Unanswered Questions
To the editor:
After reading Sharon Mc-Clain’s letter last week, I have so many questions. I hope that other readers did, too. Before addressing those, I would like to share my qualifications. I am a retired public school educator with thirty-four years of experience. I hold a Texas State Board of Education certification as an All-Level Learning Resources Specialist Grades (PK-12). I acquired my certification by completing my Master’s degree in Learning Resources at UH Clear Lake. Before retiring and moving to La Grange, I was a school librarian for twenty-one years. I wish Ms. McClain would have shared her qualifications as well as when and why she was in the school library. Here are my questions: Did she speak to library staff about her concerns? If she was there after hours, she could have called or sent an email the next day. The next step after that would have been to contact the school administrators. Since she didn’t mention making any contact, my guess is she didn’t.
When was she there? The month of May is busy in any school library but especially busy at our middle/high school library. Advanced Placement testing takes place in the library. Each test is several hours long and there are multiple tests given over several days. Some of those tests have 30-50 students taking them which means that many tables are needed. If she was in the library during that time, I am sure there were tables and chairs everywhere possibly blocking some shelves. Very few students were checking out books since the school year was almost over plus the library staff was taking books on carts to the classrooms that needed them by requests from the teachers.
Why was Ms. McClain roaming behind the counter of the library examining surface areas and cabinets? The more she elaborated on her findings, the more I became concerned about her motive for being there.
She states that it looked more like a storage area. Back in the days of overhead projectors, every projector had to come back to my library for the summer. They took up a huge amount of space. Again, if she was there in May, many items were coming back to the library that hadn’t been there all year.
Ms. McClain states that “throughout the space are piles of items unrelated to the core purpose of the school library.”
What does that even mean? What are her qualifications to judge what should and shouldn’t be there? What items were there? I know that a student group doing a food drive met in the library. Could she have seen their donations that hadn’t been moved yet? My library often had items that to the uninformed eye might seem unrelated.
I have spent time in both school libraries in LGISD. I know how hard the staff works to provide a great atmosphere for our students. Part of my time at the library in question was volunteering to look at the collection for books that might need to be withdrawn because of age or low circulation. I am likely responsible for one or two of the carts of books that Ms. McClain saw. I regret that it gave her a bad impression; however, had she asked the staff about them, she would have known. Rather than asking the entire community to tour the library, I would like to ask that you sign up to volunteer in the school district or become a mentor for a student. Learn first hand about our schools and our students rather than from Ms. McClain or me.
Her complaints are presented with no context and no reason for her visit. She didn’t follow the logical method of addressing concerns. Instead, she is trying to create public outcry when none is needed or deserved. Her motives are highly suspect as well as her methods of nosing around in an area that should have been closed after hours. Let’s stop going straight to the newspaper or social media and start by having the courtesy to talk to individuals in person and get the whole story. Our students deserve adults who display human decency and common sense to serve as role models for how to handle questions and concerns.