Full text reprint exclusively on KQWeb
The purpose of this article is to pose some questions that often are asked and some answers that might be helpful when planning to renovate or build a new school library media center (SLMC). Over the course of the past twenty-five years, I have headed two public libraries and two independent SLMCs that have undergone new construction or renovations. One renovation was in a Carnegie public library that serves an industrial community of eight thousand people. Another was in an SLMC for 227 students in grades eight to twelve in an historic landmark mansion in Manhattan. One new construction project was a branch public library for a community of twenty-six thousand in an inner-city neighborhood. The other new project, in whose planning I am presently engaged, is an SLMC for 414 children in grades pre-K to seven set to open in 2003. This new SLMC will be part of an addition to the same landmark building in New York City where the upper school library media center was renovated six years ago. I hope that some lessons I’ve learned from these experiences may be of value to others who are undertaking their own SLMC construction or renovation.
Q. We have an experienced team of administrators working with the architects. Our school library media specialists (SLMS) are busy teaching and administering the library media program. Why do they need to be involved in planning a new facility or a renovation?
A. The SLMSs who are responsible for the day-to-day SLMC program should be involved in every phase of planning and implementing a new facility or renovation. There is no substitute for their expertise and familiarity with the ins and outs of the physical space and program. SLMSs who are involved in planning the facility will be deeply invested in reaching a successful outcome. Their continual participation will help ensure that the design is functional. It will also reduce the likelihood of dissatisfaction after the SLMC is completed.
Q. How far in advance should we begin planning a new SLMC?
A. In my present school we have been developing our library media program and facilities based on a long-range plan for information services that was drafted nearly ten years ago. The aspects of that plan relating to the renovation and construction of SLMC facilities are about to reach completion in 2003. Other renovations and construction in which I have been involved took from three to six years to plan. In my experience, this advanced planning has always been beneficial because it allowed time for the necessary fundraising, brainstorming throughout the process, making needed changes, finding the best contractors and vendors, and developing respect and understanding among the members of the planning team.
Q. Why do we need a written, long-range plan for the SLMC program and facilities?
A. The advantages of having a written, long-range plan are many. It establishes a frame of reference by which to measure your progress. It serves as a tool for education and advocacy with administrators, board members, financial directors, teachers, parents, donors, and SLMC users. It states concrete objectives to be reached by specific dates. It gives projected dollar figures to guide financial planning and fundraising.
The plan should be flexible enough to absorb technological advances, adapt to curricular and pedagogical changes, and accommodate a growing or changing school population. Most important, the plan should articulate the SLMC’s mission and program so that the new facility may be designed to fulfill its primary functions.
Q. If we have an experienced team of SLMSs, technology specialists, administrators, and architects, why do we need a library consultant?
A. Administrators and financial directors may ask this question when faced with the prospect of funding a consultant’s fees in addition to all the other costs of the project. SLMSs should point out the many advantages of employing an independent consultant. The consultant can bring people of divergent viewpoints together. He or she can detect gaps in program planning. A consultant will advocate for designing an SLMC whose form follows its function. Most important, a consultant can make disinterested, credible recommendations to administrators and architects. Following are just three examples of the positive results we enjoyed from having a professional library consultant participate in our SLMC facilities planning.
During our long-range planning for information services nine years ago, our consultant noticed that communication between SLMSs and technology specialists was sometimes hindered by our respective professional jargons. By helping us sort out the separate and shared goals of our two programs, which were often expressed in the particular language of each profession, we became better able to appreciate our common interests. This improved understanding paved the way for future teamwork on SLMC facilities planning that continues today. Since the architectural footprint (outline) for our new SLMC was already established, the consultant suggested inventive ways to create teaching spaces for concurrent lower and middle school information literacy classes. She also mapped out a central circulation and study area for use by drop-ins while classes are in session. She helped us better define our educational specifications to accommodate a growing student population, larger collections, and new A/V and technology services. During brainstorming sessions with the consultant, our technology director offered to give back to the new SLMC a 288-square-foot adjacent computer lab that was shown in the early drawings. That space now is designated as a storytime area. In exchange, the SLMC will house twenty wireless laptop computers on a mobile cart for use in both the SLMC and classrooms. Among the four libraries I’ve headed, all of which have undergone renovation or new construction, those that were planned with a library consultant achieved the best results. They incorporated the ideas of more stakeholders, had more detailed educational specifications, made more flexible use of space, and worked better for staff and patrons.
Q. How can we find a library consultant?
A. Your best bet is to ask other librarians who have used consultants. You might also post a request for recommendations on LM_NET or your local professional association electronic discussion list. Another possible source is Donna Walters’s article "Media Center Makeovers," which lists a number of links for consulting firms as well as custom design services and furniture sources.1 The Library Buildings Consultants List is a database of consultants with their contact information.2 You must be a registered, paying member of the Library Administration and Management Association, a division of the American Library Association (ALA), to search the database.
Q. Are there any courses I can take to learn more about planning new SLMC facilities?
A. The Taft Educational Center in Watertown, Connecticut, sponsors an annual summer course called "Planning Libraries for the Twenty-First Century," which is taught by Walter DeMelle Jr., director of the Edsel Ford Memorial Library at the Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Connecticut.3 DeMelle is an experienced SLMS and a professional library consultant. The two-week course includes site visits to SLMCs and a generous array of professional materials to take home for use in planning SLMCs. Participants also earn continuing education units.
Q. If we must compromise on space, design, or functionality, what should we be willing to sacrifice?
A. It is wise to include all visionary ideas in the planning process at the outset. As the process continues, some compromises will probably become necessary. When planning our upper school library media center renovation in 1996, we needed to preserve the beauty and original structure of the landmark mansion’s historic interiors while adapting them to accommodate a contemporary school library media program. The new lower/middle school library media center also had to complement the landmark building to which it was being added. Space in New York City is always at a premium, so this presented another planning challenge for us.
In both library media centers our goals were to add larger, more flexible spaces for staff, collections, displays, teaching, learning, reading and study, computing, presentations, programs, and storage.
One solution we found for adding staff workspace was to design customized circulation desks for both SLMCs. In the upper school library media center, we utilized the mansion’s existing built-in shelves and cabinets with a custom-made circulation desk that serves many purposes. By situating the desk under the room’s historic balcony and in front of the built-in shelves and cupboards, we created an area of architectural focus that not only provides circulation services but also serves as a workspace for our paraprofessional. It also provides a secure storage area for small A/V equipment, a locking cabinet for a cable recording station, and a display space for new books along the facade of the desk. The circulation area in the new lower/middle school library media center will be designed to serve similar multiple purposes. We enhanced teaching, learning, and presentation space in the upper school library media center by purchasing uniform-sized tables and chairs that can be reconfigured for various uses, and by mounting a retractable viewing screen atop a bank of shelving. In the new lower/middle school library media center, we will also have same-size, easily reconfigured tables and chairs.
Overhead multimedia projectors and ceiling-mounted, retractable viewing screens will allow for A/V presentations without sacrificing space for other functions. We are still weighing the trade-offs between adding electronic white board technology or more desktop workstations in the new SLMC. We increased shelving by going as high as 96 inches in the lower/middle school library media center and up to 110 inches in the upper school library media center. The tall shelves around the periphery of the upper school facility enhance the appearance of the room, which has a high vaulted ceiling, and students like to use the safe, mobile ladders to reach books on the top shelves. The highest shelves in the lower/middle school library media center initially will have doors to provide concealed storage. These doors can be removed for future collection growth.
We gained computer space by adding built-in counters in both SLMCs and by placing workstations in the window wells around the outer walls of the upper school facility. Shades are used to block the glare from the windows. Wireless laptops on mobile carts fill out the remaining computer needs. In our limited spaces, we sacrificed having librarians’ offices in favor of locating our desks on the floor with shelves nearby for our professional use. While this solution has some disadvantages, it greatly expands teaching space. It also enables professional staff to have continuous supervision of the SLMCs and to be invitingly accessible to students and faculty.
Q. Can you recommend some books on planning SLMCs?
A. The books I’ve found most helpful have been Baule’s Facilities Planning for School Library Media and Technology Centers, Erikson and Markuson’s Designing a School Library Media Center for the Future, and Klasing’s Designing and Renovating School Library Media Centers.4 All are well organized, practical, and readable. They break the planning process into manageable steps and provide diagrams and tables that are useful for preparing your own educational specifications.
For inspiration on developing and assessing your own school library media program, I recommend Loertscher’s Taxonomies of the School Library Media Program.5 Our SLMSs have been reading and discussing it together. We are using the rankings it suggests for evaluating our library media program in relation to SLMC staff, teachers, students, and administrators.
Q. Can you recommend some Web sites for information on planning SLMC facilities?
A. The National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities (NCEF) provides an extensive list of links, books, and articles on the design of K-12 SLMCs.6 For materials on planning small or large library building projects, see the ALA Fact Sheet Building Libraries and Library Additions: A Selected Annotated Bibliography.7
Q. When the time comes to move from the old SLMC to the new one, should we use in-house staff or hire professional movers?
A. My experience with professional library movers has been very positive. Good ones are fast, efficient, and reasonably priced. They know exactly how to pack books in the right order for unpacking and loading them correctly to the shelves in the new space. If technological equipment is to be moved, arrange this in consultation with your school’s technology specialists.
Q. What important lessons have you learned from experience that you would recommend to other SLMSs?
A. Building and renovating an SLMC is an enlightening professional experience. It reveals a lot about present facilities and programs, the good and less adequate aspects of our services, the strengths we want to build on, and our flexibility in adapting to the inevitable limitations that arise in any facility. In addition to the suggestions offered above, some lessons I’ve learned that I would pass along to others are these:
Have a vision for the new SLMC that will take you beyond your present levels of service. Share this vision continually with all partners in the planning process.
Be sure that SLMSs understand their roles in relation to architects, construction managers, designers, furniture representatives, and contractors. An SLMC building project is a team effort. Everyone has expertise to contribute, and everyone should respect each other’s specialized roles. Find out exactly what you’re responsible for and, equally important, what should be left to others. A good article on the role of the school library media specialist vis-a-vis the architect is Fenton’s "Architectural Follies."8
Stay flexible. Every project changes greatly from conception to completion. These continual changes can be fun. Collegial brainstorming often leads to great moments of epiphany when a design problem that seemed intractable is suddenly solved by a unique, unexpected idea.
Write down all the programmatic and functional details you can think of and incorporate them in the educational specifications for the architects. Include measurements for shelving, furniture, and technological and A/V equipment. Be equally specific about the measurements you need for the following functional spaces: circulation services, professional and technical work, storage, teaching, learning, reading and study, computing, presentations, special programs, meetings, displays, and exhibits. Tell the architects your exact needs for adjacencies, lighting and light control, climate control, acoustical control, and signage. Tell them how you want all furnishings and equipment to be positioned.
Visit other schools. Talk to their SLMSs about what they like and don’t like about their renovation or new construction. Check out jobs that are new, medium-aged, and old to see how the design and furnishings have held up over time. Read the professional literature on planning SLMC renovations and new facilities. Learn basic architectural and construction terms and how to read architectural plans. Study these carefully at every phase of the project, and ask lots of questions. Avoid setting aside parts of the library for permanent placement of objects or collections from special donors. This limits your flexibility and binds you to layouts that may not work later on. Make shelf space, rather than windows, a design priority. Specify rectangular tables for no more than four persons. Students tend to congregate noisily at large tables. Tables for four can be pushed together to create conference-type seating when needed. Provide sufficient ways to dim or block light for A/V viewing. Specify library doors that close automatically to exclude external noise. Consider using an independent furniture manufacturers’ representative, who may offer a greater variety of product lines, design consultation, and customization than individual vendors are able to provide.
Q. If you had a renovation or new facility to do over, what additional details would you emphasize?
A. Hindsight is 20/20, but I have learned some other important lessons by going through a number of facilities projects. In future SLMC planning, I would stress the following:
Incorporate more users in the planning process. When selecting shelving, furnishings, fabric, and carpet, ask which styles, colors, and fabrics will be continued and can be replaced; then choose accordingly. Get the names and addresses of all suppliers and copies of all warranties for your permanent files. Plan signage very carefully. This can be one of the biggest challenges in SLMC design, and it’s difficult to get it just right. Install electrical outlets in the appropriate locations in the floor of the SLMC, not just on the walls. Keep working with architects and contractors until the punch list is finished to your satisfaction, preferably within a year of the project’s completion.
Q. In view of technological innovation and the proliferation of digitized information, what is the future of SLMC facilities?
A. Predictions in the literature and among educators about the future of SLMCs range from direly pessimistic to hyperbolically optimistic. I have heard a report of one independent school for grades seven to twelve, founded eight years ago, that has no library nor any plans to provide one because administrators, teachers, and parents view the Internet, local libraries, and private book purchasing as adequate sources for research and reading material. Another private school with which I am acquainted has opted to put a technologist in charge of library media services. Yet another has eliminated the SLMS position entirely. Some administrators, technology specialists, and pundits are saying that we only need plan for the delivery of reading and information services from virtual libraries of electronic books, digitized databases, and the Internet.
At the same time, support for SLMCs and library media programs is increasing in other quarters. A private initiative in New York City called The Patrons Program has a Library Connections component that is charged with developing SLMCs for parochial schools.9 Its library teachers are working to enhance collections, improve facilities, and better integrate information literacy in curriculum. Lance’s well-known studies present strong evidence for the importance of SLMCs and SLMSs in raising student achievement. His recent findings have been published in the book How School Library Media Centers Help Kids Achieve Standards: The Second Colorado Study.10 For further information about the impact of SLMC programs on students’ academic success, see Powering Achievement: School Library Media Programs Make a Difference: The Evidence, by Lance and Loertscher.11 During the past ten years, the independent school where I work has underwritten an upper school library media center renovation and the construction of a new SLMC for grades pre-K to seven. Our circulation, attendance, and collaboration in curricular projects have grown from year to year. A schoolwide curriculum mapping process is now underway, with a view to creating more interdisciplinary curricular connections and an even more integral role for our SLMSs and SLMCs.
My MLS program at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies always stressed that librarianship is a service profession. This remains true today, and it reminds us that the vitality of our SLMCs and programs depends on the quality, relevancy, and effectiveness of the services we provide to our users.
1 Donna Walters, "Media Center Makovers," The Book Report 20, no. 2 (May/June 2001): 54-55.
2 Library Administration and Management Association, Library Buildings Consultants List, <https://cs.ala.org/lbc>. Accessed 22 Apr. 2002.
3The Taft School, Taft Educational Center, <http://www.taftschool.org/TEC/tec.html>. Accessed 19 Apr. 2002.
4 The Taft School, "02D16 Planning Libraries for the Twenty-First Century," TEC Course Descriptions Week D," <http://www.taftschool.org/TEC/d_descriptions.html>;. Accessed 19 Apr. 2002.
5 Steven M. Baule, Facilities Planning for School Library Media and Technology Centers (Worthington, Ohio: Linworth, 1999); Rolf Erikson and Carolyn Markuson, Designing a School Library Media Center for the Future (Chicago: ALA, 2001); Jane P. Klasing, Designing and Renovating School Library Media Centers (Chicago: ALA, 1991). David V. Loertscher, Taxonomies of the School Library Media Program, 2d ed. (San Jose, Calif.: Hi Willow, 2000).
6 National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities, NCEF Resources List: Libraries/ Media Centers, <http://www.edfacilities.org/rl/libraries.cfm>. Accessed 7 Apr. 2002.
7 American Library Association, Building Libraries and Library Additions: A Selected Annotated Bibliography, <http://www.ala.org/library/fact11.html>. Accessed 18 Apr. 2002.
8 Serena Fenton, "Architectural Follies," School Library Journal, 1 Feb. 1999, <http://slj.reviewsnews.com/index.asp?layout=articleArchive&articleId=CA153009&display=searchResults&stt=001>;. Accessed 24 Apr. 2002.
9 The Patrons Program: Library Connections, <http://;www.patronsprogram.org/home2.html>. Accessed 16 Aug. 2002.
10 Keith Curry Lance, Marcia J. Rodney, and Christine Hamilton-Pennell, How School Libraries Help Kids Achieve Standards: The Second Colorado Study (San Jose, Calif.: Hi Willow, 2001).
11 Keith Curry Lance and David V. Loertscher, Powering Achievement: School Library Media Programs Make a Difference: The Evidence (San Jose, Calif.: Hi Willow, 2000). Also available online at <http://www.lmcsource.com/tech/power/power.htm>. Accessed 1 May 2002.
Mary Anne Lenk is Director of Library and Media Services, Convent of the Sacred Heart, New York, N.Y. She also is coauthor of "Library Media Specialists: The Keystone to Integrating Information Technology and Information Literacy," Independent School 60, no. 4 (summer 2001): 12-;26.
© 2002 Mary Anne Lenk