Virginia

CASE STUDY 4: SIMONE GILLIES TEACHDER-LIBRARIAN ST STEPHEN'S CATHOLIC COLLEGE MAREEBA .

Case Study 4 focuses on the Teacher-Librarian at St Stephen's Catholic College in Mareeba. St Stephen's is a new Year 8-12 co-educational College in the Cairns Diocese, with a current enrolment of 265 students. As a qualified teacher, the TL began working as the part-time Library Assistant when the College first opened in 2006, as a means of hopefully gaining the position of Teacher-Librarian, when the College was able to afford the position. She completed her Masters through Charles Sturt University in 2010 and this year gained the position of Teacher-Librarian. She is employed for 15 hours as a Teacher-Librarian and 15 hours as a Library Assistant. There is one other library assistant for 6 hours of work a week. The College is set in a semi-rural environment and the design is single story spread over the campus. The current library is situated in a central position in the library close to the administration area and some classrooms. However the new Library/Resource Centre will be some distance from classrooms, administration and students' lunch and gathering areas. While TL noted it will be quiet she also stated that she felt it would be on the outside of the College. (Interview)

The Teacher-Librarian is currently assisting in the planning of the new Resource Centre which will open sometime in 2013 and she has some elements she will require in the design. These include a workroom hidden from the public as the Teacher-Librarian would prefer the clients see only the smooth running of the floor, not the behind the scenes workings. Quiet spaces for reading, alone time and study are important in her plan.The Teacher-Librarian would like the Resource Centre to stand out from a classroom; to be a welcoming space where a variety of students can accomplish a variety of goals. She would like it to be large enough for a few classes to access the Resource Centre at the same time in spaces that suit the purpose of their time in the centre.The Teacher-Librarianalso thinks it is important to have a great display areas and shelving which allows good access to books. (email)

The role statement, written from a combination of the the ALIA website and other TL's statements is under review, along with the writing of a role description for the library officer's role. The current role statement addresses the areas of teaching and learning, management, leadership, literacy promotion, curriculum involvement and services. It outlines in dot form the activities under each of these headings for which the TL is responsible. The Collection Policy is twenty-three pages and contains a mixture of policy, procedures and consequences of the policy. (documents)

This mentor is a proactive Teacher-Librarian, promoting her role and the role of the Resource Centre within the school. To finally gain recognition of the work she does and to ultimately be employed and paid as a Teacher-Librarian, she presented a report on her role in the Library and her role statement. She believes that through both of these documents the Principal was able to get a better sense of what she was doing and when I suggested perhaps he felt guilty for not paying someone with a Masters in Applied Science (Teacher-Librarianship) she agreed that it was also a contributing factor. (Interview) The Teacher-Librarian stated that before completing her report and role statement that the Principal was unsure of her role and that some teachers did not know she was a teacher and that she had been studying to gain her qualifications. She stated that she spends a lot of time doing professional reading, is a member of the OZ_TL network, attends Diocesan meetings for TLs and loves dappling in Web2.0 technologies.

While establishing the physical space of a library the Teacher-Librarian is still overcoming the many hurdles in establishing a new College, including working in a temporary library space that this year has had is third move. Presently the space in the library is very limited, and has been utilized to suit the majority of the school. There is a classroom space (use portable data projector & screen when necessary), a study space and a reading space. All spaces are used for a variety of reasons, depending on the group in the library. The office/ circulation desk/ work room have been created in a corner of the library. Although in a makeshift library the book displays and shelving invited readers to make a selection and find a comfortable seat to read. During my visit the Teacher-Librarian was also given supervisions and at one stage has a mixture of three classes in the library for whom she was responsible. We discussed the challenges that arise from being responsible for students in study time from needing the space for them as well as having laptops available; the study group are not guaranteed the use of laptops as the trolleys are used by class teachers in classrooms and they have priority bookings.

The Teacher-Librarian feels the students are more aware of her role and finds most of her lunchtimes are extremely busy, the library is also open before school and at morning tea. When questioned about after school openings the Teacher-Librarian stated that due to being a country school and students catching buses the library is not used by students after school. However many teacher meetings are held in the library. It was a hive of activity during my visit. sheruns a book club for both students and teachers, organizes Readers Cup and maintains a blog that links off her developing website.

Students, according to the Teacher-Librarian, have a better knowledge of what she does because she assists them when they are in the Resource Centre, they know that she can guide them to find and use resources; she runs a book club and is an avid reader of teenage fiction, sharing her thoughts on what she reads through the Library blog. This term the Teacher-Librarian has set up one year level of classes with a blog challenge to try to get students involved as she noted that not many students commented on her blog (Text book reference for case study).

When questioned about planning and working with teachers the discussion lead to whether knowing content matter is important for teacher-librarians. The Teacher-Librarian felt you had to have sense of the subject matter to help students and then stated that it would be also be good to have some input into the preparation of task sheets. On further questioning Simone hinted that she has little time to meet and plan with teachers. Some of her lessons have been designed around past task sheets from which she takes the type of questions students are given and went through the process with students on how to locate the information using different sources.

The Teacher-Librarian presents five minute 'show and tell' sessions at staff meetings; displaying and explaining such things as new resources, copyright, information literacy, IT and Web2.0. Although she felt that not all the teachers understand what a great resource she can be for them, quite often after this in servicing they request lessons for their classes. Lesson requests included research skills, website evaluation, use of databases and referencing. The Teacher-Librarian teaches Year 8 once a fortnight throughout the year. During the first semester these lessons are mainly focused on the skills of locating resources and during the second Semester she concentrates on literature and literacy. She stated that she was able to work closely with some teachers and noted no one subject was more prominent in their requests of library help but that she mainly worked with Science, SoSE, English and RE.. All teachers are expected to attend any lessons she teaches to either assist her with supervision or to supervise the study groups in the library while she teaches. I asked about team teaching and teacher-Librarian suggested that this did not happen but at least the teacher was present during the lesson.

The Teacher-Librarian stated that she was waiting for the HODs to give her some direction of what units they intended covering in the Australian Curriculum so that she could start ordering resources. She felt frustrated in that she was not involved in Curriculum development in the College although sheis the parent representative on the Curriculum Board. Apart from this her

Simone manages the booking system for library spaces and laptops, due to the size of the school there was no need for digital equipment to be on systems. Simone can also manage student printing and has IT problem solving skills to assist teachers and students. There was a sense of frustration as she spoke of the many things she does that she feels are not part of her role but tempered it with an acknowledgement that that is what happens in small schools.

The library budget is prepared and managed by the Teacher-Librarian and covers all requirements from covering materials, licenses, subcriptions and book resources. Since the employment of a Business Manager she believes that she is being given the money required to develop the resources and services of the Resource Centre as the College student numbers are increasing.