Equity, diversity, and inclusion (commonly shortened to EDI) is a term that has become common in our institutional language around race and racism. In schools, EDI most often refers to the demographics of the student and employee body, the need for and the distribution of school resources to marginalized groups and the work and policies needed to make a school community more inclusive. In the March/April issue, Adrienne Almeida, K.C. Boyd, Jean Darnell, Erika Long, and I frame a conversation about EDI around identity. At the heart of this conversation is the question: What does EDI look like in a school library when the librarians are Black women?
In “Leading a School Library as My Authentic Self,” Adrienne Almeida details her understanding that building relationships and collaborating with students is key.
In “Advocacy: 2021 Style and Beyond,” K.C. Boyd shares that speaking up has become essential to librarianship.
In “Unpacking Black Librarianship,” Jean Darnell teaches activism as a tool of empowerment and change.
In “Making a Mark on White Space: My Experience as a Black Librarian,” Erika Long acknowledges the need for greater representation in librarianship.
In “Black School Librarianship: Navigating Race and Creating Change,” I encourage librarians to be intentional in their teaching and position within their school communities to create change.
About the Content Expert
Maegen Rose is the middle school librarian at Rye Country Day School in Rye, New York. She is the private school representative for the School Library Media Specialists of Southeast New York. She is a member of AASL and is serving on the 2019–2021 Coretta Scott King Book Awards Jury.
Knowledge Quest, Volume 49, No. 4 – Black School Librarianship: Navigating Race and Creating Change
Feature
Black School Librarianship: Navigating Race and Creating Change
Maegen Rose
Black School Librarianship Articles
Leading a School Library as My Authentic Self
Adrienne Almeida
Advocacy: 2021 and Beyond
K.C. Boyd
Unpacking Black School Librarianship
Jean Darnell
Making a Mark on White Space
Erika Long
Departments
President’s Column
Our Ongoing Commitment to Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
Kathy Carroll
KQ Editorial Board Liaison Column
Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion: Focusing the Lens on the School Library Profession
Iris Eichenlaub
Columns
2021 AASL Election: President Candidate Statements
AASL Ballot
Research into Practice Column
“I Choose…to Give My All to My Students and Colleagues”
Karen Nourse Reed
CBC Column
Black History Is American History: Why We Should Celebrate Year Round
Don Tate
Author: Maegen Rose
Maegen Rose is the middle school librarian at Rye Country Day School in Rye, New York. She is the private school representative for the School Library Media Specialists of Southeast New York. She is a member of AASL and is serving on the 2019–2021 Coretta Scott King Book Awards Jury.
Categories: KQ Content
What an inspiring topic on ‘exploring the experiences of Black school librarians’, I congratulate and salute you that you are able to address such a pertinent topic especially during this critical time of lockdowns informed by the covid-19 pandemic. It is time that school libraries and other types of libraries such as public libraries should be coming forth to encourage users to form book clubs and strong national and international live online webcast platforms where our young ones will be encouraged to fight the pandemic by reading and sharing their stories online. However, my concern is that in Africa we are far from reaching the point of engaging in webcast platforms as we are still fighting the scarcity of printed storybooks and subject books written in our vernacular languages. Nonetheless, I am positive that mobile technologies uploaded with interesting storybooks can be invested in schools so as to encourage the young ones to continue reading from their comfort zones and also be taught on how to use communication tools such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams, WhatsApps and others to share their stories within their online book clubs. I will appreciate it that we form a team to drive such projects.