In the age of accountability, all organizations need proof that what they do matters. Funders want facts, policymakers demand measurable progress. So when iSchool researcher Eliza Dresang, recipient of an Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) National Leadership Planning grant, gathered a group of public librarians from across the state and asked them what they’d like to see on her research agenda, the reply was unanimous.

“They all said early literacy,” says the noted scholar, who holds the endowed Beverly Cleary Professorship in Children and Youth Services at the iSchool. “They really wanted to know if what they were doing at their libraries was making a difference or not.”

Dresang found that research connecting libraries’ early literacy efforts and children’s readiness to read was scarce to non-existent. She dug into the subject and, with state and national research partners, produced an authoritative white paper examining current research and practice and asking “Where do we go from here?”

That widely-publicized paper was a leading influence in the IMLS move to turn its  own research lens on early literacy and, in June this year, publish the influential report “Growing Young Minds: How Museums and Libraries Create Lifelong Learners.” The report calls on policymakers to recognize museums and libraries as mainstream partners in the national conversation on early literacy. In too many communities, “museums and libraries are not ‘at the table’ helping to craft the policies and practices that link children and their families to early learning resources,” the report states.

Dresang provided not only grist and inspiration for the IMLS report, she was a major behind-scenes player, serving as one of the key advisers and commenting on early drafts. “They wanted advice on how to develop it and what was important about it,” says the iSchool professor, author of the much-cited “Radical Change: Books for Youth in a Digital Age.”

The IMLS report points to the urgency of addressing the pressing issue of early literacy. Studies show too many American children – particularly children of poverty – enter kindergarten without reading-ready skills and once they fall behind, many never catch up. “Kindergarten is too late, children need to start earlier,” says Dresang.  “Schools can’t do that, but other agencies can.”

Even in Washington state, nearly half of young children enter kindergarten with inadequate skills in language, communication, and literacy. But Washington-based organizations, including the Early Learning Public Library Partnership, the Foundation of Early Leaning, and the Washington State Library, are aggressively tackling the problem. The IMLS report highlights their determined efforts in a section called “Success Spotlights,” which also describes how the iSchool answered state library leaders’ call for evidence-based program evaluations by developing pioneering research on library storytimes.

“The IMLS report has many examples and case studies that show great programs going on in libraries and museums, but ours is the only research study,” says Dresang, who led the storytime study with funding from a three-year IMLS National Leadership Research grant.

Bringing hard-core research rigor to the corner of the library where children ages 0-5 wiggle and giggle and clap and gasp at storytime was no easy task. “It is very difficult to design research studies in informal learning situations, because you can’t count on who is going to be there,” says Dresang.

The study was a massive undertaking. Dresang needed a large, random sampling of libraries from every corner of the state. She also needed enough researchers to collect data from those 40 libraries. Dresang invited her on-campus and on-line students to participate in her graduate research seminar class, and provided volunteers with measurement tools that allowed them to reliably, consistently code children’s interactions and reactions during storytime. “It’s not typical for masters students to be involved in actual research projects – not where you are actually going to use the data,” says Dresang.

In year two, the iSchool team observed 20 libraries in a control group and 20 in an experimental group that used evidence-based tools and training based on year-one data. The new techniques concentrated on children’s acquisition of letter knowledge and phonological awareness – the skills most important for beginning readers. “Librarians and children in the experimental group showed statistically significant improvement in these two goals and their behavioral indicators while the control group did not,” says Dresang. “What that said to us is that you can purposefully focus on these early learning principles in storytime and it will impact the program and the children. There is no other study that has shown this.”

By the end of the data collection, her research team had logged 24,000 miles, and observed and coded 240 storytimes. That wouldn’t have been possible, Dresang says, without the cooperation of the librarians and the dedication of her volunteer iSchool students.

Dresang is now in her third year of the grant, with another ambitious agenda. Her research team, partnered with state library organizations, is building a website where tools developed in the research project can be posted for public use. Dresang is also connecting the libraries in the study with the schools where the children will attend kindergarten. “We want to see if we can help schools and libraries work together and establish liaisons.”

Meanwhile, the state library system is making preparations to provide training for all libraries based on the planning and evaluation tools developed for the iSchool storytime research. Facts are finally in hand. “Everyone thinks storytimes are good. They have lasted for over 100 years,” says Dresang. “But we are moving into an age where it’s not enough to say we know they are good, we have to know why they are good, how they are good, and if there is a way to make them better. And I think, with this study, we have found that there is a way to make them even more effective.”