Services & Resources

The Library/Media Center’s collection, art work and bulletin board displays strive to be inclusive of all peoples of the world. The library policy promotes a bias-free collection and seeks to promote and celebrate complex and diverse cultures in the world. In doing so, we take into account issues of race, ethnicity, religion and gender as we maintain and update our materials. Our goal is to include a wide array of voices which represent the diversity of our world.

We continue to work in expanding the presence of diverse images and voices in all areas including non-fiction. We are constantly looking for materials that portray different people in “everyday situations”. As such we hope to promote an understanding of all people as members of the global family and work to convey this idea to our students.

As traditional library curricula rely more and more on technology and electronic resources, our Library/Media Center continues to work to incorporate technology into our program. Our routine functions are thoroughly automated. Both the catalog and the circulation system are electronic. All materials are bar coded to provide efficiency in circulation. All students, faculty and staff have identification numbers with which they can check out books. Parents may request their own patron barcode. Administration of the collection, including reports, bibliographies and overdue notices is handled through the library automation system.

Additionally, we have subscriptions to the New York Times online archive as well as 19 databases and ebooks through INFOTRAC. Through our website students can search our own collection from home as well as access the collection at the San Francisco Public Library. These systems not only help the circulation process and provide an ever-widening range of research opportunities, but also allow students to develop basicdata base search skills which they will continue to use throughout their lives.

All 19 desktop computers in the library provide access to the database software and the Internet. They are also networked to the school’s main server and e-mail server to allow students to access their own files, work on current projects and save their work all from a workstation in the center. We also have several laptops with wireless connections to these services.

The library/media center has a state of the art audiovisual system for projecting films and DVDs in the center itself. This system can also be connected to a laptop.

The Librarians continue to monitor new technologies that will further enhance the center’s support of the school philosophy and program.