Pamela Dear, Library Media Specialist Maureen Lutar, Library Paraprofessional

Welcome to Baldwin Middle School Library Media Center!  We have about 21,000 volumes in the media center with online access to the catalog and the internet. 

The primary purpose of the library media center is to ensure that every student has the opportunity to become an independent, effective, responsible, and creative user of ideas and information.  These skills and attributes are necessary for personal success and participation in an ever-changing society.

Abraham Baldwin Middle School in Guilford, Connecticut, was completed in 1970.  The first librarian was Ruth C. Hill and she noted in a report that "in September <the library> was an immense room with a chair, a card table, a portable typewriter and stacks of boxes full of books."  In December 1970 the library had about 2000 volumes ready for the shelves.  By June 1971, the collection had grown to 3382 volumes, five years of periodicals, 239 filmstrips, 43 teaching units and 30 film loops.

Mrs. Hill also recorded that on a slow day as few as 275 students used the media center.  Apparently the record was 760 students in one day.  Since there weren't that many students attending the school, it meant that many of the students visited the media center more than once that day.

Although the library media center has changed dramatically over the years, the initial goals and spirit of the program still continue today.  Ruth Hill reported to the school district that "the educational goal of a middle school library program is to acquaint students with the wide variety of library resources and to develop the skills necessary to use them in retrieving, correlating, comparing and evaluating information; to help develop the ability to work independently or in small group situations; and to encourage the growth of reading abilities and appreciations."

On January 16, 1980, the Abraham Baldwin Middle School Library Media Center was dedicated to Ruth C. Hill in recognition of her years of service.

Angela Bartolini was the Library Media Specialist from September 1979 to June 1984.

Nancy P. Gruhn was the Library Media Specialist at Baldwin from September 1984 until December 2002. Her enthusiasm and dedication to making the media center at Baldwin the heart of the curriculum, created the bustling hive of activity that Baldwin enjoys today.

Nancy Gruhn teaches information literacy classes in fall 2001.

Currently, Pamela F. Dear is the Library Media Specialist at Baldwin. She continuing the traditions of excellence established by her predecessors as well as moving the media center into the information age of technology.

During the first part of 2003, the technology push within the district purchased many computers so that by October 2003 the Baldwin Library Media Center housed 56 computers for the students to use with their classes or during study hall. In the fall of 2007, Baldwin acquired a mobile computer lab (30 laptops) that the teachers can sign up to use in their classrooms. With this acquisition, Baldwin became a wireless facility and entered the 21st century. Fall 2008 brought another mobile computer lab to the media center as well as four Macintosh computers with iMovie capabilities. As teachers enhance more and more lessons plans with technology, the mobile labs and desktop computers are in constant use.