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The School Library Media Center: Quotable Facts

The highest achieving students come from schools with good library media centers.¹

Libraries are at the heart of the learning experience for almost 44 million elementary, middle and high school students in schools with library media centers.²

In the United States, sales of video games and other entertainment software ($7.3 billion in 2004³) total more than nine times the amount spent on books, periodicals, audiovisual, and other materials for school library media centers ($771.2 million in 2004⁴).

Collections are often much out of date with little available funding for replacement.⁵

Funding for schools comes primarily from local property taxes, with some funding from state and federal governments. 2002 saw the first direct funding for school library materials in almost thirty years (Improving Literacy Through School Libraries Grants, U.S. Department of Education). On average, schools annually spend about $15.00 per student, less than the cost of one hardcover book, on print and non-print library resources.⁶

The median per pupil expenditure of local funds by school library media centers for books in 2001-2002 was $8.87 for elementary schools, $8.60 for middle schools, and $9.55 for senior high schools.⁷

More than 98 percent of public school libraries and more than 90 percent of private school libraries provide Internet access. ⁸ Unfortunately, this fact is often used to justify decreased budgets for books and other materials.

School library media specialists across the country report that library funding for staff and materials is being dramatically cut back in financially troubled areas of the United States.

Elementary school libraries have all but disappeared in some school districts.⁹

As a rule, this does not mean that the rooms and shelves of books have disappeared, but there is no professional staff to assist teachers and students with learning. In some districts, library media specialists are stretched among two, three or more schools.¹⁰

Sources:

1. Keith Curry Lance, Marcia J. Rodney and Christine Hamilton-Pennell, How School Librarians Help Kids Achieve Standards, 2000.
2. U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, The Status of Public and Private School Library Media Centers in the United States: 1999-2000, March 2004.
3. Entertainment Software Association, "Sales & Genre Data," <www.theesa.com/facts/sales_genre_data.php>. Accessed 3 August 2005.
4. Book Industry Study Group, Inc., Book Industry Trends 2005, 2005.
5. Virginia H. Matthews, "Kids Can’t Wait: Library Advocacy Now!" President’s Paper for Mary Somerville, ALA President, 1996–97, 1996.
6. Marilyn L. Miller and Marilyn L. Shontz, "The SLJ Spending Survey," School Library Journal, Oct. 2003.
7. Miller and Shontz.
8. U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, School Library Media Centers: Selected Results From the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002 (ELS:2002), December 2004.
9. Matthews.
10. Matthews.