A Tessa Transition!

As many of you know, long time CCBC Director KT Horning will be retiring this summer after a long and distinguished career. Friday, we heard the news that a new Director has been chosen. 

Dear Colleagues, 

I write to you today about a transition at the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) in our senior leadership team.  Assistant State Superintendent Tessa Michaelson Schmidt will be leaving her leadership role at the DPI in the Division for Libraries and Technology for a leadership role in one of our partners at the UW Madison.  I will let Tessa tell you more here: 

“I have made the difficult decision to leave DPI and resign from my appointment as Assistant State Superintendent as of June 10, 2022. I have been selected as the next director of the Cooperative Children’s Book Center (CCBC), a library of the UW’s School of Education.

Throughout my career, I have had one foot in libraries and one foot in education. The heart of my work has always centered on the transformative power of books for children and young adults. In this new  role, I will continue to support Wisconsin educators and librarians and their efforts to provide access to high quality, diverse,  and inspiring reading materials. 

As a bit of history, the CCBC was created in 1963 as a “cooperative activity” between the UW and DPI with the purpose of having a book examination library to serve the campus and the statewide professional community. Nearly 60 years later, the CCBC plays a national role in identifying and tracking diversity statistics related to children’s publishing as well as providing critical intellectual freedom services to Wisconsin school and public libraries facing book challenges. I am honored to be selected as the next leader of this library following the current director’s retirement. Thank you for your attention and understanding. It is a privilege to be an agency leader, and I thank you for your support.”

We are happy for Tessa and sorry to see her leave. But we know she is taking on a leadership role at our major partner in children’s and adolescent literature. It reassures me to know that Tessa will continue her advocacy for children’s reading material that brings them joy, opens their worlds, and provides windows and mirrors for them to see themselves and others.  She led us, with others, to continued strength at the DPI in this sad time of calls to ban, censor, and remove books; calls that ignore strong local policies related to the selection and reconsideration of library materials, as well as related guidelines and procedures. As leader of CCBC, Tessa will grow as our partner for all children in their exploration of the written word and their growth as readers and humans.  Our gratitude to Tessa for all her work over the last ten plus years at the DPI. 

At this point, transition planning is occurring.  We will be going through a recruitment process for a new Assistant State Superintendent for DLT. If you have any suggestions or questions, please reach out to me.

Sincerely,

 

John W. Johnson, PhD

Deputy State Superintendent

Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

The youth librarians of Wisconsin and WLA’s Youth Service Section offer our sincere congratulations to our colleague Tessa!