I believe my fellow Nebraskan Warren Buffett could find the resources for David Rothman’s modest proposal:
Andrew Carnegie was a social Darwinian. He wanted to give the fittest the tools to rise to the top. Public libraries — as spreaders of skills, knowledge and culture — advanced his goal.
Often hailed as Carnegie II, Bill Gates is if nothing else a champion of standardized testing and other forms of meritocracy. So here’s a not-so-modest proposal for one of planet Earth’s richest people, now worth around $78.5 billion.
Update Carnegie’s vision. Work toward a national digital library endowment, which, as I’ll show, could boost K-12 test scores.
The endowment could help buy e-books and other items and finance the hiring and professional development of school and juvenile librarians and family literacy workers in the very poorest areas. It could also narrow the library-related digital divide — $38 tablets already exist, and better econo-models for e-books are ahead.
Michael Sauers is the Director of Logan Library in Logan, UT. Prior to this he was one of the founding staff and Technology Manager for Do Space in Omaha, NE. After earning his MLS in 1995 from the University at Albany's School of Information Science and Policy Michael spent his first 20 years as a librarian training other librarians in technology along with time as a public library trustee, a bookstore manager for a library friends group, a reference librarian, a technology consultant, and a bookseller. He has written dozens of articles for various journals and magazines and has published 14 books ranging from library technology, blogging, Web design, and an index to a popular horror magazine. In his spare time, he blogs at TravelinLibrarian.info, runs The Collector's Guide to Dean Koontz website at CollectingKoontz.com, takes many, many photos, and typically reads more than 100 books a year.
Unless otherwise stated, all opinions are my own and are not to be considered those of the City of Logan, UT.
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I believe my fellow Nebraskan Warren Buffett could find the resources for David Rothman’s modest proposal: