Attitudes of School Librarians toward the Inclusion of Graphic Novels in School Library Collections

This study describes the responses in interviews of five school librarians toward including graphic novels in their school's library. Each was presented with a set of 12 graphic novels and asked to determine if she would collect them, would not collect them, or was not certain. The librarians were willing overall to have graphic novels in school libraries. Their decisions were based on the age group of students that they served. However, their comments suggested unfamiliarity with the visual-verbal format and criteria for evaluation. Further research on visual-verbal literacy needs to be completed and publicized, and librarians need to be educated about the skills necessary to read words and pictures together