Home  AASL  AASL President honors Delaine Eastin

AASL NEWS
For Immediate Release
July 1, 1999
Contact: Steven Hofmann
Phone: 312-280-4389
Fax: 312-664-7459

AASL President honors Delaine Eastin

Sharon Coatney, 1998-1999 President of the American Association of School Librarians (AASL), honored Delaine Eastin, California's State Superintendent of Public Instruction, with the Crystal Apple Award during the American Library Association's Annual Conference, June 24-30, in New Orleans.

The Crystal Apple Award is given at the discretion of the AASL president to an individual or group that has had significant impact on school libraries and students.

Eastin is recognized as an ardent spokesperson for school libraries. As a member of the City Council in Union City, the Alameda County Library Advisory Commission, the California State Assembly, and currently as the first woman to be elected California's State Superintendent of Public Instruction, she has persistently worked to improve libraries for the 12% of America's school children who attend California schools. In 1994, Eastin's legislation created the California Public School Library Protection Fund, a major catalyst for the unprecedented $158.5 million made available this spring to begin renovating California's infamously dated school library collections.

This $158.5 million in state financing-representing about $28 per student, California's single largest allocation ever for school libraries-is supplying school libraries with new books and materials and allowing seriously outdated books to be weeded out of the collections. Recently removed from a school library in the Los Angeles Unified School District were science books from the '50s and American history books dating back as far as the 1930's.

A native Californian, Eastin received her bachelor's degree from the University of California, Davis, and a master's degree in political science from the University of California, Santa Barbara. She taught political science and women's studies for seven years, then served as a corporate planner for Pacific Telesis Group-a position she held until her election to the California State Assembly in 1986.

The Crystal Apple Award was presented at the AASL Awards Luncheon on Monday, June 28. Accepting on behalf of Eastin was Barbara Jeffus, School Library Consultant for the California Department of Education.

AASL is a division of the American Library Association.

-30-