Happy Canadian Library Workers Day to all the students and staff on the Library Team at LTSS, and in the other libraries in our community and around the world. Thank you for all that you do to help with the vital work and joyful experiences of libraries!
Libraries are vital to our individual and collective prosperity and well-being. Libraries are a joy. Libraries build community. Libraries promote literacy. Libraries are safe spaces. Libraries bridge the gap between haves and have nots. Libraries protect intellectual freedom. Libraries put books into the hands of kids. Libraries support healthy communities. Libraries are essential to the health of democracy. Libraries promote positive social values. Libraries provide online resources. Libraries build readers. Libraries are hubs of a community. Libraries promote lifelong learning. Libraries support democratic citizenship. This list of why libraries are important goes on and on.
Celebrate Canadian Library Month, along with International School Library Month, this October. All libraries, including school libraries, public libraries, even “free little libraries”, are vital to society. Find out more. Visit us in person, or online at tweedsmuirlibrary.ca
Check out this map of the School Library to see all the different areas in our space, and all the different types of library materials that are available for you to borrow.
Better still, come down to see the place in person!
The School Library is open for the 2024-2025 school year. However, we need student volunteers so that we can offer borrowing options to students before school, at lunch, and after school. If you are interested in joining us, come down to the School Library to learn more!
Could this be YOU?
Please also fill out our online application form let us know that you are interested.
Another school year begins at Lord Tweedsmuir Secondary. We look forward to seeing you here in the School Library.
We hope that you have a relaxing and refreshing summer holiday filled with fun and good times with family and friends.
Look for the occasional online update, otherwise, we will see you again in person at your School Library for the 2024-2025 School Year.
If you have overdue library books, please return them.
Look in your locker. Under your bed. In the car. Where are those library books that you need to return? Avoid fines for lost books by returning them ASAP.
The end of the school year is in sight. Be sure to return any overdue books and/or clear up any fines for lost or damaged materials.
Celebrate National Indigenous History Month in Canada by learning more about First Nations, Metis and Inuit people. Come down to your School Library to browse through our Indigenous Peoples Collection. This section of the School Library is devoted to titles from authentic indigenous writers.
All titles in the Indigenous Peoples Collection are designated with spine labels bearing the “IPC” prefix. Sublocations in the IPC include:
and more…
June is National Indigenous History Month in Canada.
“The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.”
Source: Unknown*
The rights and freedoms of Canadians include the right to read what you want to read. Such rights and freedoms are fundamental to democracy. However, such rights and freedoms are meaningless unless citizens exercise these rights and freedoms.
There are authoritarian forces at work in our society that seek power by attacking your rights, including attempts to censor or limit your freedom to read. Totalitarian states know that uneducated and illiterate citizens are easier to control and oppress. Such forces can only celebrate that the work is much simpler when significant portions of the population choose not to read. Censorship becomes less pressing when “aliteracy” becomes prevalent.
A true democracy guarantees fundamental rights and freedoms to its citizens. But to work effectively, indeed, to survive, democracy requires that citizens exercise those rights. In particular, democracy breaks down if citizens aren’t educated, informed and active.
The rise of powerful new information technology in the last few decades has made it more important than ever that citizens are highly “information literate.” Citizens must not only have access to information, they must have the tools required to wade through increasingly destructive levels of misinformation, disinformation, propaganda, and outright lies. Citizens need to have access to information that is credible, accurate and trustworthy.
The rise of anti-intellectualism and anti-science movements, perhaps most recently represented by anti-vax conspiracies, are part of the wider breakdown of democratic institutions. There is little doubt that attacks on public education over many years have reaped some these results and are integral to the rise of authoritarianism.
It is not enough to celebrate the Freedom to Read. As citizens of democratic societies, we have an obligation to exercise our Freedom to Read, in part so that we are equipped to defend our democratic rights and freedoms.
It is clear that democracy is under attack, throughout the world, and in our back yard. We must act.
Find out more:
Note* The above quote, or variations on it, are often popularly attributed to Mark Twain. However the original source of this quote, or its variations, remains unclear.
We wish you all the best for 2024. Please be sure to come by your School Library to say hello, and to discuss how we can help you in the coming year.
Lord Tweedsmuir Secondary School Library 