Legislature Week 7 & IEA's Library Committee

In this episode, we discuss Week 7 of the Idaho Legislature, including final legislative approval of Idaho's first voucher bill, House Bill 93. We also talk to IEA member and Rigby High School librarian, Heidi Robbins, about the impact of 2024 library legislation and IEA's new Library Committee.

Host: Mike Journee

Transcript

Unknown: 0:00

Music.

Mike Journee: 0:12

Welcome to the IAEA reporter podcast, a regular discussion about the news and events important to Idaho Education Association members and those who value public education. IEA members are public school educators from all over the state and members of the largest union in Idaho. They're Idaho's most important education experts, and they use their influence to fight for a free, quality and equitable public education for every student in the state. I'm Mike Journee, communications director at DIA and I'll be your host for this episode. Today, we talked to Heidi Robbins, an IEA member and school librarian in Rigby, Idaho, who is chairperson of the IEA new library committee, which was created at IEA annual delegate Assembly last April. We discussed 2020 four's house code 710 better known as the library bill, which gives anyone the right to question the availability of books in school or community libraries that they deem inappropriate or offensive. But first, a quick summary of what happened this week during the 2025 legislature with IAEA political director, Chris Perry. Chris Perry, welcome back to the IAEA reporter podcast, and let's take a quick look at what's happened at the Idaho legislature for the over the past several days, we haven't done an update like this for a couple of weeks, and so there's been a lot of movement on some important bills for IAEA members, anybody who's been paying attention to the news over the past few days, have has heard that the Idaho Senate approved House Bill 93 on a 20 to 15 vote. That was the final legislative approval of what would be Idaho's first voucher legislation. It is a tax credit bill brought forward by Representative Wendy Horman out of Idaho, falls, and that bill has gone through. And it's, it's, it's been a really unfortunate process to watch this bill come through, Chris, not you and I have talked about this number of times there. The bill has zero accountability measures that Governor little called for in his State of the State address at the beginning of the legislative session. And in fact, we're leaning on, we're asking members to to call the governor's office and veto this bill.

Chris Parri: 2:34

Yeah, it's a bad bill. I mean, there's no way around it. It. I think it's bad, even by voucher standards, which is a unique accomplishment, but I guess after you've failed, you know, upwards of 15 times to get something like this done, you don't really end up with the best version of it when it it makes it out of the legislature for the first time. So, yeah, it's a really bad bill. Doesn't have any accountability in it. There's kind of no way to contort your mind into thinking that it fits the standards laid out by the governor of fair, accountable, reasonable and transparent. It's not fair. It will, most of this money will go to people who are already in private schools. It's not accountable. There's no like enforcement on, you know, making sure that private schools actually like serve students. It's not responsible for the same reason. There's no like reporting back. It doesn't hold people to account to like Idaho values at all. Like it allows people just to freely discriminate using taxpayer dollars, and then clearly not transparent either. Because if we could figure out what some of these private schools are actually teaching, using these these public dollars to be even more of a public outcry. So right now, we are in the midst of that public outcry. I think that this is one of those issues that it's, you know, it's not just the education groups that are really concerned about it. This one is really broken containment and gone. Kind of universal. People are just really mad about this legislation across the board. You know, our polling showed that 94% of people wanted at least background checks if we were going to go down this road. 94% like, I feel like the other 6% are the people who voted for it in the legislature. So, yeah, it's not a good bill. It's headed to the governor's desk. We are trying to get members and other folks to contact the governor and ask for that veto.

Unknown: 4:27

And yeah, it's, it's been a rough couple weeks.

Mike Journee: 4:32

Well, I, you know, I want to point out that vote comes after tremendous pressure from the voucher lobby, the National voucher lobby that have been spending millions of dollars in Idaho on elections and spending millions of dollars lobbying lawmakers on this, on this, on trying to get vouchers in Idaho. Hats off to you for the turnout that we have had in opposition. Hats off to the lawmakers who have resisted that. You know, a.

Unknown: 5:00

Veto proof. I'm sorry, veto sustaining minority is available to the governor if he decides to veto this bill, according to the votes of both the House and the Senate, we're the last red state in the country that doesn't have some kind of a voucher program. And Chris, that's Hats off to your the hard work that you've been doing over the past few years, as well as the influence of the IEA, so. So hats off to you guys and for this work. But we do want to kill this bill, and I'm just going to put put out there right now. And for those who are interested in reading more, we will have they can go to Idaho, ea.org, backslash news, and read more about this legislation, but, but I wanted to put the governor's email address in here, and also his phone number and encourage people to call right away and tell the governor to beat those legislation. His email address is governor@gov.idaho.gov a little bit redundant, but that's where it is.And then the phone number is 208334210, 3342100, call, email, let them know that it's time to veto this legislation.

Chris Parri: 6:08

And you mentioned the vote counts on these things, I want to point out exactly how close is. So you know, in the in the house, it was, I think, 28 to 42 I believe, and and then in the Senate, it was 20 to 15. Those numbers can be a little bit seething, because it's only half of the difference that you need to make up to kill one of these bills. So on the Senate, if you look at that, you need we lost in the Senate by three votes, essentially three, which is certainly in the margin of error, almost in, like a primary election, right? Like, if there's any sign that those, those primary elections have a massive impact on education policy, this is the one you should take. Because if had we won three of the primary seats that that we wanted to last, May, wewould have beaten vouchers yet again, right? There's a reason that the the pro voucher group spent $2 million trying to get a couple wins here. And to be honest, their record is not that great on winning. They spent $2 million and, you know, and got barely enough seats to get vouchers done, right? This is not like a overwhelming victory for them

Mike Journee: 7:20

and and I think we can see that sentiment too, just in the reaction that we've had to our social media posts on Ida social media channels regarding this, people are sharing, people are liking, people are commenting. People are are it's it's something that we also know that that especially on the House Committee, the emails that the that the committees received and that lawmakers received were nine to one saying, don't pass this bill.

Chris Parri: 7:46

It's worse than nine to one. It was like 93% or something. We're against it. It's just absolutely ridiculous. Like, you know, I hope people don't get cynical, like, we should keep reaching out to people. And, yeah, it is pretty crazy when you get 93% of folks to say, don't do this, and then they just do it. So no worries there. If people are feeling a little bit grumpy, me too,

Mike Journee: 8:05

and that's, and that's, you know, I think that that's testament to the to the out of state influence here and what's going on, and the fact that this is not done the Idaho way, as the governor called for in his State of the State dress well, we got some other territory we want to cover, so I want to move on, but I do want to encourage people to go ahead and make those calls and emails to the governor to encourage them to do the right thing with this legislation. Another bill that's been that we've been following Chris that directly impacts the IEA, is a union busting bill that's been brought forward. It was passed by the House last week, and in awaits a hearing in the Senate side. This is a union bus to go through and through it would really impact the way IEA members are able to collaborate with their with their school districts. It really hampers their ability to do the work of the Union. And in fact, one provision of it would take away union members ability to pay their dues via payroll deduction, and so, of course, that's something that the IEA has been working on diligently over the past year and a half. Everyone who is listening who has not converted to IEA auto pay to pay their union dues. They need to do so right away, please, so that the impact of this bill will be as minimal as possible on their union, you can go to idahoea.org and and under the member section, you can go down to Idaho IEA auto pay and find all the information you need about convertingthat bill is waiting a hearing Chris on the Senate side. We're not sure when that will happen, but we'll be keeping an eye on that.

Chris Parri: 9:40

Yeah, yeah, if and when that bill moves forward, we will let members know, and there'll be actions we can take. But like you said, it's just a bad bill. Get your apparel deduction for no real reason other than it, the people that sponsored it and the groups pushing it hit unions, every union the state is lined up in opposition against it, along with the school administrators who view this as like it. It's a huge red flag, I think, for people, if the administrators are against it, they're on one side of the bargaining table. We're on the other side. So if, if it's a union busting bill that the administrators are against, then it actually has pretty broad impacts on school districts that even the administrators don't want to see. So this bill, there's no way around it. It hurts kids and it hurts teachers and it hurts administrators. This is just a bad bill pushed by an out of state group funded by billionaires. So, yeah, awful.

Mike Journee: 10:28

That's right, we'll be keeping an eye on all that members know. One other thing that I want to touch on before we wrap up is the fact that the I the legislature's budget committee, Jay Thacker, the Joint Finance and appropriations committee, has been talking about pay raises for state employees, which would include educators this year, a 5% pay raise is what's been discussed. Typically, these budget bills come come forward at the end of the session, after all, the policy has been drafted by the various committees, and then the Budget Committee will come through and fund the things that what the committee wants to fund, and at the levels that they want to fund, but the conversations right now are around a 5% pay increase and educators will be included. That's great news for our members, but even better news Chris is the fact that Senator Jim Woodward, out of North Idaho, is bringing a bill that could in better, that could improve that pay raise, the pay raise that educators received a few legislative sessions ago, the $6,359 average that was part of it was never put into the Idaho career ladder, the framework for funding educator pay in The state. And his bill would do that. And so that raise would then compound the 5% that that would they would raise if the bill for state pay rate, state pay raises goes through jfac, this is good news for educators. It's going to be more money in educators pockets all the way across the board, but we're really paying close attention to that.

Chris Parri: 12:00

Yeah. Huge shout out to Senator Woodward up in north Idaho. He's been probably one of the staunchest supporters of public education in this, in the entire legislature. And yeah, his bill is great. It gets it kind of the raises that that the legislature have. They've been funding the raises. But I think at the bargaining table, maybe some of our educators have experienced this. The school boards are a little bit hesitant to always, kind of grant an ongoing raise, if the decision is always up to the jfac committee to provide that money. So sometimes the school boards will agree to, like a, you know, a bonus. We'll see what the legislature does next year. This bill helps kind of some certainty that this money will be there, will be there for Educator pay, and then, like you said, we add 5% rate raise on top of that, and it goes to both educators and administrators, which I think is important. I think a lot of folks, I think are now more than ever, seeing the issues that we have with recruiting and retaining amazing administrators, and how important that is for a workplace as well. So yeah, I think this is, this is good. The Good News of the session is that it looks like educators and administrators will be able to to get some some extra money in their pockets. So

Mike Journee: 13:22

Well, Chris, that's all the topics we had to discuss this this week. I want to thank you again for joining us, and again, thank you for all the work that you're doing down at the State House on behalf of Ida members. It's been a it's been a monumental session so far, and a lot of ways groundbreaking, not necessarily in good ways, but but it is also something that that we're always, we're always on top of, and you've been doing just fine, fine work down there. So thank you for that.

Chris Parri: 13:47

Thanks, Mike. One last thing too, like, I want people to know, like, vouchers might go through. You know, there's attacks on unions, all of this stuff. Your union, the IEA, is not going anywhere. We don't exist because the government says we're we can we exist in spite often of the government. We exist because teachers want us to exist and that it's good for kids. It's good for school districts to have us there in collaborating with districts for the benefit of our communities and our students. I know it can feel hopeless sometimes, but we're not going anywhere. You guys aren't going anywhere. Your students aren't going anywhere. Keep your heads up. They want you to be discouraged, but it's up to us to not not be discouraged, to remain resilient and hopeful for the folks that need us. So keep that in mind. Keep fighting for you.

Mike Journee: 14:39

Well said, Chris, thank you, my friend. Talk to you soon. Next up on the IAEA reporter podcast, a discussion about 2020, four's House Bill 710 better known as the library Bill and I A's new library committee. Joining me is IEA member. And Rigby high school librarian. Heidi Robbins, well. Heidi Robbins, thank you for joining the IAEA reporter podcast and talking with us today about libraries and all the wonderful things that you guys are doing with IE library committee,

Heidi Robbins: 15:22

yeah, thank you for having me

Mike Journee: 15:26

so you're a school librarian in Rigby. Can you tell us a little bit about your library and how large it is, how many students you serve, that kind of thing?

Heidi Robbins: 15:34

Sure. Yeah. I am the librarian at Rigby High School. We are the only high school in our school district. We have 2100 students just over I'm the only one in the library, and I actually teach classes too. So it's it's a lot, it's a lot different than maybe some of the bigger schools in the Boise year Meridian area, which I love it, though it's great. Teaching classes keeps me grounded with kids sometimes, and we have a kind of a small collection. We have just over 6000 books, which isn't a lot for the size of school we have, but I've been the librarian. This is my third year here, and we have been working to update our collection with a lot of grants. We've been really lucky to get some grants, and it's great. We check out. Last year, we checked out just over 10,000 books, which is phenomenal for our little our little community. And, yeah,

Mike Journee: 16:29

well, that's fantastic. So tell me, I've always the idea of being librarian has always been so appealing to me. How did you get drawn to this profession? Why did you choose to do it?

Heidi Robbins: 16:39

So I lived in Washington state for a while, and in Washington State, you have to have done student teaching and get a certification to be a sub. So I was a certified teacher. So I got my sub certification, and I started working in my children's elementary school as a sub. And I subbed in the library a lot, and I met this amazing librarian, and she just, I've loved reading. I have I'm an English teacher, you know, and she just instilled this like excitement around librarianship, and she told me about the program that she went through at Central Washington University to get her certification. And I thought, why not? And so I did it. I got my master's degree through them. I never anticipated moving back to Idaho, where I grew up, but we ended up moving back, and I happened to move into a community that needed a certified librarian, which I wasn't expecting. And so I kind of just fell into it. I feel like it just, you know, Fate, Fate brought me here.

Mike Journee: 17:41

So, you know, I know just generally for educators, the past few years have been really, really difficult, you know, with the pandemic and coming out of the pandemic and how educators have have really kind of been centered on in these cultural wars that we're talking about in education policies these days. But one of the more surprising things for me has been how libraries and librarians have really been in the crosshairs of that more than any single group of educators. Probably, can you tell us a little bit about what the past few years have been like for you, having chosen a profession that you love and that find great value, and how has these past few years felt to you?

Heidi Robbins: 18:24

Yeah, I have my ups and downs. I love my job. I have the best job in the world. So many people say My dream job is to be a librarian. It's so great, but I really got into librarianship as all of this culture war type feeling is exploding, and so I really don't know a lot different. This has kind of been my whole librarian experience. There's a lot of fear. I talk to a lot of librarians. I try to collaborate. I really like to reach out and get to know other librarians, because it makes me feel less alone, because it isn't kind of a lonely job. And I would say that we're all kind of scared. I feel like I'm on the chopping block literally every year. I don't know if my job's gonna get cut. I know my admin values me. I know that my co workers value me. I know that my students value me. But that doesn't mean I don't feel afraid that my job is gonna get cut or that my funding is, you know, always going to be there. It's, it's really scary. And I think all librarians kind of feel that right now, not just in our state, but across the country. It's a, it's a scary place to be in. People feel very deeply their values, and when they feel like you're in the way of their values, it, it can be a scary place to be. Yeah, yeah,

Mike Journee: 19:43

that was really well said in the way of people's values, and that's kind of where things are. I think a lot of the angst that you're talking about really came about, really kind of crystallized, I think perhaps last legislative session with House Bill 70.

Heidi Robbins: 20:00

Me, and which has become known ubiquitously as the library bill. Unfortunately, Governor little signed into law. Would you talk a little bit about this law, what it does and and, well, then we'll talk about the impacts that it's having on you, on on you and your your fellow librarians, but talk a little bit about this law, what? Yeah, so this law makes it so anybody within a library community can request that a book be reconsidered for a collection and that the access for this book to minors be taken away. It does need to go through the library's reconsideration policy. Which every library should have a reconsideration policy. If they don't, they probably don't have a certified librarian. They probably don't have somebody educated in library, if they don't have it. So they should go through this reconsideration policy. If in the reconsideration guidelines, they decide that they don't want to move this to an adults only section, then the person who complained about it her or who submitted the reconsideration request, they are allowed to sue the library for up to $250 is what it says. But what people don't realize is they can also get damages on top of that. So if they say, this ruined my child's psyche, this caused my child to have to go to counseling, like all those things, those costs, can also come on top of of that, that lawsuit. So the library does have the option to move those books to an adults only section that cannot be accessed by minors.

Mike Journee: 21:37

And I guess one question that I have is, how many, how many school libraries have an adults only section?

Heidi Robbins: 21:44

None that I know of. I currently have a place that I would set it up if I needed to, but it would have to stay behind my circulation desk, and part of it would have to be none of my library. So I mentioned before that I'm the only person that runs my library. I don't have any aids, but I also teach two two hours of the day. I teach classes two out of the six hours. So I rely on library aids. Juniors and Seniors can sign up to aid in the library, and I train them, and they run the library for me while I'm teaching class. If a book was reconsidered and had to be put in an adult Swami section behind the circulation desk, they are not even allowed to touch it if they're not 18. So that would really put a damper on me being able to keep my library open.

Mike Journee: 22:29

So what was your initial reaction when you first heard about this bill? It seems it would seem to really chill Freedom ofInformation, freedom of speech, in a way that some of the bills authors might not have attended, or maybe they did, I don't know, but, but what was your reaction when you, when you, when you heard about this bill?

Heidi Robbins: 22:53

I think my first, my first reaction was,sadly, not surprised, because they tried other bills before that, right, that fortunately hadn't passed. So I was slightly hopeful, but also I was really scared. It's something that students would come and ask me about, and I tried to stay neutral as a teacher, as an educator, that's my job. But I would tell them what it meant, and I would have kids who would come to me and check daily as it was going through Congress, and they were like, has it passed? What's going on? Who do I need to call? I literally had students who were like, what do we need to do? And I would say, contact your legislator and let them know how you feel about it, like you get to decide. And the hardest, the hardest group of kids I have, I have some LGBTQ kids who would come to me daily because they are targeted in this bill, it does say that any LGBTQ content is considered explicit, and these kids felt attacks, and so they would come to me and they would ask me how it was going, and they were really scared. And I think for me, like it's hard, because I want to stand up for my kids. I'm in this job for those kids, and there's books I give to kids that they need, that I maybe even want to give them to my own children at home, because they don't need them. And so like, it's my job as a parent to decide what my own children read. It's my job as a librarian to have access to whatever information kids need. Those are two different roles, and I felt like those roles were getting crossed. I don't get to decide what is right or wrong for somebody else, and I don't want to have to decide that that is too much for me. And that feels like that's what this bill is trying to do, decide what's right and wrong for every child.

Mike Journee: 24:42

Heidi, what was the reaction to that legislation? Like in your school district, you mentioned you got really good support from your administration. Can you talk a little bit about what there did you see, anything from higher up, beyond your management of the library itself, about this legislation and any direction that you got? Yeah.

Heidi Robbins: 24:59

Yeah, so my district actually changed pretty drastically when I was first hired. We didn't have a very solid reconsideration policy for libraries. Specifically. We had a blanket one for curriculum, and libraries just kind of fell under that. And I talked to some higher ups at the district, and I said, we need to really change this. And they were a little reticent to do it. Instead, they instituted a library committee that had to approve every book for every school, and then it had to get approved by the school board. Now this is obviously a very tedious process. Each school had their own Committee. It it. I had$20,000 in grants the year we did it, and we were meeting all the time. My committee was so busy, and they were all volunteers, parents and teachers, and it took so much time. Well, when this bill passed, our district realized they actually did need a more solid reconsideration policy, so they put one in place, and we got rid of our library committee. I think that's actually a much better solution. It's, it's what every library should have. So that was actually a really positive thing for us, that we have that reconsideration policy, and I was able to talk through with some of my leadership before they made that policy. Our director of secondary education, she had talked to me in depth about what should be in a policy, and I felt very seen when it was written. So I do appreciate that. We also have, like I said, I have a space prepared for if and when we get a challenge. I have forms in my library. I have an enclosed bookshelf behind my circulation desk, so I'm ready when that challenge probably inevitably comes, unfortunately, but

Mike Journee: 26:39

it hasn't happened yet?

Heidi Robbins: 26:41

No, we haven't had, we haven't had any challenges escalated yet. As a librarian, I think every librarian, excuse me, I think every librarian will say they have had a parent upset about a book their kid read. And I will say I have it almost every year, and usually I'm able to talk to the parent and say, You know what upset you about this book? Okay? I completely, you know, I can empathize. I can understand, as a parent, there's certain things I don't want my child reading. I will try to keep an eye on that. For your kid, we do self checkout, so your kid is kind of in charge of their own checkout. But when they come in, if they say, you know, I really don't want a book that has a lot of language in it. I really don't want a book that has x, y, z in it, whatever it is, then I'm happy to point them to books that fit their needs, because that's my job. That's what I'm here for. And usually parents are actually really willing to talk. I haven't had any that have been too riled. I've had to meet with a principal in the room only one time, and luckily, he was level headed and helped me out, and we were able to come to terms. And I've never had to escalate beyond that, but I don't think that will be the case my whole career, not with the political climate we're in.

Mike Journee: 27:55

Yeah, that's a really that's a really great point. I mean, my next question was going to be, what are you hearing from parents about the changes? I mean, they have, I'm not sure if it's visible to them or not. Your students might need who have been paying attention to the bill might know. But are you hearing anything else from parents about this legislation?

Heidi Robbins: 28:16

I would say in my area, the people that know about it are the people who didn't want it. I feel like sometimes maybe we stay in our lane to our detriment. Sometimes people don't know what affects them until it actually affects them. And I think that's kind of the case with this bill. I think until they realize that if our school gets sued and we lose funding for certain things, they're not going to realize that it affects them. I have had conversations with lots of parents with all the other librarians in my district, so I'm the only certified librarian in my district. The rest are paras, and so as such, I try to support them as much as possible, and this has been a huge area where they've needed support, because there have been some schools where there have been parents a little bit more angry than what I've had to deal with, and I've been able to talk them through it, with how they deal with it, but also teaching them about what the bill actually means. We've had to teach admin, you know, like we don't actually pull books until there's an official challenge. We don't have to move them until there's an official challenge. So understanding what the law actually says is a little bit different than realizing that there is a lot in place.

Mike Journee: 29:27

It's really interesting because it sounds like your, your your school district was, was really thoughtful about their approach to this, how they how they developed the policies and everything, you know we had there. There are districts in Idaho that began pulling books right away. One here in the Treasure Valley is a big one that started doing that kind of thing. So that's really heartening to hear that they had a very thoughtful reaction to to the legislation and and, and I love hearing you say you're prepared. You got the forms, you got things there, you've got a section already ready to go, I'm sure. That that any of the other librarians and around the state who are listening this year are probably taking notes about that so so well done.

Unknown: 30:07

Thank you. Yeah, we were really lucky. I honestly wasn't sure which way my district would go, because I was so new, but I think we really lucked out, and I feel like I really do have a supportive community with the parents that I have talked to. But again, you don't, I don't know everyone. 2100 students is a lot, so we'll see what happens. Well, last year, you were a delegate to IEA delegate assembly, and you brought forward a new business item to form an IEA library committee. What was behind that was, was, was this part of the your kind of reaction to the legislation? And what else is behind that?

Heidi Robbins: 30:51

Yeah, it was definitely a reaction to this legislation. I It's kind of a funny little story. I am kind of new to the Union. This is my third year in it, the first year I was a librarian, I was like, I have to join. The year before, when I was a teacher, I was hired last minute, and it didn't even cross my mind, because I was trying to survive. But my first year as a librarian, I thought, there are these bills that are trying to come. I need to join. I need to have a group of people that I know have my back. So I joined, but I didn't really get involved. And then over the summer, I got involved, and I just loved it, and I met so many people, and I met Lane mcinelli, and he took me, like, to this leadership conference in Chicago, which is amazing. And then I decided to do delegate assembly. And at mini da, he and I were talking, and he was like, Are you going to do a new business item about libraries? And I said, Well, I kind of have this idea, but it's my first time. I don't even know how delegate assembly goes. I'm not sure if I should do it or not. And he was like, why not just try it? And I said, Okay, I'll jump in. So I decided to just make this committee. My reason behind making the committee was to give librarians within the IEA, a support system. I have mentioned that I'm the only certified librarian in my school district. I did get one of my para librarians did join the IEA this year, which makes me really excited, but a lot of parents don't want to because they don't make enough money, and so I wanted, I wanted them to feel like, okay, there is a reason for me to join. There's a reason for me to be there. But then also I wanted those who are already members to feel like I'm seen within the union. A lot of the things that we hear about within the IEA have to do with classroom teachers, which is amazing. We have so many classroom teachers, and we need to support them, but we as librarians, are islands. We're islands in our schools, sometimes islands in our district, and we need a support system that that we can go to when we have questions, when we don't know how to deal with this bill, when we don't know a book to recommend a student, even something that's simple, this committee is what that's for. We do book talks. We are going to do a talk about grants. We're going to do talks about all these different things and anything that's an important to a topic to librarians. We want to talk about it, and we want to bring librarians together.

Mike Journee: 33:08

How's it going so far? What, what is our what has been the reaction so far? Are you getting people who are interested and and participating?

Heidi Robbins: 33:17

Yeah, we are. It's a slow burn. I feel like, at first, you know, people are really excited, and then they realize how busy they are. But we have solid members of the committee. We have people literally on every area of the state who are part of this committee, and I'm hearing that they want to keep it going. So that's my plan for delegate Assembly this year, is to do another new business item to keep this library committee going, because last year's it made it last for a year. So we want to, we want to keep it going, and we just want to grow it. We I want people from every region represented on our committee, so anybody listening, if they're interested. I, I would love to have more involvement. But we also do our monthly book chats that any librarian can jump on at any time for 10 minutes, if they want to and talk about books, or if they have something else they really need to talk about. We're here for it. We're open to it. And then we're going to have quarterly chats about different topics. I mentioned grants. We have some other topics that we would like to talk about, and anything that librarians need support with. That's, that's what we want to do, and we just want to keep it going.

Mike Journee: 34:25

Yeah, I was going to mention I heard that you guys had a session coming up about grant writing and getting, and grants are an important part of what you do. You've written them several times just so far, and so it's, I would imagine that's going to be a topic that people would be really interested in.

Heidi Robbins: 34:41

Yeah, I have a unique situation. I have great admins, but I have zero funding, so my budget is literally no money unless I can raise it myself. So to me, that's a challenge, and I write grants constantly, so it's a topic that I so very deeply, and I know a lot of librarians, even if they have a budget, maybe. Be it's a couple $100 that they can buy 10 books, if they're lucky. So I know that's not enough, so it's a really important topic.

Mike Journee: 35:09

Great. Have you or your colleagues discussed ways to push back and advocate for students access to books? I mean, either part of this committee or in other ways, is that something that's an ongoing conversation with you guys?

Heidi Robbins: 35:21

Yeah, within the committee, we've had conversations about what every school is doing. How are how are you handling things? How are you talking to administrators? I think a lot of a lot of my colleagues across the state, maybe have administrators who don't understand libraries or the need for libraries. Maybe they don't understand the need for students to be able to read whatever they want, things like that. So we have been able to help share what we're doing, which I think is a really great resource. What's working and what isn't working. In other districts, you can't always fix the problem for them, but maybe you can even just offering support, saying, Hey, we're here if you need to talk it through. I know that there, you know, there is a lawsuit right now going on, and I have talked to people as that was going around since I don't have any challenges in my district. I wasn't super helpful, but I was able to talk through things with them. And I know, you know, as librarians, we're all trying to do what we can to get kids access to the books they need. And I think just hearing that other people are not pulling books if we don't have to, and other people are displaying books that maybe are a little bit more controversial and that it's going okay, gives others the courage to keep pushing through. I

Mike Journee: 36:38

was going to ask you how you mentioned in your your district, so far, your in your library, so far, there hasn't really been any challenges. What are you hearing a lot of challenges from, from across the state. Is, uh, from your colleagues. It

Heidi Robbins: 36:53

really depends on the region they're from. I think a lot of people know the regions that are having the most challenges, or the districts that are having the most challenges. I think it's very concentrated right now. Do I think there's a possibility of it spreading? Of course, I do, but I do for the most part, it seems like it is concentrated in certain areas. And I don't think it's hard for anybody to do a little search and find out books that are being banned in Idaho and where they're being banned. The interesting thing is that it sometimes brings conversations with students. They'll pick up a book, and I'll be like, oh my goodness, did you know this was just banned in Idaho, in another area, and they'll be like, why? And I'll say, I have no idea. Why don't you read it and tell me what you think. And then they love it, like, there's there's books that I love, that I'm floored are being banned in certain areas, and it makes kids excited to read them. I mean, obviously I know which kids are going to be okay with them and which aren't, but that's my job, and it's kind of made some great conversation starters.

Mike Journee: 37:50

Yeah, that's fantastic. You just made my thing.So tell us a little bit about how anybody who's interested in getting involved with the library committee. Tell us a little bit about how they can do that.

Heidi Robbins: 38:01

Yeah, if anybody's interested in being on the library committee or even just joining our chats, if you want to shoot me an email, I am happy to share my email address. It's kind of long. It's my full name, Heidi Maxine robbins@yahoo.com, H, E, I D, I m, a, x, I N, E, R, O, B, B, I N, s@yahoo.com, if you shoot me an email, I am happy to invite you to our next committee meeting. If you just want to join our chats, we are trying to send those out. We send out QR codes. We try to share it on social media. We're going to try to create a Facebook page just for librarians within the IEA, and we will share that. It's going to be a private group. That way you have the ability to ask questions and have a safe space so not just anybody can see what we're talking about, because sometimes there's sensitive topics that you fear for your job or your fear for your view from the community, those are some things we're going to do. So please be watching for that. And if you're at delegate assembly, please find me. I will be presenting a new business item in for this committee, and I would be so happy to talk libraries with you, or just hear from somebody that's like, thank you. I'm in this fight too. Like, I just want to, I want to connect with you if you're a librarian or if you are a teacher that just loves your librarian. I want to hear from you

Mike Journee: 39:20

that's fantastic. And feeling you'll probably have a few folks take you up on that. So that's that's wonderful. Heidi, thank you so much for the conversation. Thank you so much for what you do on a day to day basis. Thank you for your involvement with the IAEA and your union. You're doing fantastic work and and it couldn't be any more important than it is right now to do what you do. And so thank you for standing up for students. Thank you for standing up for for freedom of ideas and freedom of expression and for for everything you do every day.

Heidi Robbins: 39:53

Well, thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. You.

Mike Journee: 40:01

thank you for listening to this episode of The IEA reporter podcast, and thanks to IEA member Heidi Robbins and IEA political director Chris Perry for joining us. Please watch for updates about new podcast episodes on IAEA social media channels or sign up to receive IAEA reporter emailed updates on our website@idahoea.org I'm Mike Journee, and as always, I hope you join me in thanking Idaho's public school educators for everything they do for our State students, families and public schools. You