OEMA Newsletter
  
An Electronic Newsletter
of The Oregon Educational Media Association
Volume 16 No. 7
March, 2004

FROM THE PRESIDENT'S KEYBOARD

I've just returned from a meeting of teacher's who, under the guidelines of our fearless leader, have been identified as "not highly qualified". I am included because I am currently teaching a 6th grade language arts class and do not have a degree in English or reading or literature or whatever else you need to teach language arts to sixth graders. My B.A.'s in math and psychology are not relevant here and curiously enough neither is my MLS. Also useless is the generalist endorsement which the state invented so that whoever wanted to could be middle school teachers. That does not surprise me.

When I sarcastically asked what does a media endorsement (that's what my certification says) and 34 years of teaching experience get ya' ( yes I said ya' - remember I don't know nothin' about English) the response was that George Bush, husband of the first librarian, doesn't care about that. I know that the politically correct response might have been that the legislation does not address the library / media center but the meeting had degenerated quickly and there is some question about whether or not the framers of this particular piece of legislation could identify a library if they saw one.

So to those of you who are carrying the banner of information literacy and literature appreciation - hold that banner high. It is a mighty wind that looks to rip it from our hands. But I know we will persevere. The OSLIS folks are closing in on a possible support group and somewhere out there I know there is someone with the perfect plan that we can present to the LSTA folks. If you have a good idea, we are meeting in Eugene on the first Saturday of spring break to craft a proposal. If you actually have a life and are planning something fun for spring break, let me know your good ideas and I will bring it to the meeting. I will even give you credit.

I also hope you are all geared up to attend your spring conferences if for no other reason that to enjoy the company of like-minded folks. These connections will be what sustain us over these lean times. That and the knowledge that when they wake up to the reality of what they need to know to stay ahead of the game, they are going to come looking for us. I personally plan to make them beg.

The rain is warmer. Spring is on the way. Enjoy.

SUMMER INSTITUTE RETURNS
Gary Hartzell comes to Oregon

Building Influence…Influence building

July 12th and 13th, 2004

Mark your calendars for July 12th and 13th on the coast in Newport. Dr. Gary Hartzell will challenge us to build influence for ourselves and our school library media programs. Professor Hartzell works to bring the school library to the attention of administrators through conference presentations, articles, and books.

Who is Gary Hartzell?

• Author of “Building Influence for the School Librarian: Tenets, Targets, and Tactics” (2nd edition, Linworth)
• Former high school teacher and principal
• Professor of Educational Administration and Supervision at the University of Nebraska at Omaha
• Author of “Building Influence,” a monthly column in SLJ
• Featured Speaker at the White House Conference on School Libraries in June 2002
• Member of the Advisory Board for the Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries
• Popular and dynamic presenter at state and national conferences i.e. ALA, AASL, and AECT
• Author of “Why Should Principals Support School Libraries?” ERIC Digest November, 2002

Program Building Influence…Influence Building

• 6 in-depth workshop hours with Gary Hartzell
• Panel presentation by Oregon principals and other administrators who are major supporters of school libraries
• Steve Wisely, retired Medford Schools Superintendent, OEMA Administrator of the Year, and featured speaker at the White House Conference on School Libraries in June 2002 will moderate the panel.
• “Tactics and Targets” group process with OEMA leaders
• The OEMA “all-stars” will recreate their traveling "road show" on quality library media programs as presented to administrators in Oregon education programs (most recently to administrators-in-training at George Fox). Star presenters include Kelly Kuntz, Melanie Lucas, Martha Decherd, Kathy Chan, and Karen Wedeking.

Location: Best Western Agate Beach Inn

North Coast Highway Newport, Oregon

Spectacular panoramic views of the Pacific Ocean, Agate Beach and the Yaquina Head Lighthouse.
$104. single/double hillside $124.ocean view

Reservations: Call 1 800 547-3310 and identify yourself as a participant in OEMA Summer Institute.

Registration: $125.

conference fee includes 3 meals (dinner, breakfast, lunch)

registration form on OEMA home page <http://www.oema.net>

For registration info contact JoAnn Klassen oemamembership@comcast.net

If you have other questions or would like to help with the summer institute, email conference chair Mary McClintock marymc@teleport.com

SCHOOL LIBRARIES: THE NEW CORPS OF DISCOVERY

Award-winning classroom teacher and national speaker, Wayne Free will be the keynote speaker for OEMA's 2004 Fall Conference in Seaside. Mr. Free will be addressing technology through the curriculum and how librarians incorporate technology through literature.
What animals did Lewis & Clark encounter on their expedition? What plants did they discover on their trip? Join Dorothy Hinshaw Patent during Friday's author dessert as she shares her slides on her research of Animals on the Trail with Lewis & Clark, Plants on the Trail of Lewis & Clark, and The Lewis and Clark Trail : Then and Now.

Are you confused about copyright issues and the Internet? Learn what is correct for school libraries with Leonard DuBoff, Portland lawyer and expert.

Would you like to venture down the Columbia River? Join the Lewis & Clark EcoTour and discover the journey of Meriweather Lewis & William Clark's expedition. Be sure to wear your 'coon skin cap and dry moccasins.

Other extended sessions include Building Your Own Library Webpage, Videostreaming, Book Repair, Basic AV Repair, and Hotter than Hot Young Adult Literature.

Discover what's new for libraries in the exhibits, learn from your colleagues from over fifty concurrent sessions, and share your insights with other attendees with Nancy Farmer's The House of the Scorpion.

Set your calendars for October 8 & 9, 2004. As Lewis & Clark discovered the Pacific Ocean over 200 years ago, you can discover the new opportunities for you and your library in beautiful Seaside. For more information, contact Gregory Lum, 2004 Conference Chair, at glum@jesuitportland.com

SPRING REGIONAL CONFERENCES

Regions 1 (Clatsop, Columbia, Tillamook, Washington) and 4 (Clackamas, Hood River, Multnomah, Sherman, Wasco) will have a joint conference on March 6 at the George Fox Center in Portland. Kathy Chan and Edith Fuller have planned 6 great sessions packed with lots of ideas.

Region 2 (Benton, Lincoln, Linn, Marion, Polk, Yamhill) will meet April 3 at Marion Miller Elementary School in Salem. Contact Carol Dinges for more information.

Region 3 (Coos, Douglas, Lane) will meet April 24 at Briggs Middle School in Springfield. Watch from more information from Linda Erickson.

Region 5 (Curry,Jackson, Josephine, Klamath, Lake) will meet May 1 in Medford. Suzie Schweitzer will be sending out more information.

Region 6 (Baker, Gilliam, Malheur, MOrrow, Umatilla, Union, Wallowa) will meet on March 13 at Umatilla High School. Members in Region 7 are invited to attend this Book Festival co-sponsored by Region 6 and the Umatilla Morrow ESD. Sessions include author Deborah Hopkinson, Mary Norton on book awards, book repair, book selection and more.

SCHOLARSHIP REMINDER

Two scholarships of $800.00 each are being offered by OEMA to undergraduate students working toward an educational media endorsement or individuals studying at the graduate level in the fields of educational media/instructional technology.  The scholarship grants may be used to assist the recipients to further their education in a summer session or academic year of study at any accredited college or university in Oregon.  Deadline for application submissions is May 1, 2004.  Application forms are available on the OEMA website at http://www.oema.net under “Scholarships.”  Requests for application forms may also be made by e-mail to Jenny_Takeda@beavton.k12.or.us or by calling 503-591-4165 (work).

ANNOUNCING THE CONNIE HULL MINI-GRANT AWARD RECIPIENTS

Dayton Grade School, Dayton: Jann Tankersley, Library Media Specialist - Project: Science to Go: Fact & Fiction Learning Packs

Nellie Muir Elementary, Woodburn: Mary Parra, Librarian/Teacher - Project: Literature & Art Connection/Literature y Conexion de Art

Lane Middle School, SE Portland: Linda Campillo, Library Assistant - Project: Lane Literacy Day

LaGrande High School, La Grande: Sharon Porter, Library Media Specialist - Project: Tiger Teens Book Club: Our Online Book Group

Winston Churchill High School, Eugene: Julie Vignoul, Librarian - Project: Literary Lunch Bunch

These five award winners who each received $200 will share the results of their projects at the annual OEMA FAll Conference in Seaside next October.

OEMA WEBPAGE HIGHLIGHTS

The OEMA website can answer your questions about the organization. Link to <http://www.oema.net/organization.html> to  awards, bylaws, the Connie Hull Endowment Fund, the Listserv, membership, the OEMA Board of Directors, OEMA Regions, Policies & Procedures, promotions and scholarships.

IT WORKS FOR ME

If you have hints or suggestions to make life in the Media Center easier please send them to Meg.Miranda@corvallis.k12.or.us)
I was constantly being asked by students for pencils, pens, paper, note cards. Now I keep a supply for students where they can serve themselves. When I find pens or pencils lying around I just pop them into the student supply basket. This way I don't have to hunt through my drawers for an extra pen. An appeal to parents through the newsletter at the beginning of the school year usually brings in enough donations so that I don't have to purchase materials. Having a few supplies on hand enables unprepared students to get to work and maximize their time in the library.

SCHEPPKE EDUCATES OREGON LIBRARIANS ABOUT OSLIS

Reprinted with permission from Letters to Libraries Online, the monthly newsletter of the Oregon State Library.

PS. (From the State Librarian)

The defeat of Measure 30 last month puts at risk one of the most innovative and successful LSTA-supported projects in recent years. The Oregon School Library Information System (also known as OSLIS) is designed to provide licensed databases, other librarian-selected Web-based information, and information literacy resources to all of Oregon's K-12 students. It was developed, beginning in the late 1990's by a coalition of the Oregon Educational Media Association, and several other education partners. The site went live in 2000 with support from LSTA and from the Oregon Department of Education. For two years the grant funds paid for the EBSCO and Oregonian databases on the site. When grant support ended, districts had to begin to pay for access to the EBSCO databases. The good news is that even in these tough budget times, most Oregon school districts have paid their share of the statewide EBSCO database costs in the past two years. The bad news is not all districts paid, and as a result about a quarter of Oregon's K-12 students had to be cut off from access to the periodical databases.

The defeat of Measure 30, that will result in hundreds of millions of dollars lost to K-12 education next year, puts the future of OSLIS in jeopardy. Even this year, there is no funding to support hosting and maintenance of the website at Linn-Benton-Lincoln ESD, where it resides. Thankfully, the ESD has decided not to pull the plug on OSLIS, at least through the end of this school year. However the biggest threat might come next year, when the Measure 30 cuts hit. It could happen that not enough schools are able to pay for the periodicals databases. The cost is part of the statewide periodicals database license for all types of libraries that the State Library will rebid this year with the help of the Statewide Database Licensing Advisory Committee. If the schools can't come up with the money for their share of the new contract, schools might have to be written out of the final agreement. If this happens, OSLIS will no longer be a viable product.

What would it be like if we didn't have OSLIS? Every school district would be on their own in providing electronic library resources for Oregon students. This is the way it was before OSLIS. It was a situation of "haves and have nots." And even the "haves" paid way too much for their electronic resources. Public and academic libraries carry an added burden when Oregon K-12 students do not have access to electronic library resources. Students come to the public library searching for what their school is unable to provide. When they go on to college, these students haven't learned to use database resources and their overall information literacy skills are low.

We can't let this happen. I believe we need to do what it takes to save OSLIS. I am pleased that the Oregon Educational Media Association President Linda Ague has made this a priority for OEMA. She has appointed a special committee, ably led by Sheryl Steinke of Eugene, to resolve the problems that are facing OSLIS and put the project on solid ground beginning next year. The committee is making good progress and the State Library Board is behind their efforts. The survival of OSLIS is something the entire Oregon library community needs to get behind, because we all have a stake in the outcome. - Jim Scheppke

ADRIAN LIBRARY GRANT REPORT

Community support is a key factor in making 2003-2004 "The Year of the Grants" for the Adrian School Library. 

We learned of the Libri Foundation and their program of matching grants for rural libraries through a community member who was taking education courses. School libraries are only eligible for this grant if they serve as community libraries and are open during the summer. Adrian met this criteria because of the work of parent volunteers in organizing a summer reading program last summer. Another parent gathered donations in the community which were matched 2 to 1 by the Libri Foundation. I sorted through the Foundation's list of 700 award-winning books to choose the 60+ books that would be most useful in our library. Those books have arrived and are now in circulation with some of the shorter ones are being checked out more than once a day.

Community and staff members worked together last spring on an application for an Improving Literacy Through School Libraries grant. With minimal grant-writing experience and resources, we did not have much hope of receiving one of about 80 grants being offered nationwide. Learning that our application would be funded was very exciting and gratifying, but also very scary. Now we are expected to make our dreams actually happen!

We had chosen "Success through Access" as the theme of our grant, arguing that our students would be more successful if they had access to more up-to-date nonfiction books, to an electronic library catalog, to more computers both for school assignments and for the library catalog, and access to the library itself after school and during the summer.

Before we had time to do much toward those goals, we learned that a former community member had been one of 100 winners nationwide in a Target stores drawing in which she named the Adrian School Library to be the recipient of $10,000 worth of books. Target's arrangement for the books was with Capstone Press, Compass Point Press, and Picture Window Books. We have now placed our order for over 400 books from those catalogs, and have learned how easy it is to become greedy. It was really hard to limit our choices because we _need_ more books than the $10,000 will cover!

Now we are working on Improving Literacy through School Libraries projects. We began keeping the library open until 6:00 p.m. Monday through Thursday in November. Enough students are taking advantage of the program that we plan to continue "7th Period @ the Library" at least until spring weather calls more students outside. Four new computers have been purchased and are in use in the library. Work has started on creating an electronic catalog. We have rented a barcode scanner and are scanning barcodes on books new enough to have them, recording ISBNs from books new enough to have ISBNs but too old for barcodes, and sorting through the older books to decide which ones are worth keeping in the library. So far barcodes of over 5,000 books have been scanned or otherwise recorded. When the numbers are sent to Jaywil Software, they will send us records that will fit right into the ResourceMate software we are using. Information about another 900 titles without barcodes has already been entered into the computer and many more books (in stacks and boxes all over the library!) remain for which information will be entered by hand. 

One of our next steps is to decide how to spend $9,000 on middle school/high school nonfiction. I think we have a fairly well-rounded collection, but all areas need to be updated. I could use a lot of help with this. Would you be willing to suggest must-have high school non-fiction titles? Or do you have any tips that would at least help me narrow down the choices? More specifically, what current books dealing with genetic disorders can you recommend? Responses sent to the OEMA listserv at OEMA@rocket.saw.net could help others as well, or I would be glad to hear from you personally at ewitty@malesd.k12.or.us .

RUTH MURRAY NEW YRCA REP. FOR OREGON

Congratulations to Ruth Murray for being the new Oregon YRCA representative. Ruth is library media specialist at Athey Creek MS in West Linn, the middle school representative on the OEMA board and also an instructor in the PSU library media program.

Ruth announces the YRCA nominees for 2005.

Contact Ruth at
Ruth Murray
Athey Creek Middle School Library - PSU Library Media program
860 S. Clematis Rd West Linn, Oregon 97068
Telephone: 503.673.7442 wk; 505.650.9316 home
Email: murrayr@wlwv.k12.or.us or ruthanddave1@comcast.net

GEORGE FOX SUMMER ENROLLMENT OPEN

George Fox is now enrolling for summer semester on the Newberg campus. You may enroll at http://edfl.georgefox.edu.

Courses that apply to a library media endorsement are:

For those interested in a Master of Education degree or Continuing Teaching License, please see further information at http://edfl.georgefox.edu

You may also contact

LET'S GET GRAPHIC AT SILVERTON HIGH

Being inspired by the workshop on graphic novels at the October Preconference and by a small donation for books, I purchased about 30 graphic novels to start a collection here at Silverton High School. Thought I’d share the bulletin board we made to publicize the new collection because it came together so easily. We scanned the covers of some of the books before we put barcodes on then printed them out in color and mounted them on purple paper. For the board’s background we used shiny orange wrapping paper. In the upper corner a small sign says, “Look what’s new in the library.” The words “POW!” “ZAP!” and “READ!” are scattered around, and a dialog bubble says “Let’s Get Graphic!” (OK, guess I wouldn’t recommend that part for younger levels…) Kids and staff have really responded to the bright display. I’m amused to find that although I was in hopes that the graphic novels would pull in more boys and non-readers, it was a group of senior TAG girls that came racing in as soon as the display was up and who have continued to read their way through all of them.
P.S. I’d love to hear about boards others have done that are easy, effective, and don’t rely on artistic abilities!

AASL RESOURCE GUIDES FOR SCHOOL LIBRARY MEDIA PROGRAMS

These bibliographies of resources arranged alphabetically by frequently used topics in the professional literature can be accessed at
http://www.ala.org/aasl/resources Books, journal articles, Web sites and other media are included, and the bibliographies will be continually revised and updated.

THE AASL HOTLIST

Check out these new or timely Web resources...

National Library Week Web Site
http://www.ala.org/ala/pio/campaign/nlw/nationallibraryweek.htm
--Features National Library Week 2004 proclamation, programming and display ideas, sample PSAs, press releases and letter to the editor.

Grants.gov Web Site

http://www.grants.gov

--For those interested in Federal grants, Grants.gov is a federal Web site that offers a centralized source to
locate and apply for up to 900 programs from the 26 Federal grant-making agencies.

WHY FILTERS WON'T WORK

Both children and adults need to be able to assess as well as access information--to distinguish between that which is useful and that which is not. We do not help when we simply wall them off from information and ideas that are controversial or disturbing. Regrettably, forcing libraries to choose between funding, equitable access, and censorship means millions of library users will lose, particularly those Americans who reside in the most poverty-stricken areas of the country.

Why Filters Won't Protect Children or Adults by Nancy Kranich,

published in Library Administration & Management, vol. 18, number 1, Winter 2004, pp. 14-18.

<http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/ifissues/issuesrelatedlinks/whyfilterswontprotect.htm>

ALICE SERIES TOPS LIST OF ALA MOST CHALLENGED

Phyllis Reynolds Naylor's Alice series tops the list of most challenged books of 2003, ending the four-year reign of J. K. Rowling's
Harry Potter series, according to the American Library Association's (ALA) Office for Intellectual Freedom. The Alice series drew complaints from parents and others concerned about the books' sexual content. http://www.ala.org/ala/pr2004/prfeb2004/AliceseriestopsALAs.htm

CALENDAR

OEMA Newsletter -- Editor: Sheryl Steinke

Published monthly on the 5th of the month September through May
To receive the OEMA Newsletter by email, subscribe to the OEMA mailing list using the form at http://www.oema.net/telecommunication/list.html

Send news items for the Newsletter to:
* Email: sherylsteinke@comcast.net
* Mail: Sheryl Steinke at 2405 Blacktail Dr. Eugene, OR 97405

Deadline: 1 week before publication, except 2 weeks for the January issue.