Celebrating the work

 This evening’s open dinner was pretty star-studded! From Clint Johnston, BCTF President, to Chris Kennedy, Superintendent of West Vancouver School Board, to the four Angela Thacker award winners, to the Leading Learning Implementation award winning district, Surrey, we heard it all. 

We heard from Clint that TLs are one of the strongest collectives, and that our solidarity has been critical in keeping TLs in school libraries. 

We heard from Chris that despite all of the technological changes in the world over the past 40 years, that libraries remain the strongest gathering spaces, and that the culture building that comes through libraries is unmatched. 

From the Angela Thacker Memorial Award winners we heard first from Rabia Khokar that her love for libraries came from weekly visits to the public library and now she sees libraries as the biggest classroom in the school. Rebeca Rubio reminded us that our work takes courage and to keep up our commitment. Jonelle St-Aubyn celebrated the fact that TLs are challenging the norms and that we are a good in the world for our students. Leigh Border, via recording, shared her thanks for everyone committed to moving Teacher Librarians of Newfoundland and Labrador (TLNL) forward. 

Angela Lapointe received the Leading Learning Implementation Award for Surrey, and spoke honestly about how the support she receives from her administration makes it able for her to better support her TLs. Her district leader, also in attendance, spoke of Andrea’s energy and efforts to connect all 150 TLs in the district. 

Every speaker noted the importance of Canadian School Libraries and the impact of the work taken on by the leadership team; but also, the mentorship, friendship and collaboration of Carol Koechlin and Anita Brooks-Kirkland with them. 

The take away for me tonight? We are a powerful group of innovators, supporters, learners, (this list could go on and on) etc, but we do things best when we do them TOGETHER.