What to Do When the Budget Has Been Crushed

I intentionally chose the cartoon at the left because sometime in the future, I am afraid that  "free" libraries might be a thing of the past. Budget and job cuts are happening all over the country, and teacher-librarians have had to come up with ways to buy books for their collections.

Are you in that majority?

This school year I was not given any money for my budget. I have needed to pull out all the tricks in my magic bag, and although I have not been able to adequately stack the shelves, I've done about as good as one can do considering the circumstances. If you find yourself in this spot in the future, here are some of the things I have done to generate ca$h:

1, Keep a small school store stocked with book covers,(jumbo Book Sox, the original one) pens, pencils (students are always unprepared..) erasers, notebooks and ear buds. Can you guess which item we sell the most of? It's the ear buds. Price markup is the key, folks. Purchase from clearance sales, discount warehouses etc.

2. The raffle sale. See if you can get a local business to donate an item, or take the price of the item out of the raffle sales. With the second choice you won't make as much, but you'll still make something. If you attend a book fair, you might have gotten the author to autograph your copy, The autograph will make your book raffle more appealing.

3, Charge students 10 cents per sheet for printing from the computer. Believe me, this money adds up.

4. Charge students for copying in color or black and white. Many companies like Apple are giving away free all-in-one printer/scanners with the purchase of  a computer. See if a colleague will donate it so that it will cost you nothing. (Old printer/scanners as donations can work as well. You will have to pay for the ink if your technology department or supervisor does not have the funds for it.)

Hope this takes the sting out of the "zero dollar game."  If you have any suggestions to share, please add to the comments. I still haven't found a high school library with no budget other than us.

How Important are School Libraries?

Looking to show your administration how necessary school libraries and teacher-librarians are? Here is a terrific interview. Perhaps your administration should taken a listen as well. Tell them it's only 30 minutes out of their day....

Library Budget Results: What's Next?

A while back, I asked for some assistance with a brief survey on school library budgets. Now that I have the results, I passed them on to my principal with the hopes of receiving more money next year. (My budget was next to the lowest result of $0) It's a sad fact that the most important place in the school building has been hit with financial cuts across the country. As you can see from the chart below, the highest amount of $90,000.00 is so far above everyone else I am wondering if it is accurate. But, that said, my next step is to find more creative fund raising tactics which I will share in a future post. I welcome your comments below. (By the way, if yours is the $90,000 budget, we are all green with envy.)

Middle School and High School Teacher Librarians: I Need Your Help

I've always known that my library budget was very limited, but I would like to work on getting more money. (Wouldn't we all?) In order to have the facts on my side, I need you to take a quick anonymous survey. Once I have enough information, I will use it to campaign for more money. Thank you for taking a moment to help out.