Sharyl Smith, former school district administrator in Utah and school library lobbyist.
(Updated: March 30, 2015 at 8:16 p.m. ET) Utah’s school libraries have won an additional $500,000 for the new books, electronic resources, and other materials for the upcoming 2015–2016 school year budget, pending the final vote by the state legislature this week.
Advocate Sharyl Smith and others had not given up the fight for more school library funding, which School Library Journal reported on during February of last year, and celebrated the decision to increase the school library budget made by the state’s Executive Appropriation Committee last week.
“In the coming school year, school libraries will have $1,050,000 [total] to spend expressly on school library books and electronic resources,” wrote Smith by email.
Correction: March 30, 2015 at 8:16 p.m. ET: According to Ben Leishman, fiscal analyst for Public Education in the Utah State Legislature, the Utah legislature approved $1.6 million total for the 2015–2016 school year for School Library Books and Electronic Resources. The funding for the year was originally for $550,000, and the increase was for $1,050,000. The budget for the 2016–2017 school year will start with a $850,000 base.
While the outcome isn’t yet official, Smith, a former school district administrator in Utah and retired faculty member from the University of Washington Information School, is celebratory in seeing the efforts of her year-plus long push for school library funding, along with efforts by other members of the Utah organization Parents Advocating Libraries in Schools (PALS), including Barbara Smith, school board member for Utah’s Davis School District, and Anne Diekema, an assistant professor at Utah State University, finally see the light of day.
Meeting with multiple leaders from Utah’s House and Senate and convincing majority whips from both houses to sponsor their proposal, members of the PALS Steering Committee had stayed active, advocating for more funding using methods such as emailing legislators with uniform subject lines titled “Save the Line Item”—among other pursuits—to keep school libraries front and center in the eyes of lawmakers.
“We’ve provided field trips for legislators and members of the governor’s staff to see teacher librarians instructing elementary school students in information literacy skills and applications,” says Smith by email. “Additionally, every year we award a ’Best Listener Award‘ to one representative and one senator. It’s a little tongue-in-cheek, because it sounds so ‘schoolmarmish,’ but we want to recognize those lawmakers who really ‘get it.’”
Nationally, school librarians and libraries are having to play a larger role in advocating not just for their positions, but for their funding as well. The American Library Association’s American Association of School Librarians even offers a website dedicated to online links, tools, and other information on how to help school libraries and librarians arm themselves in advocacy.
Utah Governor Gary Herbert had pushed for an increase in education funding across his state as well, asking for $500 million for schools for the coming fiscal year. While the proposed budget lawmakers preliminarily passed last week reportedly was just half of that amount, it did expand funding for school libraries.
School libraries have seen their ups and downs in terms of funding for the past seven years. A single appropriation of $2 million in 2007 dropped to $1.5 million in 2008, then careened to $500,000 in the 2009–2010 school year. A small increase of $50,000 brought the overall budget to $550,000 in 2013, where it sat until the increase from $550,000 to $1,050,000 last week.
While it’s not definite when the budget vote will take place this week, lawmakers from Utah’s full legislature will need to pass a final budget before their session ends March 12. Smith says that while she’s confident, she won’t completely relax until the House and Senate make their final vote this week.
Notes Smith: “As legislators like to say, ‘You never know the final outcome until the gavel comes down at midnight on the last day of the session!’”
Update: On March 12, Smith shared via email that the bill, “including funding for school library books and electronic resources, has passed both the House and Senate. Our funding…is secure.”
