Information and digital literacy in education via the digital path

Libraries have long counted up the books on their shelves to show their value. That meant Harvard University’s library (with 18.9-million books) was clearly superior to Duke University’s (with 6.1-million volumes) or University of California at Riverside’s (with a mere 3 million titles).

These days, though, libraries are finding new ways to measure their worth. They’re counting how many times students use electronic library resources or visit in person, and comparing that to how well the students do in their classes and how likely they are to stay in school and earn a degree. And many library leaders are finding a strong correlation, meaning that students who consume more library materials tend to be more successful academically.

May 2019 marks five years since I completed the practicum to earn a Master of Science degree in Library Media Education (LME) from Western Kentucky University. The LME Practicum requires 120 field hours—with 40 of these hours being completed in a school library media/educational technology center under the supervision of an experienced library media/educational technology specialist.

The goal of the LME Practicum is for graduate students to be able to apply library media education skills in instruction, technology, collaboration, and administration under the supervision of a certified school librarian. Performance is assessed using the supervising media specialist evaluation, video conferencing, student time log, practicum evidence presentation, and a practicum reflection. Not much has changed regarding the practicum and its requirements since my experience five years ago. What has changed is the fact that I am no longer the one completing the practicum. Now, I am the supervising librarian.

There is currently a dearth of research on African American college students and their interactions in academic libraries. The purpose of this quantitative study is to investigate whether African American college students view academic libraries as welcoming places and to identify factors that are most influential in their perceptions of welcomeness. Adopting the theoretical lens of “library in the life of the user,” we administered a national online survey questionnaire to 160 black college students attending non-historically black colleges and universities in the United States. The survey data were analyzed by employing correlation coefficient and multiple regression analysis to test our hypotheses. The analytical results showed that participants felt welcomed in academic libraries, and library as place and information needs were significant factors that affected students’ perceptions of welcomeness. Our findings suggest that library patrons are important actors in constituting the atmospheric character of the library.

Students at our public, urban community college were experiencing difficulties finding correct, consistent answers to their questions about navigating college processes, information students needed to succeed in school. These difficulties were fueled not only by our students’ backgrounds—they are often the first generation in their family to attend college, may require additional academic preparation, or lack support for their higher education dreams—but also by the siloed information environment prevalent in academia. When our college president realized the extent of student challenges in this area, she looked to the college’s librarians, campus experts in knowledge organization and provision, for direction with a knowledge management initiative to support our students.

Knowledge management can be broadly thought of as the ways institutional knowledge is gathered, organized, and made available in coordinated ways that are useful to the organization. Along with Student Affairs, the Library co-led the development of a collegewide knowledge base, the goal of which was to provide students and other users, including college faculty and staff, with the correct answer to common questions. The Library hired a part-time metadata librarian originally just for this project, but that librarian was later appointed full-time faculty while continuing to manage daily operation of the knowledge base.

Now in its fifth year, the collaborative Ask LaGuardia knowledge base has become an institution at the college. Usage has grown. Librarians involved in knowledge

While the role of the library has evolved to provide services from internet access to journalism programmes, countless libraries still face closure, as civic leaders fail to recognise the critical social, intellectual, cultural, and economic roles they play