INSIGHT ‘‘
Leia Sands, School Librarian, in collaboration with Bev Kinahan, Families and Wellbeing Librarian.
SLG
Stronger together: How collaboration between public and school libraries can benefit a shared community
As a school librarian in two West Sussex primary schools, it is important to explore how the school library can support and benefit the community that I work with. Over the last few years, we have been working closely with our local public libraries, discovering that our collaborative journey has reaped mutually-beneficial rewards, enhancing our offers and outcomes to the communities that we support.
W Relationships
Alongside working with the SLS, we have formed positive relationships with our local Families and Wellbeing Librarians, which has enabled us to increase the reach of both the school and public libraries in our communities. As a first step, the school felt that it was important to encourage pupils to engage with the public library, so we decided to take the whole school for class visits. These sessions are a positive experience for our children, and ensure that every pupil has the opportunity to sign up for a library card, borrow a book and meet the welcoming staff. For me personally, as a lone worker, this experience helped me to form positive, supportive working relationships, with a team of library staff based five minutes from my workplace. These visits opened the door to collaborating with the public library to further engage our school families, thus supporting our pupil’s engagement with reading for pleasure. We were lucky to be visited by children’s author, Joseph Coelho, who was also completing his public library marathon at the time. We invited families to discover the public library, by attending a poetry recital at the end of the school day, where pupils showcased the work they had produced in Joseph’s workshops. Working together to support the public library to promote
50 INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL
E are lucky to have a fantastic Schools Library Service, which provides excellent resources for our children, along with training and support for school library staff and pupil librarians.
The schools I work in have participated in a recent Celebration of Reading Festival, where pupils enjoyed five virtual author visits over two weeks. The service supports us to develop a reading culture and provides opportunities for pupil voice through feedback from mobile library visits. Teachers are supported to use interesting texts to enhance classroom learning and the school library has access to new and exciting texts to promote reading for pleasure.
and deliver The Reading Agency’s Summer Reading Challenge has benefitted us both. The school provides a platform in assemblies for library staff to engage and enthuse the children about taking part in the challenge. The school library celebrates those who have participated, through celebration assemblies and a display in the school library of pupils holding their certificates. This collaborative approach helps to ensure pupil engagement in the challenge is high and gives them the opportunity to access books when the school is closed in the summer holidays.
Celebration
West Sussex Libraries has been celebrating its 100th anniversary this year, and this has given us increased opportunities to collaborate. Our pupils were invited to design a poster to celebrate the centenary, and loved seeing their work on display in their local library. As part of these centenary celebrations, the public library also visited both schools, to give pupils the opportunity to take part in an immersive virtual reality experience. The children loved jumping into a magical world of virtual books, with one child saying: “I wish I could do this every day at school”. This VR experience resulted in more school families visiting the public library to take part. I was honoured to be recognised as a Centenary Library Champion by West Sussex, in recognition of my efforts to ensure every pupil in our school has the opportunity to develop a love of reading through access to both their school and public library. Working together to support the wellbeing of our shared community is an important part of our collaboration. Earlier in the year, our local library invited some of our pupils to visit their Knit and Natter group. This intergenerational session provided a boost to the wellbeing of all who attended and gave our pupils the opportunity to learn new skills from the group. On returning to school, the children were inspired to set up a lunchtime library pom-pom making club to share their newly learnt skills. We are looking forward to continuing our work together to promote reading as a community wide value, and further our collaborative work to support and benefit those who live in our local communities. IP
Winter 2025
Working together to support the public library to promote and deliver The Reading Agency’s Summer Reading Challenge has benefitted us both.
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