Teaching Analytic Thinking: Bridging the Gap between Student Skills and Professional Needs in Information Science

Abstract

Research methods and statistics have gone in and out of fashion as important subject matter for information science master's students. There continue to be classic reasons for studying these subjects professionalism, practical problem solving, and understanding the research process - as well as new, probably more powerful forces that require students to learn these materials. A cohort of 232 information science master's students at the University at Albany, State University of New York, indicated their mathematical skills, undergraduate majors, and confidence in their statistical abilities in surveys conducted over six academic semesters. Their responses, as well as changes in software packages, World Wide Web information, distance learning, and business approaches to information dissemination, strongly indicate that statistics and research methods should be required course materials in information science master's programs today.