Policies & Procedures
Student Policies and Procedures
The library opens at 7:10am and closes at 2:15pm. Students may come to the library before school, 7:10am until 7:40am. Students will visit the library with their classroom teachers on a bi-weekly rotation.
Students in grades K4-K5 may check out one book at a time, grades 1-2 may check out two books at a time, and grades 3-8 may check out three books at a time, for a period of two weeks. Students will check out books by providing the library staff with their Student ID. Students may NOT check out books for another student. A book may be renewed one time, unless another person has requested the book or if the student has overdue books or outstanding fines. Once a book is checked out, the student assumes responsibility for the book.
If books are damaged or lost, a fine will be assessed up to the price of replacing the book.
Check out books and check your account from class! Student accounts can be checked from the classroom to see if you owe fines or have an overdue book. After logging into your chromebook, select Destiny under Student Resources on the Sterling School website. Log in to Destiny and place books on hold for checkout or use the menu to view checkouts, fines, and holds.
All l books must be returned by May 15th (this date is subject to change).
Maintain a quiet, courteous atmosphere. You are expected to study, read magazines, or look for books.
Students who disregard the rules will be asked to return to their classrooms and their checkout privileges may be restricted. Check-out privileges may also be restricted if you leave your books in the halls or if you mistreat your books.
A Bookfair will be held once a year. The library and school rules apply during this time. Students will have an opportunity to browse the bookfair during class; after this chance, students may leave the classroom, with teacher permission, only when an item is to be purchased.
Teacher and Staff Services
The Sterling School School Media Center’s collection materials have been selected to reflect the needs of the curriculum and the learning community.
The SS media center provides a professional library for the faculty and staff of the school community. This library offers class set kits, guidebooks, and other professional resource materials. Most class set kits include books, teacher guides.
Teachers may check out media center materials for as long as they need them. The teacher checking out the material remains responsible for the item even if he/she loans the material out to another faculty member. Teachers should consider time as a factor since others may also request use of the material. Special consideration should also be made concerning the relevance of the material with one’s subject matter and test objectives.
The media center will provide flexibility and fairness to all teachers through cooperative instructional planning as well as providing teachers with the necessary media resources to enhance their curriculum.
The librarian will run a report for homeroom teachers, notifying them of the missing and overdue student items. Please encourage students to bring back library books in an effort to maintain our collection.
Class Scheduling Procedures
The Sterling School Library Media Center provides open access and flexibility to its patrons in accordance with the Association of American School Libraries recommendations and guidelines.
Students must have a pass when visiting the library from classes.
Teachers please send no more than five students at a time to the library (unless bringing a class to do scheduled research).
Teachers may schedule classes for media center activities with the librarian. During the scheduling, topics such as materials requested for book carts, research, technology, and assessment may be discussed between the librarian and the teacher. This cooperative effort will provide the media specialist with the necessary information to gather resources that will enhance research efficiency.
If a scheduled time you wanted is not available, please email the dates for scheduling to the media clerk. Cancellations are possible and you will be notified of the open time.
Procedures for Bringing Classes to the Media Center
Students should return any books that are due upon arrival to the media center.
Students must have an Acceptable Use Policy form signed by a parent or guardian on file with the school for Internet Usage.
Teachers are expected to provide active supervision when bringing a class for research.
COLLECTION DEVELOPMENT POLICY
Materials are selected to serve the curriculum and the needs and specific interests of our students with individual learning styles. The Sterling School Library Media Center provides a wide range of materials on all levels of difficulty, in a variety of formats, and with diversity of appeal. Materials available range from K4-8th grades.
The day-to-day operation of the Sterling School Library Media Center is the responsibility of the media specialist, who coordinates, selects and purchases all materials. While extensive help and advice is sought from administrators, teachers, library clerks, students, parents and others affiliated with school library, final responsibility for the selection of all materials lies with the media specialist.
The Sterling Library Media Center exists to provide resources to support the curriculum and recreational needs of the students and staff of the school community and to assist in the development of information literacy of its clients.
The aim is to provide a balanced collection which:
supports the school’s priority areas
reflects the local community as well as information of a global nature
supports curriculum needs
contains selections from the South Carolina State Book Award list as well as national book award lists in the appropriate age levels
reflects the recreational needs of the students
The criteria for collection development will be according to:
relevance to current or future curriculum
appropriateness of level to intended users
cost, value and suitability for library use
accuracy and currency of content
authority and reputation of authors, producers or publishers
scope of the work, adequacy of coverage and level of detail
treatment of subject matter, taking in to account language, bias and approach
ASSESSMENT AND INVENTORY PROCESS
Assessment of the collection includes taking inventory of existing materials, running circulation reports, and weeding outdated and inappropriate materials.
The inventory is a process by which holdings are checked against the automated cataloging system and the actual item to determine if the resource is still part of the collection and still meets selection criteria. The objective of this inventory is to ensure that the automated cataloging system accurately reflects the collection, which is the key access point for students and teachers to locate information within the library. Library media materials should be weeded if they:
Are in poor physical condition
Have not been circulated in three years
Are outdated in content, use, or accuracy
Are biased or portray stereotypes
Duplicate information which is no longer in heavy demand
Are superseded by new or revised information