Tamara Ballard

Task 5: Interview
Lancaster Middle School

Middle School Library Media Specialist Interview #2

The media specialist at Lancaster Middle School is Raquel Hewitt, and she has 15 years

of experience. Before being a librarian, she taught in the classroom for 4 years. Her past job

experiences have prepared her directly and indirectly to become the media specialist she is today.

Being a teacher for 4 years, working in the prison allowed her to be able to have an order of

things. Raquel chose to pursue a degree as a media specialist because of her childhood. When

she was a child, her parents said she would be a librarian. Mrs. Hewitt kept encyclopedias in her

room, and her sisters would have to check them out. Then she would check to see if they wrote

in them once they returned them. She felt like she became a school librarian on a fluke. TWU

(Texas Woman’s University) had a grant and they were only taking 15 students, but they had

thousands of applicants. Her school librarian encouraged her to apply. Raquel was in the

beginning of her semester in college to get her masters in Reading, but she was just beginning

and some of those classes could transfer over. The number of applicants kept going up because it

was free. They called her after two interviews and they said she was in. She was very surprised

and was not expecting it, this was not my career path. Her educational preparation was a little

different because she worked in a prison before working in a school letting. It prepared her to be

a school librarian because it taught me that I would need a behavior management plan for

students in the library. She was also an instructional coach, and remembered that she wanted to

make things that she taught purposeful for others to use. That has been ingrained in her. School
management was something that was not taught while pursuing her masters to become a media

specialist.

When it comes to cooperative program planning and planning with teachers, Mrs. Hewitt

tries to keep herself involved as much as she can. She plans with them at least once or twice

every six weeks, and gives them resources that they can use. The resources are currently digital

so they can share with their distant learners. When it comes to teachers, she would develop a

strong team approach, and that would get some reluctant teachers to utilize the library. For

example, before she would approach a teacher, she would look at that grade level’s TEKS

standards. Then she would share resources with the teacher and mention the standards to get

their attention. The reluctant teachers would be interested in the conversation when they see that

she knows a little about the standards they are currently teaching.

The role of the library in the overall reading program revolves around our staff. Raquel

believes that older teachers or more seasoned teachers see the value in reading tangible books.

The new teachers or inexperienced teachers would just go with the curriculum. The new

curriculum does not have that many books for daily reading. She has to make them see the value

of daily reading. Now that Lancaster Middle School has started the district Benchmark this

week, the teachers who have had their students reading online, and reading from their class

library will notice those students' grades will be higher than those that have not been reading.

Also, their scores will be higher than those that don’t have access to read, or students not pushed

to read. It will be like a show and prove. Mrs. Hewitt has students that are reading on a 3rd or

4th grade reading level and in order to promote appreciation for the use of materials in the media

center, she uses online resources. She would share my school library Bitmoji page on the school
website and through her Google Classroom she would allow students to read online. That is how

she would go about story reading.

Mrs. Hewitt hosts a professional development for a cluster once every six weeks. They

go over text shared items, any new items that technology has rolled out, and how to troubleshoot

with the Promethean Boards. She would find an app and share to be shown on the Promethean

Board. She would do all of these things school wide. Whatever she finds she can roll it out for

all teachers to use.

When it comes to continued professional growth, Raquel feels that she is not a good

librarian. She feels that she is an excellent resource because she has to help everyone at the

school, but there are things she could do better. Mrs. Hewitt just doesn't have the time or the

space to do it. She knew she could do better in her collection development, but because they

don’t have enough funding to buy a collection of things. Media specialists at Lancaster ISD are

not able to do that, so they would have to chop it up, because it’s a smaller district. She needs to

develop her professional skills on being more organized, because if someone else came after her

then they would not understand what was doing in the media center.

Mrs. Hewitt would describe the media center as a space for all learners in the school

community. She would have a lunchtime group that likes to create and have debates. She would

have an inclusive space where the socially awkward kids, athletes, and kids would all go. She

would have never thought that they would talk with each other outside of the library. Some of

the students struggled in class, and may need more SEL (Social Emotional Learning) or more

hands on activities. They know they are free to come into the media center and talk about

whatever they want to talk about. They would pick topics and they would talk about current
news on CNN or what happened at school. At the same time, students have been creating things

for the past couple of years. They have been making blankets and quilts for the senior citizens at

a nursing home in Lancaster. Mrs. Hewitt and the students help in the community, and at the

same time they are helping each other.

To ensure that she has appropriate resources for all learners in middle school, she would

pull TEKS that need to be covered. She has life skills and an autism unit that have very low

performing students. When she got to the middle school, there were a few easy readers. She had

to purchase more to cover that population because the number of students grew. Ms. Hewitt had

to order accordingly based on the population. Raquel reiterates that students go to my school

library Bitmoji and click on the digital book to read. She would encourage teachers to tell their

students that are home to read online books. That is how she would include reading and

instructional materials in both print and digital formats that represent multiple perspectives and

varying points of views.

There was so much information I learned from interviewing Mrs. Hewitt. When I become

a media specialist, I will have knowledge of the TEKS on every grade level at the school I would

work for to support all teachers and students. I would write grants to get print materials in the

media center so all students reading levels were on the shelves. I would use my creativity and

knowledge from being a teacher for 15 years and host professional developments that both new

and seasoned teachers would need support. I learned that the library is a common area where

different students would come together. Therefore, I would make sure that there are many

tangible resources available. I would contact stores in the community and ask them to donate

things for the media center. My perception of the school library media specialist profession is to

not only work in the media center, but to extend to the community and stakeholders. I should
use my knowledge of being a homeroom teacher to learn the curriculum of each grade level. I

would need to step outside of my box and approach teachers and discuss their current unit and

gain their trust. I would also make the media center resourceful and have teachers come in and

select the books they wanted. I would schedule book talk with an author, I would have students

do book reviews and share them on the school’s website. In conclusion, Mrs. Hewitt has shared

a lot of information that I will take into my future of becoming a media specialist.