Congratulations to all the recipients at this year's Massachusetts School Library Association Annual Awards. Their dedication to the students and families, their school, and of course their love for reading is beyond exemplary. The following are this year's recipients:
The Library Team at CRLS, Emily Houston and Mairead Kelly, won the MSLA President's Award. This award honors an MSLA member who in a career of five years or fewer, has made a significant impact on student learning through a quality school library program.
Emily Houston and Mairead Kelly have been the librarians at the Pearl K. Wise Library at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School for three and two years respectively. In that short time, they have become a coordinated, valued, and respected team in both the CRLS school community and CPS Library Media Department. They have built strong collaborative relationships with teaching colleagues, regularly integrate technology into their teaching and work, take initiative for leading professional development workshops and have created a welcoming library space with a collection that serves the diverse needs and interests of the CRLS community.
Liz Phipps-Soeiro, Library Specialist at Cambridgeport received the MSLA Ellen Berne Pathfinder Award. This Pathfinder Award celebrates groundbreaking developments in School Librarianship.
Liz won this award for her innovative Coffee and Conversations parent outreach program. Coffee & Conversations is a program with the goals to connect school families to resources and the “decision makers” in the school, district and the city at large.
Nominated by Haggerty Librarian Sarah Novogrodsky, the Friends of Haggerty (FOH) received the MSLA Parents as Library Supporters Award. This award recognizes outstanding collaboration between a parent/teacher organization and the school library.
Thanks to FOH, the Haggerty Library has been able to invite an amazing array of authors/illustrators to visit with students. The children eagerly anticipate these visits. Librarian Sarah Novogrodsky enjoys the challenge of seeking out and planning the annual visitor schedule. Some of the guests whose books the students have recently enjoyed are Vaunda Micheaux-Nelson, Mitali Perkins, Uma Krishnaswami, Loree Griffin Burns, Jason Chin, Ellis Paul, and Monica Wellington. A mural in the Haggerty hallway contains the autographs and doodles of author/illustrators who have visited. Students look for the autographs of their favorite visitors and reminisce.