If you have worked in education for any length of time, you have probably heard the phrase “remember your why” more times than you can count. It appears in professional development sessions, conference presentations, back-to-school messages, and conversations about educator burnout. When the work gets difficult, we are encouraged to think about why we chose education in the first place and reconnect with whatever brought us here.

I have always struggled a little with that advice because I know my why. I know why I became an educator, and I know why I became a school librarian. I believe in the power of books and reading. I believe students deserve access to information and opportunities to explore ideas. I believe school libraries matter, and I believe certified school librarians bring something valuable to students, teachers, and school communities. I suspect most school librarians know their why just as clearly.

What I have needed to think about this school year is something different: my purpose. There is a distinction between the two. Our why explains why we chose this profession. Our purpose asks what we are going to do now that we are here.

That question has caused me to take a step back this year and think about what I want our library to be and how I want students and teachers to experience it. One part of that has become increasingly clear. I want to help build a stronger culture of reading in my school, something I have struggled to do for several years. I don’t want reading to be something that happens only when students walk through the library doors or when an English teacher assigns a novel. I want it to be something we notice, discuss, encourage, and celebrate throughout the school.

Wanting that has meant doing some things differently. This year, I created monthly reading challenges for our high school students and included teachers in them as well. If we want students to see reading as something valuable beyond an assignment, I think it is important for them to see the adults around them participating in a culture of reading, too.

I also started a Caught Reading program that invites teachers to recognize students they see reading independently during the school day. The idea is simple: notice students reading and celebrate it. The slips I ordered didn’t arrive until about two weeks after school started, but while I was waiting for them, multiple teachers asked when they were coming.

That stuck with me. They remembered. More importantly, they wanted to participate. Before I even had the slips in my hands, teachers were paying attention to students who were reading and looking for a way to recognize them. Something that started as an idea in the library was beginning to extend beyond it.

Maybe that is what I have been missing when thinking about purpose.

A school librarian can purchase great books, create displays, recommend titles, and develop reading programs, but one person cannot create a schoolwide culture of reading. It requires other people to see themselves as part of it. Students need to see adults reading. They need to hear people talking about books. They need teachers who notice when they choose to read and who reinforce the idea that reading has value beyond an assignment or a grade.

For me, recognizing that has required stepping outside my comfort zone. It is easier to create something in the library, run it myself, and see what happens. It is harder to ask other people to buy into an idea, initiate conversations, ask for support, and sometimes challenge the way we have always done things.

That is where purpose becomes different from knowing our why. We know why reading matters. We know why access matters. We know why information literacy, intellectual freedom, collaboration, and strong school libraries matter. Purpose asks what we are going to do because those things matter.

It also changes the way we look at the things we do. The monthly reading challenges are not my purpose, and neither is Caught Reading. They are simply things I am trying because they support something larger. They may work, they may need to change, or I may eventually replace them with something else. A program is something we do. Purpose is what we hope to accomplish by doing it.

That distinction feels especially important in school libraries, where it is easy to become consumed by the work of keeping everything running. There is always another book to process, lesson to teach, question to answer, technology problem to solve, program to plan, or unexpected need walking through the door. We can be very busy doing good and necessary work without stopping to think about where that work is taking us.

Perhaps that is why purpose deserves more of our attention. Not because it will solve burnout or make the difficult parts of our jobs disappear, but because it asks us to be intentional. What do we want our libraries to be? What do we want students and teachers to experience because the library is part of their school? What contribution are we uniquely positioned to make?

The answers will be different for each of us. For me, right now, building a stronger culture of reading is part of the answer. For someone else, it might be collaboration, information literacy, intellectual freedom, access, advocacy, or creating a greater sense of belonging. Our purpose may also change as our students, schools, and careers change.

I firmly believe we were all created for a purpose. There is value in putting that purpose into words and keeping it somewhere we will see it. Not because we are going to forget it, but because there is a difference between knowing something matters and intentionally choosing to act on it.

I don’t need to remember why I became a school librarian. I know my why. I think most of us do.

Maybe the better question is: What are we going to do with it?