SNL NEWSLETTER
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SNL consistently advocates on behalf of school libraries to the Elected Trustees, Board of Managers, elected officials, administration, library staff, and you, their community of stakeholders. Published monthly during the school year. |
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Welcome, SNL members. (Join our mailing list here.) Share with your friends so they can join as well. We promised you periodic information with suggestions of action you might take. Here you go. Reach out with questions/suggestions: [email protected] GOOD NEWS! Texas Letters About Literature 2025 – TWO HISD winners in the Grades 4-6 Level. Congratulations to Elinor of Pin Oak Middle School wrote about Wonder by R.J. Palacio to win second place; Finn of Hogg Middle School wrote about Dav Pilkey’s Dog Man series. Read their letters at the link to Texas Letters About Literature. Neither of those schools is NES. Both have library programs. Both students wrote about challenges that they and their families face. What an opportunity! It’s an opportunity that should be available to every HISD student – reading widely in order to be emotionally impacted by literature.  Also congratulations ***Kaitlyn Carpenter, librarian at Bellaire High School will graduate in May with a second MLIS, this one in Libraries Leadership and Transforming Communities from the University of Rhode Island. ***Congratulations go out to HISD librarians who are completing their MLS degrees this spring. Jennifer Moore, librarian at Travis Elementary, and Leslie Hokanson, at Parker Elementary have just passed their Texas school librarian certification exam and will graduate in May with an MLIS from UNT. ***And Friends of HISD Libraries has just funded awards of $250 to HISD media specialists who are in library school currently or who will attend the TLA conference in early April. This spring the recipients of the awards are Evelyn Mendez (Halpin ECC), Jennifer Moore (Travis ES), and Leslie Hokanson (Parker ES). FOHL likes to recognize professional development in all its forms.  HISD welcomes Erin Joshua to the Central Library Services Department Finally of HISD’s 270 campuses, 84 (77 K-12 plus 7 ECC campuses) librarians and media specialists working in open HISD libraries have someone to call in the Central office who can support them with information. SNL has met with Erin and her supervisor John Amenson and plans to continue to work with them whenever possible to rebuild or restore HISD libraries in any way we can. GOOD TO KNOW! Why does SNL keep focusing on campus libraries for HISD? This infographic is to help you remember all the reasons it remains important that our K-12 students learn to love reading. IMAGE SOURCE Information Privilege “5 premium online research tools all Philly students can use for free.” The Conversation 10 Feb 2025.  Information Privilege is another important consideration. In HISD, the most challenged students need access to diverse and trustworthy digital resources as much as the most privileged yet these less-advantaged students are the ones least able to get that access. This infographic illustrates what “information privilege” means. It is important at every K-12 age but is especially crucial as our high school students prepare for jobs and/or higher education. My friend Joyce Valenza, author of this article, may be working with the Philadelphia schools but these ideas apply equally here in Houston – except Philly has begun (as of January 2025) to rebuild its school library program across the district. HISD schools may have access to district-approved digital resources but many campuses don’t know how to access them or even why they matter because there is no one on campus to teach them how or why. SOR (Science of Reading) is NOT ENOUGH  Scarborough’s Reading Rope may date from 2001 but the ideas remain resonant today as indicated by the 2022 date on this article. SOR focuses pretty exclusively on phonological awareness, decoding, and sight recognition – which are important. But without background knowledge, vocabulary and reasoning skills, decoding is only minimally effective. All students need access to a wide range of reading opportunities all year long: class novels, library visits to self-select books, read-aloud sessions in the classroom and at home. “Scarborough’s Reading Rope.” Landmark Outreach 14 Oct 2022. ALL HANDS ON DECK! Every voice speaking out. All of you - our allies - must understand that with less support for education at all levels, Texas will need to step up and increase funding. These moves at the national levels affect public schools, school libraries, public libraries, state universities and colleges. The venture into vouchers is truly harmful as it takes funds from public schools. It is a double whammy. And with a governor hell-bent on vouchers with a legislature that has persistently minimized money for schools it’s really a TRIPLE whammy. IMAGE: https://slideplayer.com/slide/10792046/ (slide 12)  Raise Your Hand Texas is keeping up with important info about the fight for public education in Texas both funding and vouchers. Please write to your state legislators.  What Happens to K-12 if the federal Department of Education Shuts Down? (Newsweek 20 March 2025) You have probably already noted this but reminding you again how important it remains to speak up. Contact you state and federal elected representatives at every opportunity.
 And the nonprofit Every Library is offering info and links to fight FOR our libraries and against the defunding the Institute of Library and Museum Services (IMLS) and the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA). School libraries are included in both these funding sources and have counted on this money since LSTA began in 1995. The .gov links are live now (3/23/25) but who knows when they may go down. :( Here is a link to the Wayback Machine Archive which saves a exact copy of the pages as of today: https://web.archive.org/web/20250321160345/https://www.imls.gov/ and https://web.archive.org/web/20250323205717/http://web.archive.org/screenshot/https://www.imls.gov/find-funding/funding-opportunities/grants-to-states/purpose-and-priorities-of-lsta  And always, Houston’s own Community Voices in Public Education. Keep abreast of the latest HISD developments.
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AuthorThis newsletter is primarily authored by Dorcas Hand, with support from others active in SNL. If you have an idea to share, please contact our email below. Dorcas is a retired school librarian who remains active in advocacy for HISD libraries and more. SNL supports increased access to school libraries across all HISD students and campuses. Archives
October 2025
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