‘From a Goosebumps book’ – Seminole County’s skeleton crew libraries

The doors to Tuskawilla Middle School open on a recent Thursday morning, and a crush of waiting Titans pile onto the Oviedo campus. 

Students mostly head for the open courtyard to talk with friends or the cafeteria for breakfast, but dozens begin peeling off from the crowd, opting instead to come into the school’s library. A small sign out front announces that the media center is now open Tuesdays and Thursdays in the morning: “Come on in – the library is waiting for you!” it beckons. 

Seventh graders Owen Franz and Murphy Parker come inside, pull up a chair and begin a game of Uno. Last year, the library was closed due to budget cuts, remodeling – and a lack of librarians.

“The media center being open to the students to use in the morning, that’s new,” Franz says. 

“I think it’s really cool how they have a place where people can get books and play games with their friends,” Parker adds. “Instead of everyone being on their phones the whole time.”

The media center is open because volunteers with the Tuskawilla Middle School Parent Teacher Student Association are staffing the library’s hours in the morning two days a week. The goal would be to have enough volunteers to reopen the library five days a week in the mornings. 

“When I found out that the library was not open, it broke my heart,” said PTSA volunteer Kristen Smeir. “It was kinda something from a Goosebumps book, like the abandoned library.”

Tuskawilla Middle School is not alone. In fact, the majority of schools in Seminole County have no one paid to work in the media centers full-time or part-time; most Seminole County Public School libraries and media centers ran without a designated media specialist or paraprofessional last year. At best, teachers bring their classes to the library.  

Some of the schools without a media professional haven’t been able to properly maintain their library collections, or keep the library open during certain hours of the day as a result.

Out of the 58 traditional K-12 public schools in Seminole County, only 17 pay an employee to work in the media center at all. Of those, just nine are media paraprofessionals or media specialists, according to SCPS records obtained by Oviedo Community News. 

Hagerty High School in Oviedo is the only school in the county with a certified full-time media specialist, or librarian, according to the data.  

Which Seminole County schools have media center staffing?

School	Job Title	FTE	Salary
Midway Elementary School	Media Paraprofessional	1	$24,160.00
Wekiva Elementary School	Media Paraprofessional	1	$23,112.00
Lake Mary Elementary School	Media Paraprofessional	1	$23,112.00
Hagerty High School	Media Paraprofessional	1	$63,242.22
Crooms Academy	Media Paraprofessional	2	$22,482.00
Oviedo High School	Teacher	.5	$27,101.02
Stenstrom Elementary School	Media Paraprofessional	.5	$11,556.00
Carillon Elementary School	Media Paraprofessional	1	$22,912.00
Seminole High School	Assistant Technical 188	1	$22,482.00
Red Bug Elementary School	Media Paraprofessional	1	$23,112.00
Geneva Elementary School	Media Paraprofessional	1	$22,912.00
Tuskawilla Middle School	Assistant Technical 188	1	$22,482.00
Lake Brantley High School	Network Spec Sch	1	$53,223.00
Seminole High School	Assistant Technical 188	1	$22,482.00
Teague Middle School	Assistant Technical 188	1	$22,482.00
Sterling Park Elementary School	Assistant Technical 188	1	$22,912.00
Lawton Elementary School	Assistant Technical 188	1	$23,112.00

Seminole County Public Schools Chair Kristine Kraus said as much as she would love to have a media specialist in every school, the county needs teachers more. She said the school board should not be getting involved in the staffing decisions at the school level. 

She wants principals to have the authority to make the best budget decisions for each school. 

“I can’t change how a principal allocates their dollars,” Kraus said. “We have limited resources. The needs are greater than what the budget is.”

Seminole County has faced multiple years of declining enrollments as more parents opt to take vouchers for private and homeschool. 

“In a perfect world, we would have enough funding that every school could have a media specialist,” Kraus said. “But in this world, with this budget, it’s just not always possible. I also don’t want to take autonomy away from the principals in the schools. They know best.”

The number of books checked out during the most recent school year is trending downward. In the 2023-24 school year, 401,984 items were checked out of the library. That number dropped to 385,953 in the most recent school year. 

School Year	Library Circulation
2022-2023	398,482
2023-2024	401,984
2024-2025	385,953

Nationwide, according to an analysis of school librarian data from the San Jose University in California, the number of schools in Florida that do not have a full-time equivalent librarian spiked in the 2023-24 year, the most recent year available. Florida ranks around the middle of the pack of states with data on school librarians, with Washington D.C. and South Carolina having the highest ratios, and California and South Dakota having the lowest. 

A media paraprofessional serves the role of a media specialist, but may not have all the certifications a media specialist does. Media specialists must either have a certification as an educational media specialist for pre-K-12 or have a valid Florida teaching certificate with a plan to obtain the specialist certification within two years, along with a minimum of six hours in media specialist course work in management, cataloging, reference or literature.

By comparison, Orange County Public Schools has 205 full-time certified library media specialists within its 213 schools, according to OCPS media relations administrator Michael Ollendorff.

A records request was submitted by OCN inquiring how many Seminole public schools do not have designated media specialists, paraprofessionals, or any other title that would fit the role of monitoring and upkeeping books throughout SCPS media centers.

The records request was submitted on Nov. 14, 2024 and an incomplete response was transmitted to OCN on Feb. 27, 2025. Complete data detailing funding for Seminole County Public School staff was received by OCN on June 7, 2025. All information of the request was received June 17, 2025.

According to the report, full-time media specialists receive a salary ranging from $39,000 to $69,500. Paraprofessionals’ salaries range from $11,556 for a part-time position to $24,160 across the four types of paraprofessional positions.

Crnkovich wrote that an upside of not having a designated media specialist in some schools is giving volunteers more of an opportunity to help out.

“Knowing that there is this need in our schools it is a wonderful way to engage community, parent, and student volunteers. Some schools have also created a library club for students to support the school library program, which provides leadership opportunities for students,” Crnkovich wrote.

Without volunteers, school libraries ‘stay closed’

Heather Zimmerman, a leading volunteer for Lawton Chiles Middle School, is one of several people keeping the library running. 

Being a middle school with no media specialist or paraprofessional, the library works through volunteers, as of last school year. She said the volunteer librarian position at LCMS involves volunteers coming in to help during mornings and during lunch periods.

“If we don’t have volunteers there at lunch, then [the library] basically stays closed,” Zimmerman said. 

The library has operated this way for the last three academic years, Zimmerman said. LCMS has installed a Little Free Library outside of the school for students to use, especially when the school library is closed.

Dr. Melissa Laudani, principal of LCMS, said she has witnessed schools in Seminole that don’t have a librarian or volunteers to run it. She said in those schools, the only time the library is open is when teachers open it to take their class there. 

The lack of volunteers available is something that Zimmerman and the LCMS Parent Teacher Student Association have noticed.

“We’ve seen a huge decline in the last two years of just volunteers that are available during the day to come in,” Zimmerman said. “It seems like across Seminole County, there is a need for volunteers. That daytime volunteer has become scarce.”

Crnkovich wrote that SCPS has been consistent in its media center staffing over the last five years.

Zimmerman said she has been a volunteer at the LCMS library since 2022. Since the end of 2024, she has overseen all the volunteer staff in the Lawton Chiles school library.

The library isn’t just a place for students to get books. 

“Just providing spaces for students to be students, providing those safe places where they can see a smiling face, because that might be the only smiling face they see all day,” Zimmerman said.

Zimmerman’s mother was a teacher and her son attended LCMS, so she said she had a natural calling to get involved and help students.

“Sometimes we see the same kids come in day after day and sometimes they come in and they take a breath and go, ‘Oh, I’m so glad it’s you here today,’” Zimmerman said.

She said it also serves as a place for kids to have an adult ask them something as simple as how their day is going.

“We know that we have students that are coming from struggling situations and parents that work a lot of hours to be able to be in this area, and so it’s always just been very important for the PTSA to provide those spaces that kids can have access to adults that will just ask them how their day was,” Zimmerman said.

Some of the library volunteers have certain kids stop by just to say hello to them, Zimmerman said. These positive connections are made, however, with people who are not permanent staff.

“I think it’s sad that our schools don’t have librarians anymore,” Zimmerman said. “Like I said, I don’t know the cause and I don’t know the fix for that, but it makes me sad that our schools don’t have this ability, and I know we’re not the only one.” 

When asked what disadvantages could come from not having a designated person operating a school library or media center, Crnkovich listed a few.

“Student access is potentially limited, and students and staff do not have a professional library resource who can recommend reading materials, teach best research practices, and support the use of technology,” Crnkovich wrote.

When asked who monitors inventory in school libraries without a designated specialist, Crnkovich wrote that support is provided through the SCPS Instructional Resources Department, which meets with school administration teams to reorganize books based on ways that would best benefit students. 

Crnkovich said the department also monitors collection development and analysis of books. This involves conducting circulation analysis and reviewing books on the basis of to “assess collections for representation across different cultures, perspectives, and genres.”

As the 2025-2026 academic year begins, it’s not clear what the future of some SCPS libraries and media centers could look like.

“There’s not as much social interaction in the world now, but it’s still important, and our kids want it,” Zimmerman said. “So having the library open at lunchtime, it’s another space on campus where kids can just come. It’s a break from the roar of the middle school lunchroom.” 

Tuskawilla ‘blessed’ with library volunteers 

Back at Tuskawilla Middle School, students line up and bring books to get checked out: “Scarlet,” “This Is Just a Test,” and “Wires Crossed,” to name a few.

PTSA Volunteer Katy Leach said the second day of being open was much busier. They had students check out books on Tuesday, and turn them back in on a Thursday. 

As Leach beckoned students into the media center, one student walked by the library, looked over and said: “We have a library?”

“We are very lucky that our PTA can work well with the administration,” Leach said. “You hear horror stories of some PTAs that the administration doesn’t want them in the school at all. We work so well together.”

One student asks if the library can get “The Summer I Turned Pretty,” the book that’s the basis for the hit show streaming on Amazon. Volunteers have the students write down the titles they want on a blank sheet, which ultimately goes to Principal Randy Shuler for approval. 

Shuler is the one in charge of the school’s budget.

“For the most part, [the media center] was closed last year,” Shuler said. “Unfortunately, one area that we have to take away from was the media center to cover the clinic and things that have … more of a necessity for kids to have access to.” 

One possible solution? More students in recent years are utilizing digital book-checkouts, and in the 2024-2025 school year, over 600,000 books were checked out digitally across three platforms in the county’s public schools. 

While Orange County has more media specialists than Seminole County, physical book checkouts are on the decline in Orange County as well, according to the Orlando Sentinel. 

Shuler said the school has been “blessed” to have the PTSA get involved and help reopen the library in the mornings. Other schools are trying to find ways to keep libraries open for students. 

“This is one creative way, and a lot of other schools are finding creative ways to open their media centers,” Shuler said. “It’s nice to have this collaboration with the parents. … I know not every school has PTSAs that are as giving as this one, so we’re just very fortunate here.” 

For Smeir, the PTSA volunteer at Tuskawilla who was staffing the library recently, she said she hopes more people take notice of what’s happening at the school. 

“Hopefully they bring it back. Reading’s important,” Smeir said. “Maybe the county will realize and the state will realize how important it is for them to reopen those positions.” 

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Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly identified a PTSA volunteer. It also incorrectly identified the principal of Tuskawilla Middle School.