Balancing freedom and order

Shaler Area High School officials trying to resolve accessibility problems want to strike a balance between giving students freedom and keeping order inside the library.

Students responding to a needs assessment survey, part of the district's routine steps toward receiving accreditation, said that the library was hard to get into, and when they did get in, it didn't have enough computers.

Many students, like Michael Jerome, say they would like to be able to drop into the library whenever they want.

Under the current system, students are required to have a slip of paper signed by a librarian or a teacher authorizing them to be in the library.

"I'd like to be able to use (the library) at will, rather than get the OK from the teacher," said Jerome, 17, a 10th-grader from Shaler who was using the library Tuesday to complete an assignment for biology class.

But librarians at the school say the need to keep the library open should be balanced with the need to have every student accounted for.

What students want, said high school librarian Faith Jack, is for their school library to resemble a public library, where they can drop in and out with ease.

"They want a public library, but the reality is we can't be a public library," Jack said. "Every second they are in this building, there is an adult who is responsible for them."

That's why the library has the sign-in system, Assistant Principal David Shutter said.

"There's a monitoring system that has to go on when you have 1,500 students in one building," he said.

But maintaining order should not prevent students from using the room, Shutter said.

"By the time you finish high school, you better know how to use a library, and you should feel it's a great place to be," Shutter said.

Many of the student complaints are problems of perception, Jack said. Students often think they aren't allowed into the room during times when the room is open to them.

"Kids think they can't get to the library from lunch or we're not open after school," Jack said.

Jack said the library staff might consider making special announcements over the school's public address system during the morning, reminding students what the library's hours are.

Students who complained that the atmosphere was not user-friendly enough no doubt are responding to the librarians' duty to make sure students are using the library as a work place and not a social hangout, Shutter said.

"We are trying to take the librarians out of being disciplinarians," Shutter said.

Assistant Superintendent Brad Ferko said a consultant from Clarion University would be brought in to assist the librarians in helping make the library a more open place for students. The cost of the library's needs assessment, including the consultant, would be around $2,000, Ferko said.

Jack hopes a new computer room planned for the building will alleviate students' having to wait to use the library's 29 computers, particularly when classes doing research have signed up to use them.

Jack said she and fellow librarian Mary Pruhs were open to making the library open to all students but added that not every suggestion can be implemented into a policy.

"Some of it is going to be hard to incorporate," Jack said, "because it's hard to be all things to all people."