Monday February 3, 2003: A distraught parent of a child enrolling in Year 7 at a brand new school phones talk-back radio host Steven Price, irate that the school's library is empty of anything except shelves. Steven Price is astounded.

The Warrior Librarian phones into the radio program and explains that the library cannot be operational from Day 1 of the school's opening, as that is the first day on duty for the Teacher Librarian - who then has many months of developing the collection before it is anywhere near functional.

The Warrior Librarian also explains that in addition to deciding which books are needed, then ordering them (which might take up to 3 months for delivery), they have to be 'processed' before being shelf ready. A very brief summary of the steps involved is given, together with the information that no additional assistance is provided for these tasks.

A short time later, the Director-General speaks on air, stating that there was no awareness of these issues. The D-G asks if 'the teacher' (ie the Warrior Librarian) would be willing to speak directly with the D-G.

The radio station rings back the Warrior Librarian, and passes on the message together with the appropriate phone numbers. It should be noted at this stage that the Code of Conduct specifically prohibits school staff speaking with the media outside specific guidelines.

The Warrior Librarian makes numerous phone calls to The Specified Representatives. Everyone is 'out', no one returns any phone calls, except for one relayed message: "she [The Warrior Librarian] got herself into this mess, she can get herself out of it". Thank you so much.

The Warrior Librarian contacts a colleague known to have similar concerns. The colleague states that as much as she would like to attend the proposed meeting as a 'witness', she is unable to attend for a [note long mumbled list of reasons]. The Department of Education Media Unit is contacted to set up an appointment with the Warrior Librarian, and possibly an observer.

The Warrior Librarian spends 90 minutes with the Director-General, presenting numerous statistics, reports and other information.

By the end of the year, a core collection listing in MS Excel format (for ease of ordering) for K-6 and another for years 7-12 is available to new schools on CD. By the end of the following year, the core collection listing is available to NSW government schools via the departmental intranet.

It should be noted that the Warrior Librarian herself was not invited (by the specific division responsible for the core collection list) to participate in its development.

Unfortunately that particular Director-General was replaced during A Radical Restructure shortly thereafter. The incoming D-G has not yet been approached to continue the planning outlined in the initial D-G meeting, due to the Warrior Librarian's other commitments. Follow-up is now listed as a high priority.

Postscript: At the end of Term 3 (of 4 terms) in 2004, the Warrior Librarian contacted the Foundation Principal of a new secondary school due to open at the start of the 2005 school year. She asked the Principal if a new teacher librarian had been appointed yet. She was told that the teacher librarian would be commencing at the start of the new school year, with the rest of the classroom teachers.

When asked if it might not be a good idea for the Teacher Librarian to start earlier so as to have a functional school library from Day 1, the Principal stated: "The school's library isn't one of my priorities". Two weeks after the school opened, the principal's photograph appeared in one of the local papers - pictured in front of a shelf of books. In what library, one might ask ...