News and information for staff members and the Madison community
Vol. II No. 1 - October 19, 2006
This summer the district ran a summer library access project pilot at eight (8) MMSD elementary schools. The primary goal of the project was to ensure that Madison elementary-age school children, from both public and private schools had easy access to library materials during our summer break. Mary Watson-Peterson, MMSD Language Arts Coordinator, proposed the project to Mary Ramberg, the Director of Teaching & Learning, last spring. The primary goal of the summer access project was to minimize reading skill loss during the summer months, for students who might not have ready access to reading materials.
The Beat the Heat ... Read! Project involved staffing up to five (5) elementary library media centers up to 10 hours per week for nine (9) weeks, and extending the hours of those schools involved in summer school up to 10 hours per week, for the three (3) weeks following summer school.
We used distance from public library branch as one of the criteria for identifying possible pilot sites. The pilot locations for the 2006 summer access projects were Emerson, Franklin, Lindbergh and Muir. Emerson was included, even though a public library branch in that neighborhood is relatively close. East Washington is a busy street that can be dangerous to cross. Of the schools involved in summer school, we were able to staff Hawthorne, Huegel, Leopold and Schenk for the three additional weeks following summer school. We did not staff Cherokee, because the Sequoya branch of Madison Public library is only a very short distance away.
Over the course of the summer, MMSD Library Media Centers (LMCs) were open a total of 1120.5 hours in which time, 15,589 items (an average of 13.91 items per hour) were checked-out.
Hopefully, in the summer of 2007, we will be able expand and improve the summer LMC access program to other District locations.
Last Updated: Wed Oct 31 10:40:54 2007
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