The Anglophone South School District announced they are eliminating library staff across the board.
The Anglophone South School District says it is eliminating library staff as part of an effort to maximize its budget.
“We are laying off 13 FTE and 5 part time library worker positions,” said spokesperson for ASD Jessica Hanlon, who confirmed the cuts to The Courier.
Hanlon said the decision was made to make best use of their employees’ skill sets and to focus more directly on student learning in our classrooms.
“We value our staff and feel their skill sets can be better used in other functions of the school,” said Hanlon. “Library worker positions are not instructional and do not directly impact student learning or literacy development. Library worker roles are clerical support roles.”
She said that as schools have shifted their libraries to classroom-based book collections and Learning Commons models “schools no longer have traditional library tasks.”
In the statement sent to The Courier Hanlon did not say the elimination of library staff was being made in response to cuts sought by the provincial government to the tune of $43 million across all districts.
“We don’t actually have a ‘library’ anymore,” said Sadie McGinn, a St. Stephen High School grade 10 student.
“We used to, it’s called the Learning Commons now but they use it for kids who are doing online courses,” said McGinn. “They just have their laptop in there and there’s a supervisor but I think the most books we have are just ‘Dog Man’ books and ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid,’ so a little too young for high school.”
McGinn said there haven’t been libraries in school forever, saying it’s too bad because it was such a great resource.
“The teachers are really taking it upon themselves to make sure they have books in their classrooms,” McGinn said echoing Hanlon’s statement for why the eliminations have been made.
Joseph Jeffrey said the job of library professionals these days in Canada is different.
“These days the primary purpose of what we call school library learning commons… is to provide students with information literacy, digital literacy and the skills to take part in collaborative and participatory learning.”
That role means hands-on skills, creating new media, and exploring new ways they can communicate information through all of the types of media available today.
Hanlon emphasized it is important to note there is a difference between ‘librarians’ and the ‘library workers’ involved in the layoffs.
Hanlon clarified that the district currently does not have librarians; library workers are involved in “clerical support.”
“When I grew up you had a few TV channels, they were linear, you knew what programs were on one after the other,” said Jeffery. “Now students can hop between one short video to the next, getting all these bite-sized pieces of information that they don’t necessarily know how to put together. And that’s all part of literacy as well that we’re missing if we don’t have trained professionals who can help them parse all of that newer form of literacy.”
Jeffery said the change from the traditional librarian to information and media literacy experts has happened over the last 20-years.
“This actually isn’t just about what is happening in both Anglophone South and Anglophone West where those library workers have been eliminated,” said Jeffery. “This is a far larger problem that has been going on in New Brunswick for a while where the trained professional teacher librarians and school librarians have been eliminated.”
Jeffery championed the ‘learning commons’ model in place currently at St. Stephen said eliminating the library worker position was not the right approach.
“They’re not doing their full potential because the potential of the school library in New Brunswick has been diminished,” said Jeffery. “These library workers are doing their absolute best to keep what is essentially a broken system going.”
Jeffery said this is not a localized issue. As costs increase, local districts are being forced to make cuts where possible. Even though the New Brunswick government has made record investment into the education system, Jeffery said it just isn’t keeping up with inflation.
“When resources are limited, putting funding into direct student support gives a more immediate, measurable return on investment for both students and teachers,” said Charles Renshaw, communications officer for the Department of Education, in a statement to The Courier. “The goal of reallocating resources into classrooms is to improve literacy and numeracy rates and reduce chronic absenteeism.”
Renshaw said in the statement that the department supports the district’s decision. He said the districts are best placed to determine which staffing changes are necessary to achieve those goals.
CUPE 275 President Theresa McAllister said the union has sent letters to the department and Minister of Education Claire Johnson.
“We’re still pushing back and this is not OK.”
“They’re devastated. It’s not like teachers who can go back to the classroom. The library workers have nowhere to go,” said McAllister.
“We are going to be more out in the public,” said McAllister. “I think it’s time that we educate the public on the impacts of these cuts.”
She said they’re continuing the work to push back against the cuts.
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