

[Book Lover]

40. The people who file books back on the shelves are non-degreed staff members

Librarians are people who studied for years about research and organization methods. She or he knows the difference between an authoritative source and a poor one. They have the answers to your questions. Ah, there we have it! You've never had to actually ask a librarian for guidance in solving a problem for your small business, research paper, or intellectual curiosity, have you? Libraries are not book warehouses (that would be a bookstore), and librarians are so much more than people who are there to shush you. You're paying for this service via taxes; you ought to pop by your local branch and use it.

[JanMichael]

43. uh huh. you need to go volunteer at a small, local archive

and when you learn how much of our history has been digitized, and how much it costs to do that--

Maybe, then you will have an educated opinion on librarians, and digitized information accessible to the public.

[RandomKoolzip]

61. Hear, hear.

+1

:thumbsup:

[Dokkie]

65. +1000

Books, libraries, post office, newspapers jusl like the milk man and dinosaurs are not going to be replaced by newer and less labor intensive institutions/products. Its not the evil govts doing, its just progess(ive) and technological advancement and theres nothing you can do about it.

Hopeufully, there would be museums built in the future to remember the days of xxxxx.

[RandomKoolzip]

67. Apparently grammar, spelling and syntax are also doomed to be relics of the past.

:thumbsdown:

[coalition_unwilling]

73. Grammaw and Speeling is so 20th century! :)

[RandomKoolzip]

75. Maybe if that poster had had a librarian in his life to help him out....

....uh, just sayin'.

:shrug:

[Pooka Fey]

78. Kick - wish I'd said what you wrote.

[Dokkie]

79. apparently grammar policing

is the only refuge for a failed debater. Sorry to see you go there but argue the points I made in my post cos whether you like to admit it or not, libraries along with its workers and rare book collections are a thing of the past. You can fight it all you want but you know that am right or else you wouldnt have resorted to ad hominem attacks.

chow

[RandomKoolzip]

80. So let me get this straight:

You come here telling me, a librarian, that my job -- my entire livelihood (i.e. providing access to information for people in the hope of educating them) is obsolete, needless, useless, and that I should just deal with it.

You do this in a post that exhibits signs of poor grammar and language usage - in other words, in a post that showcases a dire need for literacy education: just the kind of education librarians provide free of charge.

Don't you see how you just proved my point?

[Dokkie]

82. Not really

For one thats not what I trying to convey. I do believe there would be fewer librarian jobs in the future, its not going to be growing prof and your job most likely would still be needed. Heck I used a librarian just last week when I needed help writing my ethics paper. My point is that the future is not bright for your profession and I truely believe it.

Not trying to excuse my poor attempt at articulating my thought but I am sloppy writer, all been and probably would remain one. Also English is not my 1st or even 2nd language and I think am at the age where it can only get better with personal practice and hard work. I appreciate the job librarians peforms and I did not mean to belittle or discount your job in any way.

[Occulus]

93. You also wrote a double negative

Would you like to know why some people react that way when you write poorly?

Because they're smart. They're intelligent, to the point that words mean things to them, and proper word order means something specific. So, when you write poorly, and with poor grammar, it literally alters the meaning of what you're saying to the point that smart people can't tell what it is you're trying to force through your drooling stewhole.

[Dokkie]

101. Unfortunately I slipped off

I wish I could take it back but it has passed the point of editing. Still, i think the intent of the post can still be understood but the "smart" people not withstanding the butchered spelling, grammar and double negative.

[emsimon33]

116. My thoughts too after reading the post!

[Occulus]

92. I didn't know every book ever written had been digitized.

Where can I access this electronic library without spending a dime? That's, without spending a dime, as part of the overall setup. Where is this website on which every book ever written (including textbooks) is free to the public for the taking?

[Hannah Bell]

112. lol. you will pay: that's the plan. if you want information, you will pay.

since most people aren't that interested, they won't pay and they won't know shit.

of those that are interested, most couldn't afford to pay for the volume/variety available even at small public libraries. our public library is under $80/year for a family if you live outside the tax area. that's a damn bargain any way you look at it.

how much does a kindle and 20 books on it cost?

[madrchsod]

11. not everyone can afford the latest toys...

[customerserviceguy]

17. That's what I was told in 1973

when I wanted to bring my $100 calculator to chemistry class. Of course, when you can get simple calculators at the dollar store, that argument falls by the wayside.

It's only a matter of time before ebook readers become quite cheap. An older model computer can be had for a pittance at a garage sale, and fulfill all the research needs that anyone had in a library before they existed.

[RandomKoolzip]

53. Absolute bullshit.

As a reference librarian and an aspiring archivist, let me reiterate what many on here have already told you: you do not know what you're talking about.

Do you know the number of interlibrary loans that come through my desk, requesting long-out-of-print books available at some other library? Very, very many. Do you know the number of projects underway to bring every book ever published to the electronic world? Very, very few. The full-scale digitization projects now underway at some universities and gov't agencies are concentrating on newspaper archives and government documents. Books (ranging from fiction paperbacks to scholarly textbooks) are not even a concern. There are literally millions of titles, some locally pressed, some older editions, etc. that will NEVER be digitized, and there will only be one storage medium for the information they comprise.

Also, your supposition that ANYONE can do whatever kind of research they want from any computer is laughable. As someone who has been in license negotiations with several different database vendors, let me tell you that the scholarly correspondence and information used in many disciplines is neither cheap nor easily accessible. Sure, there are open-source journals in the sciences, but serious researchers often depend on journal content that has either been digitized and is now available through the means of a full-text aggregator, such as EBSCO's Academic Search Premier, or which has never been digitized and sits on university shelves in their print periodicals and serials collections. The amount of scholarly research that will never make it to the online world is staggering. A serious researcher in the sciences needs content from many expensive serials, full-text aggregating databases, or print journals, and the rates for accessing such content is astronomical. This is not just stuff you'll stumble upon in Google.

Right now, public and university libraries are PAYING to bring that content to their patrons. We pay over 10,000 dollars a year at my library to bring patrons access to little more than a dozen online subscription databases - databases through which this kind of content is available exclusively, unless one wanted to use other online library services to locate the physical copies of said research and travel to aformentioned university library and copy it using a Xerox machine. In other words, ACCESS TO INFORMATION IS NOT AS FREE AS YOU THINK IT IS, DUDE. Someone (else) is paying to allow YOU to get that info, and it typically comes out of a public or university library's budget - and YOU probably think it just dropped right out of the fucking sky and into your lap for free.

Not only that, but the subscription rates for online serials and aggregated databases rises every year, sometimes by more than 10%. This is what's known in academic librarianship as the "serials crisis." You studied chemistry in college, right? Well, in 1973, all the scholarly research and communication used in this discipline was brought to you by journal publishers in consort with the college library's acquisitions department, and it was unlikely to break that library's budget, as in 1973, college libraries were still running feasible budgets and acquiring new titles as well as backlogs of titles. Since the late 1970s, however, the price of bringing that kind of scholarly content to students has shot through the roof, and library budget cutbacks have made it so a university library often spends a good 40-60% of their budget for a single fiscal year on subscription titles (many of which come in bundles wherein uneeded titles cannot be extricated, though they bring the price up). This has made it so libraries now have to scale back the kind of content they provide for researchers, especially in the sciences (some science journals have yearly subscription prices that exceed the yearly budgets for many a medium-sized public library altogether; whereas humanities journals often run at a fraction of that cost) - however, the demand for quality content, as well as the demand for quality venues in which doctoral students and other serious researchers can get published, is still sky high. The financial imbalance here can not be sustained.

Ah, but whatever - now everything's online and free, right? Right?!

[Odin2005]

62. !!!!!

:yourock:

I :loveya: Librarians! :)

[boppers]

87. 1. See #86

2. See http://scholar.google.com/

The more obscure journals *will* be a collection and indexing challenge, but it's already happening, and the aggregation is slowly being pushed out of the business, because the service they offer produces no original content.... they index and aggregate.

In some ways, the indexers and aggregators are facing the same problems as librarians.... they're not producing anything new, they're simply re-selling the work of others.

Maybe if librarians came with text ads they could sell those.

[Occulus]

95. I'm sorry you wasted your time typing that.

From experience reading what that one posts, and responding to him myself- you wasted your effort.

What you just said will not sink in. He's purposefully ignorant.

[eilen]

54. When the power goes out I guess we will all be thrown

back into the dark ages as no one knows how to read a microchip.

[Odin2005]

63. That's one of the reasons I prefer physical books.

The other being that I am a tactile person who likes things with some physical substantiality.

[Odin2005]

12. Not eveyone can afford internet access or a Kindle.

Those people use libraries if they need to use the internet.

I find it ironic that the extremist RW psychopaths that tell the poor that they "should cancel their internet access because it's not a necessity and if one needs to use the internet one can go to the library" also want to eliminate those public libraries!

[customerserviceguy]

18. Telephone service used to be quite costly once upon a time, as well

It's just a matter of time before Internet access is cheap and widely available from places other than libraries. It's expensive to maintain libraries for people who just need Internet access, anyway.

Your point about the reichwingers who point to the libraries, and then want to cut them is well taken, however.

[ohheckyeah]

105. Is it irony or design?

Keep the masses uneducated and control is much easier.

[CreekDog]

13. how about customer service guys?

Just saying.

[customerserviceguy]

19. We get outsourced to India, etc. all the time

I knew that when I took the job a few years ago. If it happens, I will have to find something else to do. I'm working on that right now.

These days, nobody's career lasts forever. Customer service is just the fifth one I've had in my 35 years of working. I'm sure there will be at least one more before I retire, and it wouldn't surprise me if there were two or three more 'careers' between now and the day I finally decide I can afford to stop working.

[Hannah Bell]

28. yes, yes, bow down & accept your cogitude.

[eilen]

55. I hope you don't need to earn a Master's degree for each of those jobs.

that could get expensive. nt

[pnwmom]

14. School librarians are as essential as they've always been.

Librarians learn more than about hardbound books; these days they're also experts in online databases, and on teaching children where to go for information online. You should use your own online skills sometime and go to a school that takes librarianship and see what they offer. I know that the University of Washington has an excellent one.

[customerserviceguy]

20. Yes, the librarianship courses at institutions of higher education

are indeed quite heavy on coursework. So are a lot of other fields of study that will get you a job asking people if they want fries with that.

It's not unusual for something to involve a lot of time, money, study, etc., and still be outmoded. That's what librarians have become today. Young people are learning research skills on a level unimaginable when I was in high school. The ability to search billions of pages of information within seconds makes the old-fashioned librarian the buggy-whip maker of our day.

I do think that it's crucial for teachers to still teach critical thinking skills in order to instruct students in how to perform better searches, and interpret the findings intelligently. Perhaps librarians could be reconfigured as teachers, unfortunately, that didn't happen to these employees in this case.

[Hannah Bell]

25. i was trying to be polite, but this: "that will get you a job asking people if they want fries"

is right-wing garbage.

[WhollyHeretic]

29. "Young people are learning research skills on a level unimaginable"

Who teaches kids research skills? You have no idea what a school librarian actually does. Librarians are teachers. Maybe if you had paid more attention in school you wouldn't display such ignorance here.

[boppers]

91. The best research skills I learned were taught by a teacher who told us to go the the library.

He taught "Social Studies" at the time. He gave us all a list of 20 questions to answer, using the school library. (This was in 7th grade).

Here's the amusing part: He knew, ahead of time, that the answers the library had were WRONG in many cases, and you had to cross-correlate a bunch of different sources to realize that all of the questions were, in essence, trick questions.

The school librarians thought it was a wonderful teaching exercise, to have these 120 students asking the same 20 questions, and they very quickly, and efficiently..... "taught" us to find the wrong answers. Repeatedly. After all, the reference section must be accurate, right? No lies in encyclopedias or dictionaries, right? :sarcasm:

Nobody got all 20 questions right, the best score was 10 IIRC... and those were kids who "cheated" by checking other sources, outside of the school library. They were mock "punished" for cheating in such a way.

The students all learned some very important lessons about how reliable books, and librarians, were.

Probably not the lessons the librarians intended, though.

The most delicious bit of irony in that memory is I heard that the Social Studies teacher eventually became the head/chief librarian for the school... some 20 years later.

[csziggy]

30. Did you miss the part that the librarians in question

Not only had to maintain their knowledge in their specialized field, they also had to be cross qualified as teachers? And in order to fire them, the authorities had to knit pick details such as whether they took attendance or had specific teaching times?

These are the very people who are needed to teach children HOW to access information, whether from a book or from the internet, "teach critical thinking skills in order to instruct students in how to perform better searches, and interpret the findings intelligently."

They did not need to be "reconfigured as teachers", they were already qualified as teachers - likely more qualified than many teachers who were kept on. But when everybody is prepared to throw the more qualified under the bus, the more educated, qualified members of a profession seem to be the first to go.

[eilen]

59. I think they "reeducated" the college professors first

in the Mao revolution.

[suffragette]

69. Yes, they teach how to access information, how to analyze

it and how and why to include it effectively in one's own paper (thought and analysis of a topic).

I would argue that with more avenues to access information and the sheer mass of sometimes conflicting information available, the skills librarians introduce and work on with people, especially students, are more important and valuable than ever.

[csziggy]

94. Exactly, and that is why librarians or "information technologists"

Whatever you call them, will still be needed long into the future. They may not shuffle books around but they will still deal with keeping information accessible and teaching people how to find and use it.

[EFerrari]

35. Sometimes I cannot believe the stuff I read here.

[madfloridian]

41. Mention teachers, librarians, libraries, public education...

and the weird comments begin. It's kind of sad, really.

[Odin2005]

64. Some people are just fucking ignorant and proud of it.

It's astonishing and depressing.

[suffragette]

68. You and me both.

[Name removed]

97. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

56. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[eilen]

57. Have you worked with any young people lately?

They may be quite able to find the latest game cheats but actual real life problem solving... They can't even find the questions that need to be answered without their hands held.

[Occulus]

96. You are so damn condescending

I really, really hope people treat you that way, too... you don't deserve 'nice'

[Hannah Bell]

24. i think you don't know what libraries do or who uses them.

[madfloridian]

99. Sounds that way to me.

[emsimon33]

118. Libraries are more than books

and even if they were only places to house books, they are critical to many who can not afford to buy books themselves or have Internet access.

[HopeHoops]

6. Yeah, and other than a school librarian, teachers rarely have Library Science degrees.

[madfloridian]

22. It's amazing what a post about librarians will cause to happen.

It's been a real surprise.

[Hannah Bell]

27. just give up. everything they're doing is wonderful, the old world is obsolete, we have computers!

[madfloridian]

39. Sometimes I feel like doing that.

I think posting about the disrespect toward teachers and education in general just makes people angry, and it causes them to post such stuff.

[RandomKoolzip]

58. Librarians ARE learning new skills.

This whole "librarianship is obsolete" meme is pure bullshit. Many librarians, now faced with governments shutting their doors (and dipshits like the one jerk in THIS thread who has NO inkling about what it takes to be a librarian) are repurposing their entire outlook to concentrate on archiving. The head music cataloger at Northwestern, in Evanston, IL, told me personally that he's trying to get his entire staff to concentrate less on acquisitions and original cataloging/processing of new materials, and into the preservation and archiving of already existing materials. This seems like the wave of the future for many in librarianship.

[madfloridian]

102. It's a tragic move. Again there is no one speaking out against it.

Just a few bloggers.

[Hannah Bell]

108. and personally, that's one of the reasons i value regional and local libraries.

i for one don't want a society where the only records of the past accessible to the general public are computerized.

too easy to do the orwell thing.

our local library has a collection of various hardbound magazines dating to the turn of the century. i love to look through them and read the take on national/world events current at the time.

[madfloridian]

110. So do I. I treasure books.

I like the new ways, but my respect and reverence is reserved for the hard copy of books. Love them.

[JVS]

103. I'm not surprised.

Disgusted, but not surprised.

[madfloridian]

104. Me., too. Disgusted that is.

[Hannah Bell]

23. kr

[csziggy]

32. One of my theories about why the mad dash to fire librarians

Is that the American Library Association is a strong advocate for freedom of speech and for making sure that books are not banned for religious or political reasons. Librarians at public libraries stood up to efforts to use the Patriot Act to track patrons' pattern of book use. Librarians in school libraries have long fought to keep good literature on the shelves when book banning was attempted for all sorts of reasons.

With librarians being fired wholesale, fewer school librarians will be prepared to stick out their necks to defend challenged books, the ones the right wing and religious nuts want removed.

While teachers fight hard for their students, keeping good books accessible is not one of their priorities. They need school librarians for that.

[proud2BlibKansan]

33. +1

[EFerrari]

36. Bingo. n/t

[ohnoyoudidnt]

38. excellent observation nt

[underpants]

46. Didn't they openly oppose FBI book searches after 9/11?

I don't know if it was the organization but many librarians openly said NO to the FBI searching people's book check out histories.

Good for them.

[madfloridian]

48. Yes, they did. Here's one article.

http://www.vla.org/?p=293

"Libraries Win Second Round against National Security Letters “I’m grateful that I am able now to talk about what happened to me, so that other libraries can learn how they can fight back from these overreaching demands,” Internet Archive founder and digital librarian Brewster Kahle stated May 7, two days after records were unsealed documenting his six-month legal battle to force the FBI to withdraw a National Security Letter because it sought details of several patrons’ archive use without a court order. The disclosure about the existence of Internet Archive v. Mukasey came two days after the records were unsealed about Kahle’s federal complaint against the Justice Department.
As legal counsel representing the digital library, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation named themselves as co-plaintiffs because the gag order that has accompanied NSLs since the 2001 enactment of the Patriot Act also forbids legal counsel from
speaking about any aspect of such a case.

The disclosed documents reveal that the FBI issued an NSL to the Internet Archive on November 19, 2007, seeking the patrons’ names and contact information and “all electronic mail header information (not to include message content and/or subject fields).” Kahle responded December 14, 2007, with a First Amendment challenge to the constitutionality of serving an NSL on a library. “The FBI cannot demand records from libraries , unless they are providers of wire or electronic communication services. The archive is not a provider,” EFF Senior Staff Attorney Kurt B. Opsahl wrote the agency three days later."

[suffragette]

71. And in fighting back against this, the librarians exposed

aspects of the Patriot Act in action which impacted people on a wide scale.
As I recall, they were the first group of people to do this and they did this at great personal risk.
I deeply appreciate them drawing back the curtain and exposing the full impact of this intrusion on our privacy and rights.

[eilen]

60. They stopped keeping records of who took out what

I know because I wanted to look up my lending history for a book title I read and wanted to read again. The librarian explained to me why she couldn't and I thanked her. (Ironically, the book was about a dystopian future in which a radical political party was pursuing a journalist for printing the truth by spreading lies about him, freezing his bank accounts and tracking him /pursuing him through the country.)

[Odin2005]

66. Wow, the character in that book sounds like Julian Assange!

What's the name of the book, I might ask? :hi:

[eilen]

84. Unfortunately, I can't remember

which is why I asked the librarian for a record of the books I borrowed.....

[csziggy]

98. Yes the ALA promoted resistance and librarians actively did it

They consider patrons' histories to be private information.

[suffragette]

70. Spot on!

[WhollyHeretic]

34. Apparently a lot of people here have no idea what a school librarian actually does

There is a reason they are now called Library Media Specialists. Research skills are very important. Most people have no idea how to actually research online. Even if books are electronic it doesn't mean librarians aren't needed for them. They match kids with books. They get kids to read who never finished a book in their life. They give kids books that help them through difficult times. They interact with and teach every kid in their school. They help other teachers develop research projects.

[ChoralScholar]

42. I don't know about California

but in Arkansas, to be a librarian (we call them media specialists) you must first have a teaching license in another subject, then a master's degree in Library Science, then you have to get a special license for Media Specialist.

In that sense, the librarian is often more qualified than a great deal of the classroom teachers.

[madfloridian]

47. That's how it is in Florida. Here's a part about CA

"In order to become school librarians, a 30 unit teaching credential is required in addition to a 30 unit library credential. We have two credentials; classroom teachers have one, and we're not considered teachers?"
Meredith Brace
Library Teacher, Santa Barbara

[dotymed]

44. This is so despicable.

These people who have accepted sub-par wages in order to help children, many for decades, are now discarded.

"Our President is "fine" with it", ask Arne.

Only highly regulated capitalism works for the people.

I say this because capitalism is now a political system as well as a (poor) economic model.

[underpants]

45. My mother was a school librarian for 30+ years and I learned a LOT from her

I guess spending a lot of time in a library helped but she had specific lesson plans forcing students to use 5 or more sources to find information in her library.

Encyclopedia
dictionary
audio tapes
microfiche
atlas
World Book
Dewey decimal system --> book
etc.

Google jumps over all those steps now but every student who was in one of her schools knew how to find what they needed.

[boppers]

88. "Google jumps over all those steps now"

Are these additional steps needed, then?

It's a bit like noting how people used to know how to saddle a horse, but now they use cars, so the car-riders have lost something vital.

[Reader Rabbit]

49. Our school librarian does so much for our kids...

...I can't even imagine turning around our reluctant readers without her. This is criminal.

[madfloridian]

51. Ours would help them on research projects, help them organize around a theme.

I could send a small group and she would work with them on research skills.

[madfloridian]

50. Librarians fought the National Security Letter and the gag

that prevented them from telling people when the FBI requested their reading records. I remember one of the signs they made said: "The FBI has not been here today." at the bottom was watch if this sign disappears.

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/mt-search.cgi?IncludeBlogs=1&search=National+Security+Letters

More:

http://motherjones.com/politics/2008/09/americas-most-dangerous-librarians

Here are some of their signs:

http://www.librarian.net/technicality.html

Librarians are amazing people.

[madfloridian]

100. Here is one of the great signs used by the brave librarians.

http://www.librarian.net/technicality.html

[madfloridian]

109. Another sign:

http://www.librarian.net/technicality.html

[coalition_unwilling]

72. Why isn't UTLA threatening a district-wide walkout over this? That's the

only language the fucktards running LAUSD understand.

UTLA = United Teachers of Los Angeles (the union representing teachers0
LAUSD = Los Angeles Unified School District

[Hannah Bell]

111. they just sold out the membership -- again. more "unpaid leave". and 1700 teachers still being

laid off.

[Recursion]

Dupe

[Recursion]

114. Because they don't want classroom teachers to lose their jobs instead

Notice that the union isn't contesting this designation

[Citizen Worker]

81. Strike! It is the only response.

[madfloridian]

83. Don't know about CA, but in FL it is illegal for teachers to strike.

[individual rights]

85. I don't understand.

If they displace existing teachers with librarians, aren't some people still going to lose their jobs?

[madfloridian]

90. Yes, thousands of people are going to lose their jobs.

But the money will flow to Iraq and Afghanistan and Libya or wherever else we choose to go.

Teachers are the beginning....next they come for ALL public employees.

[david13]

89. They are closing the libraries and the schools. But it appears they

have enough money to buy a flag for every light post in Los Angeles. That's what I saw coming down Western Avenue yesterday.
Usual insanity.
No money for library but money for flags for that ridiculous flag waving crap.
dc

[RandomThoughts]

106. And I am due beer and travel money, and many experiences.

What is your point?

[madfloridian]

107. They have enough money to hire consultants and pay superintendents huge salaries.

There's money for that always.

[Shireling]

113. Democracy, be gone with you!!

We don't need no stinkin' libraries, OR LIBRARIANS!!

:sarcasm:

[xocet]

115. Librarians and their Books: The Caretakers of a Stable Archival Medium...

A particular point of view that has been put forth in this thread is that libraries and, by extension, librarians have outlasted their usefulness due to the ostensible obsolescence of books: that is, books, libraries and librarians will be replaced by digital copies of pre-existing works, and only digital versions of future works will be available unless an individual were to choose to have a print copy made.

An important issue that needs to be considered is the stability of the archival medium or media that would potentially store digital works for posterity. A dated, but relevant, collection of thoughts regarding media stability follows:

...
4.2 Practical Life Expectancies

Those accustomed to storing paper and microfilm may be annoyed by the relatively short life expectancies (ten to thirty years) of magnetic tape materials. Some gold plated/glass substrate digital optical disc technologies promise 100-year lifetimes. However, a 100-year life expectancy is irrelevant when the system technology may be in use for no more than ten or twenty years (or less).

Audio and video recording technologies are advancing at a much faster rate than printing and microfilming technologies. We are fortunate if a recording technology stays current for more than twenty years. In the case of a magnetic recording media with a fifty-year life expectancy, the media would undoubtedly outlive the recording system technology. To truly achieve a fifty-year archival life, recording systems, sufficient spare parts, and technical manuals would need to be archived along with the recorded media.

In the case of audio and video archives, transcription is inevitable. Rather than trying to preserve old, outdated recording formats and technologies, it may be more practical to transcribe on a regular basis - every ten to twenty years or even more frequently. The old copy could be preserved until the new copy is transcribed to the next generation of recording system. In this fashion, at least two copies of the material are always in existence.

From (http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub54/4life_expectancy.html)

Another site that has a discussion of archival materials is the following: www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~gahchs/Technology/ArchivalMedia.htm

It should be kept in mind that librarians have a great deal of expertise in data organization and that librarians - at a minimum - will be needed to organize and store whatever the current archival medium happens to be.

[LetTimmySmoke]

117. With all the wars we're fighting

We got the War in Iraq, the War in Afghanistan, the War in Libya, the War on Drugs, the War on Sex, the War on Terror, the War on Evolution, the War on Christmas.

Why not a war on librarians and teachers too?

[awoke_in_2003]

119. there is an all out assault on education...

in the dark ages, only the wealthy got educated, and the masses had nothing but religion- we are heading back in that direction. Educated people are harder to control.

[Dirigo]

121. Laura Bush & GOP Talked About Being A Librarian For 8 Years

For 8 years we heard nonstop from the GOP and Laura Bush how she was a librarian for 2 years of her working life in education. And that's all we heard about. Now all of a sudden librarians aren't teachers in the field of education. The whole problem with educators today is to many of them are closet Republicons or willingly affiliate themselves with the GOP and then by their action actually unwittingly provide the knife to the GOP to stab them in the back with. When will educators wake up and smell the coffee. That includes Superintendents, Principles, Asst Principles, and Teachers. NO school board member who has an "R" after their name should ever be elected to any public school board. There is no end to the dismantaling these Neo-cons commit to advance their hateful ideology.