The Certain Standards in Context

Abstract

The Certain Standards ( report of the National Education Association's Committee on Library Organization and equipment, chairman: C. C. Certain) were adopted by the NEA in 1917, and also approved by the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools, and by ALA, who published them in 1920. Concerned with secondary school libraries, the standards were only advisory, but formed the basis of state and regional accreditation standards in the USA for over twenty years, and to British school librarians will seem remarkably practical and enlightened for their day. In particular, recommendations on the centralization in the library of audio-visual media suggest an early and authoritative source for the materials centre concept of today. The article traces the development of the school library art, and in particular the use of audio- visual materials, up to the publication of the standards, from the "school district libraries" of the 1830s to the rapid burgeoning in the 1890s and after. Quotations from the period illustrate the rapid growth of professionally-run school libraries, and the growing interest of teachers and librarians in audio-visual materials. The important contributions of C. C. Certain and Mary E. Hall are assessed, and the standards compared briefly with three contcmporancous publications.