Wednesday, November 09, 2011

The Ideal Team: CALIFORNIA SCHOOL LIBRARIANS TO HONOR STEVE LOPEZ & HECTOR TOBAR, LAUSD LIBRARY AIDE FRANNY PARRISH AND SCHOOL LIBRARIAN CONNIE WILLIAMS FOR THEIR ADVOCACY

by smf for 4LAKids

Forget the Rose Bowl Game and the Big Parade – which will be on Jan 2 this year – and forget all the Little Old Ladies of Beach Boys' fame – from Friday to Sunday the librarians will be Occupying Pasadena – and the Queen City will Rock!

This weekend is the 2011 California Library Association and California School Library Association Annual Conference & Exposition at the civic auditorium.

The Friday Legislative Luncheon keynote, State Senator Alan Lowenthal, Chair of the Senate Education Committee, will share his unique perspective as part of the "Ideal Team".

"The Ideal Team", according to California School Libraraians president Diane Alexander, "includes all the people and organizations which support our goals …which are to ensure that all California students and educators are effective users of ideas and information."

At the luncheon, and later at the Sunday morning membership breakfast, California School Librarian Association Advocate Awards will be presented to:

image HECTOR TOBAR - of the LA Times for shedding light on the importance of school libraries and the instruction that takes place in them.
image STEVE LOPEZ - of the LA Times for his articles in support of teacher librarians and paraprofessionals.
image FRANNY PARRISH - paraprofessional and equal access advocate extraordinaire. Parrish is the elementary librarian /'Library Aide' at Lohman Special Education Center in LAUSD.
image And CONNIE WILLIAMS, teacher librarian chair of the Strong School Libraries campaign, advocating on both the state and national level for equal access to instruction for all 21st century students.

CSLA president Diane Alexander continues: "Our free Cyber Sunday event at the Conference will bring together even more stakeholders in support of digital literacy. There will be workshops and a panel with representatives from Common Sense Media, PTA, CLRN, CUE, Facebook, Google, Yahoo, CDE, Creative Commons, and many others to discuss our common concerns. I have been inspired by these contacts with other organizations that have the same goals that we do. By working together we can make a difference for our students. We hope to see all of you in Pasadena to be part of the team.

The “team” meeting will be our Membership Breakfast Sunday morning. You will hear what CSLA is doing for you, share your suggestions and hear how you can support our efforts to ensure that schools understand and value our expertise. Go team!"

Tobar and Lopez are obvious honorees; their articles in the Times have been powerful messages in support of school libraries and librarians under attack in the face of budget cuts.

Franny Parrish, a frequent correspondent with 4LAKids (or perhaps a co-conspirator) was surprised by the award: "I was convinced it had been a mistake. An award for me from the California School Library Association? For what? I am not still not sure …maybe for being disrespectful to self important people with titles that are too big for their pants?"

Connie Williams, nationally certified Teacher Librarian in Petaluma City Schools in the Bay Area, Past President 2008/09 at California School Library Association and current Legislation Chair of the American Association of School Librarians – and blogger @ CIRCULATE THIS!: Stories From The School Library http://circulatethis.posterous.com/ is a powerful national voice for school libraries.

Register for the FREE CYBER SUNDAY Event here.

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