Founder's Library
Founders’ Library serves and supports all divisions of The Independence School. With two spacious, light-filled Reading Rooms, the Library can serve several classes of students at once. The staff of one professional librarian and two assistants provide instruction in the use of the Library’s resources and personalized guidance in the selection of reading materials.
Junior Reading Room
The Junior Reading Room is a fully automated library that offers an age-appropriate collection of 4200 volumes appealing to students for both research and pleasure reading. A mini-amphitheater called Writer’s Corner serves as a venue for story time, library skills, and literature-based videos shown on a large-screen projector. Students in kindergarten through grade 2 have regularly scheduled visits to the Junior Reading Room. Those in grades 1 and 2 are encouraged to drop in during the day to return and select books.
Young Adult Reading Room
The Young Adult Reading Room for grades 3 through 8, also fully automated, has ten state-of-the-art networked workstations with Internet access. A lounge offers a comfortable, informal reading area. All students are encouraged to take advantage of the Library’s flexible schedule to exchange their books and use resources as their individual schedules allow. Students in grade 3 are scheduled on a regular basis and are instructed in the use of library catalogue software. The 9500 volume book collection that serves the 3-8 curriculum has an extensive art research and American History collection.
Online Subscription Services
In addition to the book collection, the Young Adult Reading Room provides three subscription online services, SIRS Researcher, WebFind, and Britannica Online. These resources are also available to Independence families at home, free of charge, through remote access. Please contact the librarian to obtain user names and password access codes.
Britannica Online
Britannica Online contains three complete encyclopedias, Encyclopedia Britannica, Compton’s by Britannica, and Britannica Elementary Encyclopedia. This subscription offers students links to approved academic Internet sites for additional content as well as full text periodical articles. Britannica Online includes MLA bibliographic citations for all sources and links.
SIRS Discoverer
SIRS Discoverer Online is a general reference resource database for young researchers in grades 1 through 9, providing carefully selected full-text articles and images from over 1600 domestic and international newspapers, magazines and government documents.
WebFind
Discoverer WebFind offers high-quality Internet information from reputable sources such as leading universities and government agencies in a format that allows for easy searching and relevant results. This is a supplement to SIRS Discoverer.
Library Borrowing Policies
Book Limit: Kindergarten students may borrow one book at a time. Students in grades 1 through 8 may borrow a limit of three books at a time.
Books may be renewed twice; however, no renewals are allowed if the book has been placed on reserve for another student. Students must bring the book to the Library to renew it.
Fines: Books are circulated for seven days. There are no fines charged for late returns.
Overdue: Overdue notices are issued on Tuesday. Borrowing privileges are temporarily suspended when a student has an overdue book.
Lost books are billed at replacement cost.
