Apr 30, 2016 3 min read

The Worldwide Web may have democratized information and given everyone their very own megaphone, but it’s full of tripwires and booby traps for the easily hoodwinked, whether it’s a great-grandmother handing over her nest egg to a grifter working out of a Jamaican sports bar or some naive soul who decides JFK was murdered by Elvis based on a post that seemed authoritative enough.

Adults with some basic grounding in literacy and a healthy sense of skepticism can usually effectively sort the wheat from the chaff, but young people who are building their reading and research skills might need more guidance in finding their way through the internet’s thicket.

That’s where school librarians come in.

No longer just the curators of the card catalog or the icy martinets who told you to quit playing paper football during study hall, school librarians – or media specialists as they are frequently labeled nowadays – have assisted students year after year in carrying out basic research tasks they must master, particularly if they continue their education beyond the secondary level, and steering them toward sources of information that are sound and based in fact, not someone’s fanciful interpretation of history, science or any other discipline.

Unfortunately, an increasing number of decision makers in school districts both close to home and across the country are casting aside the value that school librarians can bring to their institutions. The week before last, the Trinity School Board eliminated the high school librarian’s position in a 7-1 vote, joining school districts in Kansas, North Carolina and scores of other states that are handing out pink slips to librarians. Faced with threadbare resources, officials often figure they can let their librarians go because the internet is a veritable bazaar of information and it doesn’t demand a paycheck or benefits. The National Center for Education Statistics reports the number of public school librarians dipped precipitously from 54,444 in 2006 to 45,106 just seven years later. In Trinity, they are spinning the loss of the high school librarian not as a loss, but as a gain, arguing the high school library will be transformed into a “makerspace” rich in technological gadgets.

However, before they do too much more crowing, they might want to consider the following: Districts that keep librarians in their schools generally have students with better writing and reading scores on standardized tests, and it is students in lower-income households who see the greatest benefit.

Debra Kachel, a professor of school library and information technologies at Mansfield University of Pennsylvania, recently pointed out, in the commonwealth, barber and cosmetology schools must have libraries, as must nursing schools and prisons. Public schools, however, are not required to have libraries. She also called the whole notion the internet supplanted libraries a “hoary falsehood.”

“…Those who think that the internet replaces a library must think it is OK to use WebMD instead of going to the doctor,” Kachel said.

Bidding farewell to school librarians is a decision many districts will come to regret. We shouldn’t let them go the way of telegraphers, lamplighters or elevator operators.