EASTHAMPTON — Easthampton High School’s sole librarian Nicholas Ames has resigned from his role overseeing the school’s media center — a space he says has turned into a cellphone hot spot — after the School Committee denied his request for a one-year, unpaid leave of absence.
Ames confirmed with the Gazette that he resigned on Monday, following a School Committee meeting this past Tuesday, July 21, where the request was rejected. Superintendent Michelle Balch said there is now a job posting open for the role, officially titled librarian and media specialist.
In his leave request sent to Balch late last month, Ames wrote, “stepping away for a period of time is necessary for my professional well-being and long-term effectiveness as an educator.”
“We definitely appreciated him as a librarian at Easthampton High School,” Balch said. “He developed some really great relationships with students.”
Ames, who could not be reached for further comment this week, previously told the Gazette that students often use their phones inappropriately when visiting the library. They also pop in to chat with him and other students. Since starting in the district four years ago, he said the number of students checking out books on their own has dwindled to just one or two a month.
“Students frequently use their phones to take photos of other students’ work in order to complete their own, use AI providers to complete their work, engage in bullying and harassment of other students and communicate inappropriately with their peer network and various family members, oftentimes using FaceTime,” Ames wrote.
Addressing these “ongoing challenges” became a frequent task that fell to Ames as the library’s supervisor, which he said is not a part of the job description.
School Committee Chair Laura Scott said Ames’ request was discussed by the committee in executive session, under Massachusetts General Law Chapter 30A, Section 21, which allows discussions that could impact personnel to happen privately.
Scott said she could not discuss the School Committee’s decision in depth, but noted it was assumed that Ames’ vacancy would have left the library empty for the upcoming school year, if the leave was accepted.
Leave requests are typically filed by employees seeking a sabbatical or time for professional development or education, Scott said. The committee first determines whether the request is for paid or unpaid leave, then evaluates the reasoning behind it and any potential impact on the district.
In Ames’ case, Scott said the letter didn’t speak to either of those factors directly and because of that, the committee was left to consider what the harm to students would be.
Cellphone ban?
Ames’ main concern and possible solution to student misuse of phones in the library is the lack of a “clearly enforced and consistent” bell-to-bell cellphone ban in the high school.
“The library, by its nature, is intended to be a space for focused reading, research and academic work,” Ames wrote. “Without a structured policy that is applied uniformly across the building, maintaining that environment has become a significant and daily challenge.”
Scott said she appreciates where Ames is coming from, but when it comes to cellphones, she feels that “abstention is not the answer,” and schools need to teach students how to use cellphones in a healthy way.
“We are sitting in a time where the way that we consume information and media is rapidly changing … not every person does that in the same way,” Scott said. “I think there is a reasonable level of concern that people have. I share that concern. What I want to make sure we do is moderate our response to those concerns.”
School Committee member Sam Hunter, who chairs the policy subcommittee, said the school’s current cellphone policy was developed with a lot of student input. Current policy at the high school restricts students from having their phones out during the day and teachers can let students use them when necessary. There are a lot of students with individualized education programs (IEPs) and English language learners who need phones as part of their education, Hunter said.
“There’s not an easy way to compromise on topics like this one but my hope is that if we’re going to make any sort of change to the cellphone policy, I would really want this to be student driven because it’s their school,” Hunter said.
A weakness of the current high school policy, Hunter said, is it relies on teachers to build a relationship with students to figure out what is best for both. It may be beneficial to offer more guidance to teachers to help them establish that boundary, he added.
Both Scott and Hunter said that if the district enforced a policy now, that does not align with the anticipated bell-to-bell ban making its way through Beacon Hill, it could be a waste of time and money. Hunter said cellphone policy will likely keep changing in the future, but generally feels it should be left to communities to decide.
“I have not been happy with the Legislature’s leadership on school funding in recent years and municipal funding and it really upsets me that one thing they have decided they can legislate is cellphone policy,” Hunter said.
As far as the future of the library goes, Hunter said he likes that it can be used as a third-space, where students can go to do work, hang out with friends and use technology.
“Our library is like a lot of school libraries and is not just a place to read books,” Hunter said. “Kids need more of these third spaces and see each other face to face to share ideas with each other.”
