Today sees the launch of the Great School Libraries campaign – a three year campaign spearheaded by CILIP, SLG and SLA. The campaign has three aims:
- to secure school library funding
- to produce a national framework for school libraries
- recognition of school libraries within the Ofsted framework
The Campaign working group will be aiming to engage all potential stakeholders – whether that’s school library staff, parents, and school leadership or decision makers in government. All children deserve a great school library because adequately funded, staffed school libraries deliver enhanced and independent learning as well as reading and curriculum support.
Evidence also suggests school libraries:
- Lead to higher qualifications/attainment
- Promote a better quality of life
- Generate improved results
- Alleviate pressure on health and mental health services
- Alleviate teacher workload
- Increase efficiency for schools
- Contribute to the delivery of a well-rounded education
- Deliver and teach essential Information/critical literacy skills to combat fake news and engender independent learning
Throughout the course of the campaign the School Library Data Group will be collecting evidence in order to show the huge variety of ways that UK based school libraries contribute to better outcomes for every child. Go to the Resources tab to download a Case Studies Template and an exemplar. We need as many of these as we can get, so that we can provide enough evidence of how school libraries add value to a school – please consider filling one in for us.