Norwell Schools: Library Link

According to MLS, Norwell High School was the top user of Gale databases in Massachusetts in FY 2024, compared to other public high schools of similar size. NHS students accessed Gale databases 17,881 times (views) in 2023-24, with enrollment at Norwell High School at approximately 601 students.

The only other Massachusetts high schools who had more database use had at least twice the enrollment of NHS. Here is a sample of the data:

Needham High School 18,037 views (1,645 students)

Beverly High School 18,460 views (1,250 students)

Brookline High School 27,612 views (2,181 students)

Weymouth High School 31,000 views (1,679 students)

Our K-12 library curriculum prepares our students well for high school research and beyond. Students in Norwell learn databases beginning in grade 4.

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"Massachusetts State Databases FY 2024." Massachusetts Library System, guides.masslibsystem.org/databases/FY2024. Accessed 16 Mar. 2025.

Databases are the primary way students do research in the 21st century. They provide fact-checked professional sources for students to do high quality research for school projects. Book excerpts, journal articles, images, videos, audio files, magazine and newspaper articles, and more can be found in the databases pictured above (visit https://www.galepages.com/?loc=mlin_s_norhs).

But databases are not free. Our database vendor, Gale, sells subscriptions that many school districts would not be able to afford on their own. However, the Massachusetts Library System (MLS) and the Library Board of Commissioners (MBLC) supports school and public libraries in many ways, and subscribes to these databases with their own funding. MLS then provides these subscriptions to individual public schools--as long as there is a licensed school library media specialist in each school.

Our librarians in each of our Norwell Public Schools have to recertify with MLS every year to show that we employ full-time, licensed library teachers in order to maintain access to these databases.

Cole and Vinal are the starting places for teaching database use to students. We teach citation and bibliography as early as 4th grade, using Gale in Context Elementary for research. With instruction every year, by 9th grade, students are well-prepared to achieve higher level work.

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"Statewide Databases." Massachusetts Libraries Board of Library Commissioners, mblc.state.ma.us/resource-sharing/database-licensing.php. Accessed 17 Mar. 2025.

"Statewide Databases: Home." Massachusetts Library System, guides.masslibsystem.org/databases. Accessed 17 Mar. 2025.

Last year, Vinal School swept the circulation statistics of all our schools; congratulations to Mrs. Cavanagh, who has been the school library teacher at Vinal for 10 years. Her circulations in 2023-24 topped 28,000 book checkouts! In addition, this statistic only includes print books, and not the additional checkouts on Sora, our e-book and audio book platform.

Cole School shines with the popular Cole School Book Challenge which has challenged students in grades 3, 4, and 5 to read as much as they can for 12 years. Ms. Ready emphasizes student choice for reading in the challenge, to make sure students are having fun (the key to lifelong reading enthusiasm). For 2023-2024, 122 students participated, reading almost 1,700 books for the challenge. Our top reader last year read 59 of them!

Thanks to a student support and academic enrichment grant (attained by our Director of Teaching, Learning, and Technology, Diane Provenzano), our school libraries were able to add more than 200 "Hi-Lo" books across all four schools to support students struggling with reading. "Hi-Lo" books are books that have high-interest topics, with lower reading levels to appeal to students who are working on their reading fluency. Our librarians are tracking the circulation of these books through the end of the 2024-25 school year to provide data on the grant and how it supported our students.

Cole School - Michelle Ready, michelle.ready@norwellschools.org

Vinal School - Mary Cavanagh, mary.cavanagh@norwellschools.org

Norwell Midde School - Andrea Lewis, andrea.lewis@norwellschools.org

Norwell High School - Jessica Kinsman, jessica.kinsman@norwellschools.org