[ISLMA-Share] Every Student Succeeds Act - ISLMA needs your help!

Email list for the Illinois School Library Media Association islma at list.railslibraries.info
Wed Aug 24 14:30:33 CDT 2016


In December 2015, President Obama signed the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) into law. ESSA replaces No Child Left Behind and includes language regarding "effective school library programs."

ISLMA has been working very hard over the summer to ensure that the ISBE includes school librarians as they implement ESSA here in Illinois. A task force is working with John Chrastka from the nonprofit group Everylibrary.org<http://www.everylibrary.org/>. We have written letters to Chairman Meeks and Superintendent Smith of ISBE and spoken at an ISBE meeting about the importance of school librarians and effective school library programs. The task force is also working on getting the support of various coalition partners, including IFT, IEA, ILA, ICE, Heartland and RAILS library systems and others.

ISLMA now needs YOUR help in this process. Beginning Tuesday, September 6, ISBE is hosting a second round of listening tours to collect feedback on ESSA. It is imperative that school librarians, as major stakeholders, are actively involved in these listening tours. ISLMA needs members to attend and speak at these events. We need to have at least one, if not more, school librarians at EACH location. ISLMA will provide you with talking points. (These will be available on the islma.org website soon.) We then ask you to report your feedback to ISLMA. After all the listening tours, your feedback will be shared with ISBE.

The dates and locations for the listening tour are listed at http://www.isbe.net/essa/pdf/ESSA-tour2-schedule-0916.pdf; you can also see a map of locations at http://tinyurl.com/ESSA-listening-tour

Please go to this link (https://goo.gl/E7VpM8 ) to let us know that you are attending one of the listening tour meetings. We will make sure that you receive the talking points directly. After attending, we ask that you give us feedback from your experience on this form: http://tinyurl.com/hxduk9z

This is an exciting and important time for school libraries. We look forward to sharing more on this in the coming weeks and months. We are working on scheduling a free AASL ESSA Advocacy Workshop this fall. We will also be sharing more information in a session at the ISLMA Conference in Tinley Park in November.

See the following websites for more information on ESSA.
AASL - http://www.ala.org/aasl/advocacy/legislation/essa
ISBE - http://www.isbe.net/essa/

Thank you in advance for your help!
Patti Fleser
President, Illinois School Library Media Association
President at islma.org<mailto:President at islma.org>

Patti Fleser
Library Media Specialist
Deer Path Middle School
Lake Forest, IL
847-604-7433
@DPM_Library

President, Illinois School Library Media Association
"...a library is more than a collection of dusty old books. It is a place to learn, explore, and grow!" Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's Library



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