Interested in knowing more about Pat Scales? Click here to read about her career and her time at Montevallo.
The Pat Scales Special Collection is a research collection of children’s and young adult literature. Founded in 2016, the collection is the direct result of a donation by Ms. Scales, who donated over 4,000 books and other materials to Carmichael Library at the University of Montevallo. The collection includes signed, first edition Newbery and Caldecott Award books, interactive (pop-up) books, children’s books of historical significance, intellectual freedom papers, correspondence, and marginalia.
The mission of the Pat Scales Special Collection is to promote individual and collaborative study and research of children’s and young adult literature, both on campus and in the wider educational and scholarly community.
Pat Scales is a retired middle school and high school librarian whose work has been featured in countless professional journals and on television. Pat is well-known nationally as an advocate of children’s and young adult literature and intellectual freedom. She has served for many years on the prestigious Newbery, Caldecott, and Wilder Award Committees and has also served as president of the Association of Library Service for Children, a division of the American Library Association. She has been recognized with numerous national awards, including the 1983 AASL/SIRS Intellectual Freedom Award, the 2002 ALA Movers & Shakers award, and the 2016 ALSC Distinguished Service Award.
Pat is an accomplished author whose works include Teaching Banned Books: Twelve Guides for Young Readers, Books Under Fire: A Hit List of Banned and Challenged Children’s Books, and most recently, Encourage Reading from the Start: Essays, Articles, and Interviews from the Field. She is a columnist for School Library Journal and for the Random House website, and is a regular contributor to Book Links magazine.
During her lifetime, Pat has amassed a large collection of specialized children’s and young adult books and has donated a large number of these books to her alma mater, the University of Montevallo. Her generous donations form the core of Carmichael Library’s circulating collection of young people’s books, which is used extensively by Education majors, as well as the Pat Scales Special Collection, which houses a research collection of children’s and young adult literature and related materials.
Materials added to the Pat Scales Special Collections will be:
*The Library may retain potentially controversial subject matter material for a designated amount of time to see if it is challenged.
The Library will not add duplicates to the Special Collection unless the book is in better condition than the copy currently in the collection (in which case the Library will retain both). Donations given to the Library become the property of the University; materials not selected for inclusion in the Pat Scales Special Collections may be added to the Circulating collection, or may be sold, donated or discarded at the discretion of the Library. In accordance with our more general gift policy, the Library is unable to provide appraisals of donations.
The Pat Scales Special Collections Room is located on the second floor of Carmichael Library. The reading room includes secure stacks, exhibit cases, reading tables and chairs, internet access and power sources, and reading chairs. The room is available for use by appointment during daytime hours, Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Special requests to use the room for events will be taken under consideration by the Library Director and the University Archivist.
If you would like to schedule an appointment to use the room or view materials in the collection, email the University Archivist.
Many children's and YA books can be found in Carmichael Library's circulating Youth Collection, Pat Scales Special Collection, and Archives and Special Collections. The lists below, built using TeachingBooks, feature books from these collections and include call numbers as well as links to instructional resources.
TeachingBooks is online database of thousands of multimedia resources you can use to explore children's and young adult books and their authors. The resource collection includes short movies, audio book readings, book discussion guides, lesson plans, and more. This database is provided statewide through the Alabama Virtual Library or directly here: https://www.teachingbooks.net/. Also, you can find it in the library database listing.
Note: You can also view the lists in an A to Z format.