PLEASE JOIN US
The Worcester Public Library and the
Worcester Public Library Foundation are excited to
announce the launch of a creative, new partnership with the City of Worcester and the Worcester Public Schools!
Monday, June 17, 2013 at 3:30 p.m.
Tatnuck Magnet School, 1083 Pleasant Street
So what's up?
Hey, I'm wondering, too. All the School Committee members have gotten on this was a brief heads-up (which made this all sound a bit more out there than this!) during our one-on-one budget meetings.
Here's what I know thus far: the city is proposing--or, I should say, pushing ahead on--a plan to locate children somewhat-branch libraries in some of our schools. It's being referred to as the "One Library" system.
Or so I'm told.
Discussions on this have been entirely private: there has been no discussion with the School Committee and no discussion with the Worcester Public Library board (the two public bodies that oversee the respective involved).
I have seen no mention of funding beyond what can be gleaned from the city budget this year.
I have seen no discussion of the severe space crunch the Worcester Public Schools are under, which will only get worse with our growing enrollment.
I have been part of no conversations around the allocation of city or school resources or the sustainability of this project.
I have seen no remarks on what impact this will have on Net School Spending; I have seen that this will be counted, by the city, as library spending for state requirements.
I have seen nothing regarding the lines of authority on hiring, evaluation, firing, and the like on the employees involved.
I have seen nothing on securing our buildings to the public (which, if you recall, is why we no longer have polling places in schools).
I have seen nothing, in short, that deals with the real world considerations of any such plan.
I thought we had more time to ask questions on this--silly me--and I was respecting our usual refraining from filing a lot of items during budget. Believe me, I'll be asking about this.
Of course, it will be after whatever announcement is made next week.
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