Type of Presentation

Individual paper/presentation

Target Audience

Higher Education

Location

Session Three Breakouts

Proposal

This year, as a result of a long core curriculum revision process, Information Literacy (IL) finally, for the first time, has been included in our university’s curriculum.

However, whereas most IL programs are delivered to students either in discrete IL courses or through IL-flagged content courses (in either the core curriculum, the major, or both), we had to settle for something different: the inclusion of IL learning objectives in our new curriculum is driven entirely by university assessment.

The Office of Accreditation and Assessment, in collaboration with academic departments and the Information and Research Literacy Implementation Committee identified four learning objectives of our new core curriculum that overlap with IL.

Courses identified as meeting those core objectives have been scheduled for assessment, putting in motion a process whereby departments and individual instructors collaborate with the Office of Accreditation and Assessment, the newly-formed Information and Research Literacy Advisory Committee, and, ideally, departmental subject librarians.

The explicit goal of this collaboration is to develop an assessment plan for the designated IL learning objective. However, as faculty and library leaders in the drive to include IL in the core, we see the assessment planning process as a means to achieve work that is more critical: ensuring that IL is taught explicitly, appropriately, and meaningfully.

In our presentation we will share our university’s unusual approach to IL via assessment, including the advantages and challenges of this approach.

Short Description

This year, as a result of a long core curriculum revision process, Information Literacy (IL) finally, for the first time, has been included in our university’s curriculum. However, we had to settle for something different than the typical course-centered approach: the inclusion of IL learning objectives in our new curriculum is driven entirely by assessment. In our presentation we will share our university’s unusual approach to IL via assessment, including the advantages and challenges of this approach.

Keywords

Information Literacy; Assessment; Collaboration; Core Curriculum; Learning Objectives

Publication Type and Release Option

Presentation (Open Access)

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Mar 26th, 11:45 AM Mar 26th, 12:15 PM

An Unconventional Union: Promoting Information Literacy through Assessment

Session Three Breakouts

This year, as a result of a long core curriculum revision process, Information Literacy (IL) finally, for the first time, has been included in our university’s curriculum.

However, whereas most IL programs are delivered to students either in discrete IL courses or through IL-flagged content courses (in either the core curriculum, the major, or both), we had to settle for something different: the inclusion of IL learning objectives in our new curriculum is driven entirely by university assessment.

The Office of Accreditation and Assessment, in collaboration with academic departments and the Information and Research Literacy Implementation Committee identified four learning objectives of our new core curriculum that overlap with IL.

Courses identified as meeting those core objectives have been scheduled for assessment, putting in motion a process whereby departments and individual instructors collaborate with the Office of Accreditation and Assessment, the newly-formed Information and Research Literacy Advisory Committee, and, ideally, departmental subject librarians.

The explicit goal of this collaboration is to develop an assessment plan for the designated IL learning objective. However, as faculty and library leaders in the drive to include IL in the core, we see the assessment planning process as a means to achieve work that is more critical: ensuring that IL is taught explicitly, appropriately, and meaningfully.

In our presentation we will share our university’s unusual approach to IL via assessment, including the advantages and challenges of this approach.