Today's school library media specialist works with both students and teachers to facilitate access to information in a wide variety of formats, instruct students and teachers how to acquire, evaluate and use information and the technology needed in this process, and introduces children and young adults to literature and other resources to broaden their horizons. As a collaborator, change agent, and leader, the school library media specialist develops, promotes and implements a program that will help prepare students to be effective users of ideas and information, a lifelong skill. The many roles of a library media specialist are detailed in chapter one, "The Vision," of Information Power: Building Partnerships for Learning (Chicago: American Library Association, 1998). ISBN 0-8389-3470-6
These resources provide a more detailed description of the school library media specialist's job:
Also, read testimonials from three school library media specialists.
School library media specialists are generally on a similar salary schedule as teachers. Salaries go up with years of experience and amount of education in most cases. When transferring from district to district, a school library media specialist may be given credit for some, but possibly not all years of prior experience based on the teacher contract in the district. Occasionally school library media specialists will have a slightly extended contract to finish administrative tasks outside of the school year, but this is not common.
Teacher salaries vary from district to district, but averages can be found at:
You may also be interested in the status of school librarianship around the country as you explore school librarianship as a career. School Library Journal does a biannual article on school library staffing that may be of interest. Nancy Everhart in “School Staffing Survey 2000: Looking for a Few Good Librarians” (SLJ, September 2000) surveyed the states about school librarianship and found that there were more retirements including early retirements and a prosperous economy and more lucrative job options had those interested information careers looking elsewhere. Nationwide, there was an average of one librarian for every 953 students, up from 887 two years previously. Reasons for shortage cited by respondents to the survey included retirements, limited access to library education, stricter certification rules, heavy workloads, site-based management, increasing emphasis on standards and test scores, limited access to library education, and technology coordinators replacing LMS or doing double duty. Two years later in “Filling the Void” (SLJ, July 2002) Everhart found those surveyed reporting 68 percent of school library media specialists projected to leave the profession in 12 years or less. The reported shortage was no longer just in urban and rural areas. Since then, the economic downturn has impacted staffing, especially in states with no or limited staffing requirements for school library media specialists. For more information see:
Everhart, Nancy (1998, August). "The Prognosis, Doctor?" School Library Journal , 44 (8), 32-35.
National Center for Education Statistics describes the staffing by certified library media specialists in public and private schools as of 1999-2000.
Another way to learn about the job is to shadow a school library media specialist for a day. Contact your local schools or state professional organization to set up a visit. Once you are in a job, connecting with a mentor will help the new library media specialist navigate through the challenges of a new career.