Book Return Procedures

One of the most important policies that a school librarian must determine before school starts has to do with book return procedures. Having book return procedures can set the tone and pace of your entire day as a school librarian.

It might not seem like a big deal to the teacher when books are not returned ahead of when the class arrives. However, if you are stuck behind the desk checking in books while the class is in the media center, then you cannot properly do your job. You are needed at the shelves to help find and recommend books. Your presence, walking around the library, helps to increase your visibility and authority, and to build relationships with the students.

Here is my school’s procedure:

1.       In the classroom, students placed their books in a designated basket or bag when they were ready to have the books returned.

2.       On the day that the class is scheduled to come to the media center, the students must return their books at least one hour before the scheduled time. So, it was a student’s job to bring the basket or bag to the media center ahead of time.

3.       Either I or my assistant checked in all books before the class arrived. Then we checked to see which students had overdue books, and which students could check out.

It is important that the teachers and students have a classroom routine that matches your book return procedures. Either ask the teachers to make a bag/basket, or provide one for them.

Don’t worry if the teachers and students do not follow the rules during the first few weeks of school. There will be classes who forget to return their books before they come to the media center. It’s okay to excuse this once or twice, but firmly remind them about the rules and give them a time frame for when you will stop accepting late returns.

Your days will go much more smoothly once this procedure is learned and working correctly.