I wanted to give michlib-l members some context around this update to the Michigan Department of Education (MDE) Standards for the Preparation of School Librarians.

AASL adopted new standards for Learners, Librarians, and Libraries in 2018 and the Educators of School Librarians worked on and received approval of updated School Library Preparation Standards  in 2019 that are in line with the AASL National School Library Standards.

Here is an AASL Knowledgequest blog post from April Dawkins, Asst Professor at UNC Greensboro and current AASL Board Member, explaining the update and also saying that university programs seeking national recognition must be inline with these standards.

Since these preparation standards were updated in 2019, Michigan is actually lagging in bringing their standards for preparation in line with new updated national standards.

Lisa Brakel, MASL Past President and District Librarian at Airport Schools worked diligently with the Michigan Department of Education to ensure that a wide range of stakeholders including but not limited to practicing school librarians, school administrators, and WSU professors (Wayne State University is currently the only university in Michigan with a preparation program for School Librarians) were included in the review of these standards. I was also involved in this review.

At the State Board of Education meeting this Tuesday, these proposed standards were presented to the Board of Education by Dr. Sean Kottke and Dr. Ahlam Bazzi from the MDE Office of Educator Excellence.

I provided public comment at this meeting that the Michigan Association of School Librarians (MASL) is in support of the update to these standards.

Randy Riley and Clare Membiela attended this presentation as well.

Please let me know if you have any questions about these standards.

I would be happy to answer any and all questions.

Thank you,

--Kathy Lester