School Library

Dream it.

The Library Committee of the PTO is working to open a community-led bilingual library for the students at Chandler Magnet/La Familia Elementary School in Worcester, MA.  Our goal is for our library to be a welcoming and inclusive space at the heart of our school. A donation to this campaign will help us purchase books and library materials, implement an electronic circulation system, and acquire needed furniture to open the library for the fall.  The $17,000 goal includes the costs of operations for the 2024-2025 school year.

Our School
We are a city-wide pre-k through 6th grade elementary school and our students come from every corner of Worcester.  We are also a mulitilingual school, with the only transitional bilingual education and two-way dual language programs in the district (in English/Spanish). Our school has about 550 students and is 65% low income, 80% high needs, and 49% English language learner.

Library Access
The Massachusetts Education Reform Act of 1993 eliminated a state requirement for every public school to fund and maintain a library. Pretty soon after that, elementary schools in Worcester began to see the removal of librarian positions until, by the early 2000s, no elementary school librarians remained. Many library spaces have been converted to classrooms and currently there is no funding from the Worcester Public Schools budget for elementary school libraries. library aides or librarians.

The Department of Secondary and Elementary Education does not keep statistics on library access for public school students in the state, so we do not have any reliable data to know how many schools have libraries or not. But a 2018 Massachusetts School Library Study conducted by the Special Commission on School Library Services found that there are huge inequities in Massachusetts between suburban and urban/rural school districts and access to librarians. 

There is a Worcester Public Library book mobile that visits the school once a month for a little less than 3 hours.  That equates to 20 seconds per student, which means most students do not have any consistent library access. 

Build it.

The School Library
Our school community is enthusiastic about returning our library space into a working library, but we have no budget and will be completely staffed by community and parent volunteers.  We plan to offer biweekly library visits for every class. 

To have a library would give our students, teachers, and families a bilingual center of inquiry, knowledge and creativity.  It would increase book access for our students and provide diverse media resources.  Our goal is for our library to be a welcoming and inclusive space at the heart of our school and continue to be a multi-use space serving many needs. 

Our Goals

  • Our library will open in the 2024-2025 year and provide biweekly class visits

  • Our library will increase family and community engagement with our school.

  • Our library will increase student access to media resources.

  • Our library will support literacy.

  • Our library will be a place where students feel comfortable exploring reading choices.

Sustainability
Our long term goal is to continue to advocate for professional library staff, as well as a yearly budget from the district.  While we do that, we will continue to solicit donations from community foundations, businesses, and individual donors, as well as recruit volunteers, to maintain operation of the library.  The library committee is made up of 15 parents dedicating their time and resources to make this dream a reality and make sure that we can sustain it.

How you can help
Monetary donations: We have used donations so far to purchase furniture, a desktop computer and an electronic checkout system, as well as books and other library materials.  The best way to support our project is with a monetary donation so we can continue to put that money where we need it most.

Volunteers: Our library will be completely staffed by volunteers. We are looking for people to help us with a variety of tasks leading up to opening, as well as volunteering to run the day to day operations.  If you are interested in helping, please fill out the library volunteer form.