[A-librarian-at-every-table] librarian at table paid off

[Kathleen de la Peña McCook]

AZ School District Votes to Keep Librarians
By Joan Oleck -- School Library Journal, 4/17/2008 9:31:00 AM

Bowing to public opinion, Arizona´s Tucson Unified School District 
board on April 8 took an abrupt U-turn, voting to reverse its 
decision to force elementary schools to choose between axing 
librarians or counselors to save money.

The late-February decision, which essentially pitted librarians and 
counselors against each other in a battle to save their jobs, would 
have saved Tucson's largest school district an estimated $1.55 
million next year. But the decision was a deeply unpopular one with 
local community members.

"When it comes down to the school [site], it's becoming a popularity 
contest," board member Adelita Grijalva explained to the Tucson 
Citizen. Grijalva´s decision to vote both times in favor of 
librarians may reflect her roots: She's the daughter of U.S. Rep. 
Raul Grijalva (D-AZ), one of the congressional sponsors of theSKILLs 
Act, which would mandate a certified librarian for every school 
nationwide.

The original February vote forced elementary schools to decide 
whether to keep their librarians or counselors, based on a formula of 
one full-time librarian per school for every 450 or more students.

Sally Lefko, a librarian for four years at Roskruge Bilingual, a K-9 
school in Tucson, describes the dismay that followed. "If your school 
had [a half-time librarian], you had to choose: either a half-time 
librarian or half-time counselor. It was like kicking someone 'off 
the island. But it wasn't like a stranger on a TV show; these were 
your colleagues, people you ate lunch with and saw every day."

Ten schools voted in favor of counselors over librarians, says Lefko, 
a part-time librarian at an elementary and middle school. She was 
retained by the middle school, but voted out by the elementary 
faculty, which chose to keep their counselor. "I think they figured I 
was going to be there half time for the middle school so I would 
probably [still] serve them."

Oddly enough, Lefko says, the school board didn't realize that 
librarians and counselors remained on the payroll even though their 
positions were eliminated and that the only way to save dollars was 
by attrition. The practical result was that those dismissed from a 
school were given DITs or district-initiated transfers. Lefko herself 
opted to stay part-time at her middle school because she suspected 
the new policy wouldn't last.

She was right. Ann-Eve Pedersen and her Tucson Unified School 
Supporters mobilized, and about 50 protestors showed up at the school 
board building before the April 8 meeting. Lefko, who dressed for the 
occasion as a grim reaper-her costume adorned with the letters 
TUSS-read her public letter to the board condemning their action to 
pit "us against each other" and reduce "the morale in the entire 
school district."

In the end, the board voted to reinstate the district's previous 
counselor/librarian staffing plan but to increase the formula to 600 
kids per school minimum per full-time (versus part-time) librarian. 
The result, says Lefko, is that "There is no library without a 
librarian, at least part-time."

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