President’s Message- by Linda Ernwine
New Name, New Website
At the JCSMA crossover meeting last summer we were talking about our organization’s name and how we might want to consider a name change to be more aligned with AASL, our national organization’s name and in Kentucky KASL. After polling our members for name suggestions, a vote at the fall dinner was taken and it was decided that we would now be called the Jefferson County Association of School Librarians. I thought to myself that I really did not know the full background on our name and knew that Adele Koch would be the one to ask to give us the background details. Adele explained that when Kentucky originally got a school library association, it was named KASL. Then, in the late 70s when the term school media specialist began to spring up, the name was changed to reflect the change in terminology. The national organization never changed its name, however, and many states did not change their names. We decided to go back to the name to realign ourselves with the national “brand” and also line up with many of the states. We also feel it is important to point out that we are librarians (who deal with many types of media-obviously). This has now trickled down through the state to the various districts like Jefferson County who have changed their names to reflect the state.
New Name, New Website
At the JCSMA crossover meeting last summer we were talking about our organization’s name and how we might want to consider a name change to be more aligned with AASL, our national organization’s name and in Kentucky KASL. After polling our members for name suggestions, a vote at the fall dinner was taken and it was decided that we would now be called the Jefferson County Association of School Librarians. I thought to myself that I really did not know the full background on our name and knew that Adele Koch would be the one to ask to give us the background details. Adele explained that when Kentucky originally got a school library association, it was named KASL. Then, in the late 70s when the term school media specialist began to spring up, the name was changed to reflect the change in terminology. The national organization never changed its name, however, and many states did not change their names. We decided to go back to the name to realign ourselves with the national “brand” and also line up with many of the states. We also feel it is important to point out that we are librarians (who deal with many types of media-obviously). This has now trickled down through the state to the various districts like Jefferson County who have changed their names to reflect the state.
