Publication Date
2-15-2019
Document Type
Presentation
Abstract
Information literacy became formally shaped by the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) in the late 1990s with the creation of the Information Literacy Standards for Higher Education. James Madison University adopted the Standards as learning outcomes into its general education program at that time. We continue to evolve our program to forge foundational skills for all entering students, and are in the process of moving towards the new ACRL Framework.
JMU is committed to an outcomes and assessment model of general education. For the information literacy learning domain, we’ve created a course-embedded, tutorial-test model. Thanks to the partnership between the General Education Program, the Libraries and the Center for Assessment and Research Studies (CARS), we can state that every first-year student who arrives at JMU will demonstrate information literacy competencies in their first academic year.
This model allows us to demonstrate that entering students do not arrive with information literacy skills and assert that students retain these skills beyond the first year. Once the students enter their major, they will meet their subject-specialist librarian who will build on the competencies built in General Education with skills that are specific to a discipline. CARS expertise and library liaisons work together on tests for majors, as well as, rubrics that evaluate students’ information literacy competencies in their work.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Clarke, Kathy E.; Hazard, Gretchen A.; and Leventhal, Brian C., "Critical Information Literacy: From General Education to the Major How Assessment Shapes Competencies and Student Learning" (2019). Libraries. 160.
https://commons.lib.jmu.edu/letfspubs/160
