[HANASHIR:5338] RE: HANASHIR digest 809

[DAcker9854 <DAcker9854...>]

    b) more importantly, is it my school's responsibility to buy books that I 
 want to keep? 

This is an interesting question. I think that every school has an obligation 
to its faculty to develop a professional resource library, that is, to have 
on hand the books that teachers would typically turn to when preparing 
lessons and activities for the school.  Teachers have a right to expect 
reasonable support to do their work.  That includes music.  

Music specialists (and teachers who use music regularly in their classroom) 
should be suggesting to principals music books for the school's library. 
However, because we know that budgets are limited, we have a responsibility 
to build the collection sensibly. That means realizing that in any given 
year, the school may be able to buy only a few music anthologies or 
collections in a given year.  That dictates that you start by buying books of 
greatest general appeal ( in terms of the kind of music the school sings) and 
only later getting books more specialized. After a few years of organized 
buying, you discover you have a nice collection that is of value to the 
school.   If you approach the question this way, it's not about buying books 
for yourself, but buying books for the schooland for your colleagues in the 
school, both current and future, whether you continue teaching in the school 
or not.  

David

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