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Interview of Beth Sample: Technology Coordinator Site#2

Sakinah Hunafa: Okay, hello. I love your background, by the way.

Beth Sample: Thank you.
Sakinah Hunafa: Okay, so basically, you know, you already saw the questions, right? Yeah, they're
pretty standard. Some of these questions I already know the answer to, but I have to ask you anyway.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Okay, so your name is?
Beth Sample: Beth sample. I am the media specialist here.
Sakinah Hunafa: The media specialist at Berkmar Middle School?
Beth Sample: Yes, ma'am.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Okay, what type of degree is required for your position?
Beth Sample: So, for my position, it's usually a specialist degree. So, I already had my specialist’s when
I went back to get this, so mine was an add on. So, I have my bachelor's degree, my master's degree, my
specialist degree, and then this, this was my add on degree. So, most of the people that were in my cohort
were doing their specialist degree in its instructional technology and media literacy. Mine was just an add
on. So, while they had those two years, I only had six classes I had to take.
Sakinah Hunafa: Yeah, that worked out for you.
Beth Sample: Um, unfortunately, because it was an add on, there's stuff that I think I missed. Like, I
know, some of the teachers, some of the other media specialists have like classes on, like, how to take
care of books, and how to fix books and stuff like that. I didn’t have any of that training. I've gone to
YouTube university to do that.
Sakinah Hunafa: Right. I know exactly what you're saying. But I'm glad that that worked out, you were
still able to kind of get in there and work with that.
Beth Sample: It was really great. Yeah.
Sakinah Hunafa: Okay.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: What are your job responsibilities?
Beth Sample: Oh, that's a long list. So, with every school, the list of responsibilities is very different for
the media specialists, because we have a caveat that says and other assigned duties, okay. Yeah, we have
a regular 10 standards that come from the AASL, the American Association of School Librarians, which
is really great. It's just about development, reading programs, funding and grants. I take care of all of that,
I write grants every year to try and get more books or author visits and stuff. It's a lot of just the collection
development, reading programs, collaborative work with the teachers like working with them
collaboratively on how to integrate both media technology, media literacy, technology literacy into their
lessons. That's really my main job responsibilities, except I have others like broadcast, book fair and
yearbook.
Sakinah Hunafa: Yeah, it’s a lot.
Beth Sample: A lot of times, yeah. Yeah.
Sakinah Hunafa: Yeah, that sounds like you have quite a plethora of responsibilities that you are having
to do, but it seems like you're keeping it all afloat somehow.
Beth Sample: Yeah, some days. Some days, I do it more gracefully than others.
Sakinah Hunafa: I can imagine. I said, we'll see how I do when I get there.
Beth Sample: You're going to do fabulous. It'd be great.
Sakinah Hunafa: Thank you so much.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: The next question is, how are you meeting the needs of faculty and staff
during the transition to remote learning? Either this semester or the past semester? I'm not sure how it's
set up right now at Berkmar middle.
Beth Sample: Yeah. So right now, we are back in school, there are no digital learners. What Gwinnett
said was, Hey, you don't want your kid to go back to school. Guess what, you can go to the online digital
campus. So pretty kids there. We've actually had kids try and pull out, but we have a lot of No, like, hey,
online school, like you're going to have to find another program, you decide to withdraw your child. But
anyway, there is no digital learning this year. Last semester was a little crazy.
Sakinah Hunafa: Understandably.
Beth Sample: It benefited me, because I was able to get on zooms and teach lessons. I taught more
lessons last year than I have in my three years of doing this, like, yeah, because it just made it really
simple for me to go on zoom and pop into this class and pop into that class. I was doing, you know, in one
day, I would do eighth grade science, and I was in seventh grade social studies. I was helping make
lessons. It was really great. It helps show the teachers like my value, like, hey, come in, I can give you the
gift of time to do whatever you need to do in your class.
Sakinah Hunafa: Absolutely. And then it's that boost that they need some time to work that technology
into their classroom.
Beth Sample: Sometimes it's not even technology. Sometimes it's just literacy. Like, yeah, you think, Oh,
I have to have an article. And I'm like, no, no, no. I can find you the article that has to do with whatever
standard you're teaching, interactive read aloud with the kids. Yeah, I do you do? You know, I do. We do.
You do whole gradual release all online.
Sakinah Hunafa: You know, and that's the thing too, it's like a lot of the teachers are so stressed out
with, you know, trying to make sure they teach the standards and the curriculum, that they're not really
trying to veer off too much into anything else. They're kind of like we stick with this.
Beth Sample: Especially with social studies and Science, they have content-based standards versus Math
and Language arts or English language arts, it's very much skills based. I've tried to get them to
understand, like, by the time you teach that content, they're not really going to use that again until they
reach high school. Guess what? They're really going to be retaught a lot of that content. Really in science
and social studies, we should be working on those skills. Let's use your content to help with those literacy
skills because that's the skill they're going to need long in the long run.
That's what they're going to need for the rest of their life. They’re not going to need to know about you
know, the Iran Iraq war. Yeah, it's like you're not ever get that again.
Sakinah Hunafa: That's true. It's like you're going to go to college, you're not going to hear about it in
college.
Beth Sample: Not unless you're taking like a you know, a Southwest Asian or Middle East Studies. Like
you're not going know about that. The reality is, is let's teach them the skill with the content.
Sakinah Hunafa: Absolutely.
Beth Sample: That content, but let's make it skills based. Oh, yeah, that's my push.
Sakinah Hunafa: No, no, I absolutely agree. Because I said the same thing too. With some of the other
subjects, same thing it's like you can teach them these things because it's part of the curriculum but at the
end of the day, you know, if you're focusing on just that content, they're not learning a skill they need to
know that's going to carry them throughout life not just through that semester, so they can get that grade.
Beth Sample: Exactly.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Okay, so the next question is, and this is kind of similar to the one of the
other questions, but it was saying what are typical daily activities for you?
Beth Sample: So, I can just like run through my schedule. I come in and the first thing I do is um, check
email that takes forever like answer questions, check email and then usually about this time I start with
broadcast. I have to immediately come in, it's like hit the ground running. I have to go, and I have to put
up our scrolling announcements for the day check and make sure our broadcast is ready to go. I check
emails and then usually about this time I am cleaning up the media center just trying to pick up and make
sure it looks nice and acceptable. I print out the schedule for my clerk she starts at 12:30. She’s really the
copy clerk, but she helps me out and she's amazing. This is the first year I've had some really solid help in
here in three years and far and above it has changed my life, like it has made me such a happier person.
Sakinah Hunafa: I'm sure it allows you to have a moment to focus on some things and not have to do
everything.
Beth Sample: Yeah, yes so then about this time it's you know, cleaning up the library. I'm monitoring the
kids for broadcast and then I've got Book Fair going on right now so I will spend my day in Book Fair all
day.
Sakinah Hunafa: Oh wow. Oh wow.
Beth Sample: It consists of just ordering books and you know, putting in reorders or restocks and
cleaning up the books, checking on the overall maintenance checking books and checking books out
shelving books. And then on top of that, I'm reaching out to social studies like Hey, can I come to your
PLC on Monday? I have title one spot check inventory going on. We have a bar coded inventory that
starts on Friday for textbooks.
Sakinah Hunafa: Oh, wow. Yeah, that’s going to be something.
Beth Sample: It's you know, helping this teacher find these books that she wants in her class and it's just
a lot of moving pieces every day. Right?
Sakinah Hunafa: Right. I know that just the Book fair alone is so time consuming. Yeah, so it's a lot
going on at one time. A lot of excitement too.
Beth Sample: It is and the kids are really excited. So, they'll start coming in at 9:30 this morning.
Yesterday from 9:30 to 10, I almost needed like two cash registers. Like we were just like.
Sakinah Hunafa: Well, you know, I'm going to miss that part. But you know, I can't wait to kind of see
what you guys have going on when I get there.
Beth Sample: Yeah, that's okay.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: The next question is do you have a budget that you control and how do you
make decisions for selecting resources for stakeholders?
Beth Sample: Okay, so I have several budgets. The first one is my media center budget. Usually that is
used to just buy Media Center supplies. Then I have my budget that comes from the county for
purchasing books. Then I have my loss and damage book funds, which usually goes to replace books.
However, sometimes their books like, if they're outdated and stuff, I'm obviously not going to replace
those. And those are books like, a lot of times I'll waive the fees for kids if it was purchased in 2004, but
it's got a publishing date of 1992.
Sakinah Hunafa: Oh, wow.
Beth Sample: I'm going to waive that, that is a book, which I would have weeded anyway. I’m not going
to charge a kid for that. I just don't think it's equitable. Like I said, Of course, I'm just going to weed it
anyway, why charge the kid, especially with our types of demographics where, you know, sometimes
that's a hardship with it.
Sakinah Hunafa: Right, right. Absolutely. I agree.
Beth Sample: So, I just weed that. I've got those three budgets, really, the only one that has to be
approved by stakeholders is the one that comes from the county. Okay, so a lot of times what I do, like
from the county office, they're like, hey, you are the, the most knowledgeable. So, I have a media
committee, we are required to have a media committee, we've already had our first meeting, we actually
have our second meeting on the fifth. Okay. So, you'll probably be here for that at 8:30. And that's where
we're actually going to look at our movie approval form, and all of that, um, and I can send you that, like
the agenda for that it's going to be kind of crazy. But I'm probably just going to do a zoom session so that
nobody has to come into the media center.
Sakinah Hunafa: That works for people. Yeah, it gives people the flexibility.
Beth Sample: Especially like the community members and stuff like that. Oh, yeah. It's, it's really
actually pretty great, so I usually just come up and I say, this is the list of books, and I might highlight the
books that might be semi controversial. And I'll explain why I put it there. Like, I think this is a great
book. This is the topic or issues it's dealing with; I think it's very relevant right now. And it's got really
great reviews. At the last meeting, I weeded a book, it was brought to my attention by a teacher, and we
talked about what's the difference between someone just bringing a book to you for your attention versus
someone saying, No, I don't want this book in any media center. And so, talks about what's the difference
there? As a parent, sometimes there's books, like, I don't like my child, my second grader to read Captain
Underpants. I don’t have an issue with the book, but he cannot handle potty humor. Like, it's funny. I love
it. But he doesn't know the cut off like, okay, that's funny. Let's stop.
He can't decipher when that point is. And so, I just don't want him reading it. But I don't want to, I don't
want any of the kids not to be able to read it because and so we kind of use that as like an example like,
and so we did, we looked at this book, like it was it was one that I inherited with the media center. It was
brought to my attention. And it was by Jim Henson, it was like, the Muppets. It did have some weird
inappropriate content in the back. And we kind of looked at it like, Oh, what? Yeah, take that out. I
brought up reviews. I'm like, it does say that it's for adults, or mature teens. And I'm like, probably doesn't
need to be in middle school. So yeah, it wasn't it wasn't a challenged book. But it was definitely just one
that was brought to me like, should this be here? Probably not. And so, as a group, we decided that no,
this book didn't need to be here. But the majority of it, I just give them a list of, hey, these are the books
I've purchased. Do you see anything wrong with them? And I just go ahead and highlight the ones that
might be a little controversial. I, you know, and I just go ahead and put on there, why am I purchasing it?
What are the benefits? How does it either connect to content or what's going on in our society?
Sakinah Hunafa: Okay, that makes absolute sense. I was hearing that too, a couple of times from
different media specialists that there's different criteria or sometimes people will come in and there'll be a
committee for that and they will review the books and they have a certain criteria they go by, and they
decided that they'll either you know, say we want to keep it or we don't want to keep it, you know, and we
just go buy stuff based on that.
Beth Sample: And it's nice because with Gwinnett county, anytime someone challenges a book, it's like,
a real challenge. I immediately go to the county office, the media services. And I'm like that, here you go.
So, it's very nice too, hands off for me and they do everything.
Sakinah Hunafa: Yeah, it helps because you don't have to always, you know, be completely in that you
can kind of move on to the next thing you have to do you know.
Beth Sample: Exactly, I hand that off and off, I go over here.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Have you had an opportunity to impact technology implementation
throughout your school? And would you describe a specific example?
Beth Sample: Well, um, this year, I am in charge of releasing Chromebooks to digital students and other
students that need them. And so, I've been doing that as well as helping with all the Chromebooks
dispersal into the classes. That's one of the things I helped to do this year. But our LSTC and our TFT
really have more of a handle on that. When it comes to technology, really all I do is media literacy. Like
we look at technology, literacy, media literacy, we're using Common Sense Media. It's my LSTC's goal,
to get our school common sense.edu literacy certified. I've just kind of helped with a lot of that, like I
have been, we're doing a chrome care package, like what teachers need to do to make sure that they're
taking care of their Chromebooks and stuff. And so, I've helped to have input on that. But really, it's been
spearheaded by our LSTC, which is really nice. I kind of give them my input at different stages.
Sakinah Hunafa: Well, it's good, because then they have your voice, and you have the LSTC’s voice.
So, you have a little bit of a partnership there.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Does your school have a technology committee?
Beth Sample: Um, yes and no. Yes, we have a small committee that meets for technology and to really
look at what we have and what we don't have. We have what we call our tech team, which is me, the
LSTC, the TFT, and our administrator that's over us. We meet periodically to look at technology needs.
And on top of that, like what type of technology. We just had to go at the beginning, end of August,
beginning of September, we had to go through and just get rid of all our old computers.
Our first, second and third generation laptops that just really needed to be taken off for our entire
inventory, because it's too old, they don't work.
Sakinah Hunafa: Right.
Beth Sample: So, we kind of had to look at that. We had to look at what is cost for replacing all of this?
Who gets what materials? How is this equitable? So, we just had to do all of that. So, I mean, it's really
just us. Sometimes we take teacher input. That’s really that's the LSTC, she does some teacher input
there.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Okay. How are technology decisions made?
Beth Sample: Usually with the LSTC and the TST. It'll either go through tech team, but again, the final
decision rests with the administration, and how are they going to purchase things like what kind of money
are they going to spend? And again, that is the LSTC, she spearheads all of that, which is nice.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Okay, what is the best part of your job?
Beth Sample: Oh, teaching kids.
Sakinah Hunafa: I figured, all right.
Beth Sample: Yeah, teaching kids getting them excited about reading. Like, I don't know what it is about
fourth grade, fifth grade, they kind of drop off with reading through middle school, your good readers are
going to keep reading, but your reluctant readers aren't. So, I love it when I get a kid who, I get them
hooked on an author or a series, and they just keep coming back to me for more. I love it.
Sakinah Hunafa: There's nothing like it. It's true. What you said is absolutely true. And once they hit
fourth grade, (I noticed that when I taught fourth and fifth grade), they start to (unless they're already avid
readers) to drop, and then it's a little bit harder to get them excited about it again.
Beth Sample: Yes. Yeah. So I love doing like on Friday, I just did a book tasting with all of eighth grade,
they're going to be doing book clubs during their extended learning time, which is like 30 minutes in the
morning. And I did a book tasting with them, so I gave them all the books and we talked about it and just
held tasting. It was exciting to hear students that previously weren't excited about reading excited about
getting this book and reading. It was great.
Sakinah Hunafa: It’s kind of the like the aha moment for teachers. You know when you see that that
light bulb is going on. But instead, you know for you it's the ability to say, “Oh, that spark there for
reading.”
Beth Sample: Yeah, so I ended up doing a class on Saturdays for students that are struggling with their
academics. And I was like, you know, I'm not going to sit here and we're not just going to go over these
standards. I gave them each a book and read. It was seventh grade. So, I typed social studies and language
arts together in this class, and I gave them the book, “Refugee.” I went, bought a lot of stuff, and I just
gave them copies. I was like, these are yours. When this is done, because I was like, we're not going have
a chance to read the whole thing. We're only reading excerpts in this class. But if you want to read it, have
at it. So, I had a kid first semester we did, “Prisoner B. 1065”. And so, we did that. And then second
semester, I did “Refugee,” so I had the same kid first semester and second semester. So, I'm like, this is a
kid who is struggling with just every day Language Arts. He's failing his classes. Like, let's figure it out.
Beth Sample: Give me one second. Um, I've got kids trying to go to Book fair. I'm like, No, no, no, no.
Sakinah Hunafa: Oh, no problem at all. We only have one more question.
Beth Sample: It’s ok, but yeah, he's come up to me. He's like, I love Alan Gratz. Do you have any more?
And I'm like, Well, here's Ground Zero. Well, here's this. Yeah. And this book, it's just really good. And
so, he's like, does he have any more? And I'm like, I've gone, and I've gotten these, like, random ones, like
“Wicked”. And he's like, okay, I'll read this. Okay. He's like, I didn’t really like this one as much. I was
like, yeah, it's not one of his most popular but hey, if you like these, let's try this series. So, here's a kid
who last year struggled. And now this year, I can't put enough books in his hands.
Sakinah Hunafa: That's awesome. That's so awesome.
Beth Sample: That the reminder every day like, it's that kid, that kid who was not a reader that is now in
middle school, picking up and reading.
Sakinah Hunafa: Question: Okay, and the last question is, this is the opposite, right? What do you find
to be the most challenging part of your job?
Beth Sample: My schedule. Yeah. As a teacher, I knew every hour what I was doing.
Sakinah Hunafa: You kind of know what's coming.
Beth Sample: Yeah, yes. Yes. So, my day was structured. It is not structured anymore. It is random that I
know what today it's going to be because I can look at my calendar and see. I think that has been the
hardest part. It is dealing with the fact that when in the morning I come in, I look at my schedule. I'm like,
okay, what's going on today? So, I've got bookfair that is going on. I see that I have some time. That
means I can go ahead and do this Title 1 spot check and give the materials to the AP. Then it's like, oh,
but I have to put out this fire and this fire and this fire. And oh, it's already one o'clock. I guess I need to
go to lunch. I mean, it really is like, those are kind of that's hard for me to deal with. Because I really like
consistency.
Sakinah Hunafa: Yes. You know what, you know what to expect. You can plan.
Beth Sample: Yeah, so to go with the flow is a little hard.
Sakinah Hunafa: Okay. That makes perfect sense. Right now, I'm in elementary before I come and see
you all and I noticed the same thing. She was telling me there was some flexible scheduling as far as
when students come in and things like that. What she was saying was sometimes teachers will come in for
a whole group visit with all their students. Now you have 20 kids, 20 plus kids, and they're looking for
books, trying to check out books, returning books, you know, and it can get kind of hectic in there. I know
exactly what you're saying when you say that. It changes.
Beth Sample: Yeah, so it's like, I've not only got bookfair going on, but I’ve also got teachers signed up
for Book Fair, I've got teachers signed up for checkout, it all kind of revolves around each other. On top
of that, I've got other duties that have to get done, so it gets very hectic. I can plan my day, but it's usually
going to change.
Sakinah Hunafa: I see exactly what you're saying. Well, I wanted to tell you I really enjoyed this
interview with you. And I am really looking forward to coming to Berkmar Middle.