Ever wonder how major league lobbies (e.g., conservationists, gun owners, seniors, anti-tax groups, and health care industry) gain legislator's attention? How grassroots groups get started? Would you like to learn how to increase credibility and clout with your communities, boards, local officials, and state legislators? If so, look no further, for here is the first comprehensive lobbying handbook for advocates of public and school libraries and information services. Among the topics covered: an overview of public interest and library lobbying from 1808 to the present day; the lobbying activities of major organizations and pioneering advocates; detailed advice on planning, organizing, and building legislative agendas; game plans for waging and winning political support; how to organize a library legislation day, posting and publicizing voting records; campaign war chest contributions; the preparation and delivery of testimony; and the proper handling of communications with newspapers and the electronic media. Also included are field reports from successful school and public library activists, and a listing of thirty critical issues facing library and information services in the 21st century. An essential guide for all citizen activists and professional librarians who want to defend, protect, and improve library and information services during economic downturns as well as during "boom" times.

Structured like a memoir, with tips about lobbying interwoven throughout, Lobbying for Libraries is a lively account of one woman's 21-year mission to get funding for libraries to establish systems that improve the way information is distributed nationwide. She offers valuable guidelines on how to lobby as an individual or group, design a bill, communicate with policy makers through traditional and new technologies, and how to influence the legislative process. Hoduski has quilted the fabric of her experiences in policy making into an insightful book that is as entertaining as it is useful.

School librarians are prepared to be leaders and can use their strengths to advocate for policy that benefits school libraries. This book will teach you how to engage elected officials to effect change that extends to your library. Education and information policy has a direct impact on school libraries and is shaped by decisions at the local, state, and federal levels. School librarians are positioned uniquely to leverage their inside knowledge of effective school library programs to make a difference in education through civic engagement; however, a thorough understanding of both the explicit and "hidden" rules of government is necessary to be an effective advocate. This compact book serves as a guide to advocating for effective programs, filling a gap in the practitioner literature regarding the policies that affect school library programs. Drawing on research-based best practices and the author's experience as the chairman of the ALA Legislation Committee and in political advocacy, this book explains the political process through concrete examples of both success and failure and analyzes these examples to show how librarians can move education policy in a positive direction.

This is the most comprehensive textbook on school library administration available, now updated to include the latest standards and address new technologies. This reference text provides a complete instructional overview of the workings of the library media center—from the basics of administration, budgeting, facilities management, organization, selection of materials, and staffing to explanations on how to promote information literacy and the value of digital tools like blogs, wikis, and podcasting. Since the publication of the fourth edition of Administering the School Library Media Center in 2004, many changes have altered the landscape of school library administration: the implementation of NCLB legislation and the revision of AASL standards, just to mention two. The book is divided into 14 chapters, each devoted to a major topic in school library media management. This latest edition gives media specialists a roadmap for designing a school library that is functional and intellectually stimulating, while leading sources provide guidance for further research.

Drawing on two decades of original research conducted by the authors, as well as existing research about the intersection of public policy, political discourse, and public libraries, this book seeks to understand the origins and implications of the current standing of public libraries in public policy and political discourse. It both explains the complex current circumstances and offers strategies for effectively creating a better future for public libraries. The main message is that there is a pressing need for public librarians and other supporters of public libraries to be: Aware of the political process and its implications for libraries; Attuned to the interrelationships between policy and politics; and Engaged in the policy process to articulate the need for policies that support public libraries. The style is both scholarly and accessible to general readers, with the goal of being useful to students, educators, researchers, practitioners, and friends of public libraries in library and information science. It will also be usefull for those engaged in areas of public policy, government, economics, and political science who are interested in the relationships between public libraries, public policy, and political processes. Building upon the discussion of the key issues, the book offers proposals for professional, policy-making, and political strategies that can strengthen the public library and its ability to meet the needs of individuals and communities. The discussion and analysis in the book draw upon data and real world examples from the many studies that the authors have conducted on related topics, including libraries’ outreach to increasingly diverse service populations and efforts to meet community needs through innovative partnerships. As the intersection of politics, policy, and libraries has grown in importance and complexity in recent years, the need for a book on their interrelationships is long overdue.

Today's students need to be fully prepared for successful learning and living in the information age. This book provides a practical, flexible framework for designing Guided Inquiry that helps achieve that goal. Guided Inquiry prepares today's learners for an uncertain future by providing the education that enables them to make meaning of myriad sources of information in a rapidly evolving world. The companion book, Guided Inquiry: Learning in the 21st Century, explains what Guided Inquiry is and why it is now essential now. This book, Guided Inquiry Design: A Framework for Inquiry in Your School, explains how to do it. The first three chapters provide an overview of the Guided Inquiry design framework, identify the eight phases of the Guided Inquiry process, summarize the research that grounds Guided Inquiry, and describe the five tools of inquiry that are essential to implementation. The following chapters detail the eight phases in the Guided Inquiry design process, providing examples at all levels from pre-K through 12th grade and concluding with recommendations for building Guided Inquiry in your school. The book is for pre-K–12 teachers, school librarians, and principals who are interested in and actively designing an inquiry approach to curricular learning that incorporates a wide range of resources from the library, the Internet, and the community. Staff of community resources, museum educators, and public librarians will also find the book useful for achieving student learning goals.

Gives many lobbying techniques to use in various library situations.