Meadowbrook School of Weston Library wins Sara Jaffarian Award

CHICAGO – The Meadowbrook School of Weston Library in Weston, Mass. is the recipient of the 2013 Sara Jaffarian School Library Program Award for Exemplary Humanities Programming, the American Library Association (ALA) Public Programs Office announced. The Meadowbrook School Library will receive a plaque recognizing the achievement, a cash award of $4,000 and promotion of the winning program as a model for other school libraries through ProgrammingLibrarian.org.

Audrey Borus, school librarian at the Meadowbrook School, developed and submitted the winning program, titled “Transforming Tales.” The program used fairy tales from around the world to serve as a creative introduction to global studies for the school’s third grade students. Combined with cross-curriculum lessons in world geography, art, mathematics, music and physical education, the library helped students focus on a specific culture while crafting their own fairy tales, integrating common themes in order to illustrate the interconnectedness of world cultures. More information on the “Transforming Tales” program can be found at: http://www.ala.org/programming/2013jaffarianaward/meadowbrook.   

“‘Transforming Tales’ serves as a creative gateway to global studies,” said Annalisa Keuler, chairperson of the Jaffarian Award selection committee and library media specialist at Mountain Brook High School in Mountain Brook, Ala. “The project’s impact on the school community, as well as its integration across the student curriculum and its ability to be easily replicated by other school libraries, makes it an exceptional choice for the 2013 Jaffarian Award.”

The ALA Public Programs Office is now accepting nominations for the 2014 Sara Jaffarian School Library Program Award. School libraries, public or private, that served children in any combination of grades K-8 and conducted humanities programs during the 2012-2013 school year are eligible. Applications and award guidelines are available at www.ala.org/jaffarianaward. To be considered, online nominations must be received by the ALA Public Programs Office by Dec. 15.

The Sara Jaffarian Award was established in 2006 to recognize and promote excellence in humanities programming in elementary and middle school (K-8) libraries. It is presented annually by the Public Programs Office, in cooperation with the American Association of School Librarians (AASL), and named for Sara Jaffarian, whose donation to ALA’s Cultural Communities Fund established the award. Jaffarian, a retired school librarian and long-time ALA member, spent her career passionately advocating for school libraries in every school. The Sara Jaffarian Award is selected annually by a committee comprising members of the ALA Public and Cultural Programs Advisory Committee (PCPAC), AASL and the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC). More information on the Sara Jaffarian Award can be found at: http://www.ala.org/offices/ppo/awardsgrants/jaffarian/jaffarianaward. 

Through a generous challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the ALA Public Programs Office established the ALA Cultural Communities Fund to support cultural programming in all types of libraries. Ten years later CCF continues to make possible high-quality professional development for librarians, development of new program models and recognition of excellence in library programming through achievement awards. To make a donation to CCF in honor of ten years of outstanding and important work, please visit www.ala.org/ccf.