Information Literacy Assessment

Abstract

Is it possible to administer an information literacy assessment in only a few classes that would provide essential, adequate, data from semester to semester? In a college with a student body of about 2,000, would it be possible to obtain actionable assessment results if only 150 to 200 students were assessed each semester? This article is the result of the creation and implementation of the information literacy assessment that was launched in the fall of 2009 by Savage Library at Western State College of Colorado (WSC). WSC changed its name to Western State Colorado University on August 1, 2012. The authors of this article, a librarian and a lecturer in English, collaborated closely to embed the information literacy assessment into multiple sections of the second-year writing class required for all Western students. This article presents an overview of the information literacy (IL) assessment and an analysis of the data obtained from the assessment. The article also provides an overview of how to embed IL instruction and IL assessment into the classroom to improve student skills in critical thinking, IL, public speaking, and research and persuasive writing. Through a specific case study in which IL instruction and assessment was used in multiple sections of the same second-year required writing course (COTH 202: Academic Writing and Inquiry), a broader set of implications is suggested for the usefulness and relevancy of the IL assessment in almost any academic course, regardless of the discipline. One model for how librarians and faculty might collaborate by incorporating IL instruction and assessment in a classroom setting is presented. This particular collaboration resulted in a substantial improvement in student learning outcomes as well as an easy-to-use formative method of assessing and then adjusting IL instruction as it is situated in a required writing course. OBJECTIVES Because the college had established IL as an essential general education requirement to ensure that students were achieving a proficient level of IL skills, the Communications and Theater program (COTH) committed itself to embedding library instruction into a class that was required for graduation. COTH 202: Academic Writing and Inquiry is a research writing and public speaking class where students learned scholarly research skills, wrote research papers, and communicated the results of their research in front of the class using a variety of media. IL was one of the learning outcomes specified for this class as well as for the COTH program. By expanding the number of classes receiving IL instruction, by ensuring that every student received information literacy by embedding this instruction in the required COTH 202 classes, and by assessing IL skills and making changes to the IL program based upon data from the assessments, it was expected that IL skills would increase from semester to semester. In the fall of 2008, Savage Library set out to create its student IL assessment. Assessment questions from several IL assessments formulated by colleges and universities throughout the country provided excellent models from which the library created its assessment questions. Each question was tied to one or more learning outcomes from ACRLs list of five IL standards and eighty-seven learning outcomes. (1) The assessment comprised fifty questions worth ten points each. The majority of the questions were from ACRL Standards 1-3. Relatively few questions were linked to Standards 4 and 5 because those standards are difficult or impossible to operationalize and assess quantitatively. It was up to the faculty to assess those standards by grading assignments according to rubrics established by the COTH program. It was our goal to have an assessment that would be a tool to improve IL instruction from semester to semester and a measure of how well the program achieved national standards by mapping each question to ACRLs IL competencies. …