Building and maintaining a high quality, diverse collection of materials is one of the most critical responsibilities of any school librarian. At the CSW Library, we strive to choose titles that offer a wide variety of viewpoints and allow our students to see themselves reflected within the pages of a book, all while offering materials that reflect the complexity and nuance of identities and personal stories. These principles are guided by the American Library Association's Library Bill of Rights and the National Council of Teachers of English Students’ Right to Read. Additionally, we are guided in principle by the deeply held belief that reading has the power to transform readers' lives; it is critically important that our students have access to books that reflect their own life experiences, as well as those that expose them to experiences that are different from their own. 

In the Winter of 2021, the CSW Library decided to measure how well our choices reflect the diverse and vibrant interests of our community by conducting our first Diversity, Equity and Inclusion audit of the library's fiction and graphic novel collections. This report includes a description of the factors we used in our completion of the audit and a summary of what we have learned about our collection, where there are holes, and where we can see future growth in diversity of authorship and protagonists' identities. Our last section, Implementing the Audit, provides key directives the CSW Library will use in evaluating and purchasing materials moving forward, weeding of outdated or problematic materials, and specific catalog enhancements with an eye toward strengthening our collection for The Cambridge School community.

Conducting DEI audits is an ongoing process and we will continue to use them to evaluate other parts of our collection. By providing transparency about our audit process and communicating our findings, we hope to signal to our readers that we are committed to building an inclusive library program.