Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Standing Committee on Education and Employment, I present the committee's report entitled School libraries and teacher librarians in 21st century Australia, together with the minutes of proceedings and evidence received by the committee.

Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper.

The inquiry into school libraries and teacher librarians in Australian schools was begun in the last p arliament by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Education and Training. I would like to thank the members of that c ommittee for their efforts in assembling a large body of written and oral evidence on the terms of referen ce. Earlier this year, the c hair and d eputy chair of the previous c ommittee gave their time to meet with the current c ommittee to relate the views and impressions th ey had formed during the inquiry. Our committee appreciated the ir time and the insight they provided to our inquiry and I would especially like to thank the members for Cunningham and Tangney for their presentation .

The inquiry received 387 submissions and took evidence from individual teacher librarians and their professional associations, unions, employer organisations, parents and friends associations , and other stakeholde rs, both in written submission and at hearings in each state and territory. We are especially grateful to the hundreds of people who participated in the inquiry from right across Australia. In particular, the c ommittee was struck by the passion and enthusiasm that teacher librarians have for their profession.

There can be little doubt of the educational benefits that accompany having a properly resourced school library staffed with an appropriately qualified and dedicated teacher librarian. Teacher librarians are individuals who hold qualifications in both teaching and librarianship. The Commonwealth g overnment has rolled out programs that have made major contributions to the capital resources available to Australian school libraries , such as the Building the Education Revolution and the Digital Education Revolution. Despite these investments and the provision of regular general purpose funding to schools, the Commonwealth has little control or influence on staffing arrangements within schools. The C ommonwealth g overnment is not responsible for the day-to-day management of schools. In the government sector, issues of hiring, numbers, conditions and duties of staff within schools are the responsibility of state and territory education authorities, or principals within self-managing schools. In the non-government sector , th e se decisions tend to be very much the responsibility of the schools themselves.

The c ommittee received many examples of situations where school libraries and teacher librarians we re used effectively. However, these success stories appeared to be exceptions rather than the rule. The majority of evidence received by the c ommittee detailed cases where qualified teacher librarians we re being used for purposes other than in their area of specialist qualification , such as relief from face - to - face teaching, or , often, cases where library staff were not fully qualified teacher librarians. In such cases , the potential contribution of teacher librarians to support ing the development of subject curricula and the digital literacy of other staff and students , as well as keeping libraries ' resources up to date , can be compromised. Much of the undervaluation of teacher librarians appears to arise from a lack of knowledge among employers and managers of the potential contribution of libraries and qualified staff to improved learning outcomes.

Our report contains 11 recommendations, which we believe will promote an awareness of the potential of teacher librarians to contribute to educational outcomes of Australian schools. Recommendations include the provision of a minimum level of access to online database resources in every Australian school and increasing awareness of the role that teacher librarians play, through the development of a discrete national policy statement that defines the importance of digital and information literacy. The c ommittee also recommend s a longitudinal study to establish the links between library programs and literacy , and a workforce gap analysis of teacher librarians in the Australian context. In addition, the presence of specialist teacher librarians at a school should be included on the MySchool website. These measures will raise the profile of the profession as well as serv e to provide better information to families that make up school communities.

There is a stereotypical view of libraries as stuffy rooms full of never opened books and teacher librarians enforcing silence within their domain. Th is stereotypes is in stark contrast to the potential for libraries to be a hub of activity , with teacher librarians putting students and staff in touch with the latest re sources .

I would like to thank my committee colleagues, former members of the committee and the secretariat—in particular Glen Worthington and Sara Edson.

I commend the report to the House.

Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As deputy chair of the Standing Committee on Education and Employment, I rise to support the chair of the committee in her tabling of the report School libraries and teacher librarians in 21st century Australia. The chair has adequately covered much of the information the committee received and has thanked the appropriate people. This was an inquiry from the previous committee, of which I was not a member. Indeed, only one member of the current committee was a member of the previous committee. It was very helpful to have the member for Cunningham, Sharon Bird, and the member for Tangney, Dennis Jensen, the previous chair and deputy chair of that committee, brief us on where they had got to with the inquiry, which was almost completed. Then some of the organisations came back to re-brief us as a new committee and we did some catch-up in this area. I know the chair fielded quite a number of calls from people in the profession who were very keen that this inquiry be completed, having done all the work prior to the election.

Much of the evidence concerning this inquiry focused on the changing role of teacher librarians insomuch as, as we progress into the digital revolution and the digital economy, the way children are learning nowadays is changing quickly. With it comes a whole new range of challenges. Many schools are not particularly well prepared or have the resources to deal with many of the things which come along with the digital revolution. Most of the time we look upon this as a great opportunity. With this opportunity comes great responsibility in the things children can access, the way they use their time on computers and in the development of skills to resist cyberbullying.

As the only representative on the committee of what I call regional Australia—as often happens—I know that a lot of small schools will struggle with this level of expertise. That evidence was brought to us particularly by the people from the Northern Territory, who raised this as an issue. One of the things that occurred to me was that schools do not always value teacher librarians as highly as they might. It was seen that teacher librarians in the private sector are held in higher regard than they are in the public sector. In particular, I was taken by one quote from a principal who said to a librarian, 'I always try to put my worst teacher in the library because this is where they do the least damage.' If that is the attitude in a school, it is little wonder that students do not have a positive experience with their teacher librarian. Where schools are well engaged with their librarians and getting the best out of them, teacher librarians are very high in the hierarchy and are valued for what they produce and their use to the school.

We made 11 recommendations. Some of them settled on the idea of trying to promote this role within schools. It is very important that principals in particular and school councils understand what teacher librarians do, what they will do in the future, how their role is changing and how they need the resources and backing to deal with these problems, many of which we do not even understand at this stage. We made recommendations surrounding the implementation of the new national curriculum, that appropriate resources should be provided to librarians so that they can play an active role in managing that curriculum and that appropriate databases be supplied to them in an electronic form so that when people need materials in schools they can go to the librarian, much as they do now, to put their finger on exactly what resource is being looked for.

Other recommendations we made—and there is quite a range—surrounded promoting better relationships between federal, state and local government to support school libraries and teacher librarians. I was given to reflect that in the part of South Australia I come from it is very common to have a library which includes the school and the community library. I thank the staff of the secretariat for their help during the inquiry and I thank the chair and the rest of the committee for their cooperation.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time allotted for statements on the report has expired. Does the member for Kingston wish to move a motion in connection with the report to enable it to be debated on a later occasion?

Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes. I move:

That the House take note of the report.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In accordance with standing order 39, the debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.