1. As Good As It Gets…For Now:
Assessing Information Literacy in the General Education Curriculum
Research Question
Process/Workflow
To what degree do students in the Introduction to Public Speaking class meet the student learning outcomes for information literacy in the general education curriculum?
Related Inquiries:
Do students’ levels of information literacy increase from the first to the second speech assignment?
How do students in Introduction to Public Speaking compare to English Composition students with regard to information literacy skills?
Summer 2014
Campus team decides on an annotated bibliography as the artifact to assess students’ levels of information literacy in selected Intro to Public Speaking (IPS) courses in the fall semester. Seven sections of IPS are selected to participate, instructors are contacted, and the assignment is developed.
Fall 2014
Assessment rubric is developed. Collaboration with instructors on procedures to distribute and collect the assignment. Selected sections receive additional resources and tutorials in the learning management system.
Winter 2014
Norming session leads to slight revision of the rubric. 110 annotated bibliographies are assessed for selection of appropriate keywords, identification of access/databases, and evaluation of sources. Campus team decides to add English Composition students
in the spring for comparison.
Spring 2015
Nine sections of IPS and five sections of English Comp are participating in the project. Norming session again leads to slight revision of the rubric. 168 annotated bibliographies (108/IPS; 60/English Comp) are assessed. Consultation of institutional data to compare participating students to others.
Results
Observations
There is no clear explanation for the improvement in keyword development among IPS students from fall to spring. Familiarity with the assignment from the fall potentially increased buy-in from faculty and led to stronger integration of information literacy into classroom activities in the spring. A slight revision of the rubric also may have played a role.
Scaffolding of the assignment in English Composition seems to make a difference on the ”Access" outcome.
Students in each course struggled to meet the "Evaluation" outcome.
distinguished
Fall 2014
Spring 2015
proficient
Recurring Themes in Relevant Areas of Research
developing
emerging
A comparison of Public Speaking students’ performance in three areas of information literacy between their first and second assignments in fall and spring semester, as well as an overall comparison to English Comp students.
Conclusions and Project Outcomes
This project provided a great starting point for strategically embedding information literacy (IL) into the general education curriculum. More collaboration is necessary with faculty within the courses to integrate IL instructional content made available to them in our learning management system.
University Libraries took a leadership role within the campus assessment program through this project. The identification of areas of improvement for students continues to serve as a conversation starter for campus partners within general education.
Spring 2015
The Institutional Picture
Institutional data indicates that course grades for students participating in the selected sections for the project were statistically higher than for those in other sections of IPS and English Comp: 0.19 (fall) to 0.26 higher (spring) for IPS, and 0.46 (almost half a grade point) higher for the English Comp sections. Overall , the average grade in participating sections was in the “B” range, whereas it was in the “C” range for other sections.
For a list of sources addressing the above themes, please see our handout or contact our team leader.
Team Leader and Contact: Dr. Beate Gersch, Coordinator of Instruction Services, University of Akron Libraries;
Team Members: Sabrina Andrews, Director, Office of Institutional Research; Dr. Janet Bean, Associate Professor of English; Dr. Shelley Blundell, Instructional Design Librarian, University of Akron Libraries; Dr. Andrea Ferraro, Visiting Lecturer, School of Communication (former Coordinator of Gen Ed Speech Instruction); Wendy Lampner, Manager, Office of Design & Development; Dr. Joe Salem, Associate Dean for Learning, Undergraduate Services and Commonwealth Campus Libraries, Pennsylvania State University (former Head of Research and Learning Services, University of Akron Libraries); Dr. Dudley Turner, Associate Professor of Communication.
“Assessment in Action: Academic Libraries and Student Success” is undertaken by the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) in partnership with the Association for Institutional Research and the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities. The program, a cornerstone of ACRL’s Value of Academic Libraries initiative, is made possible by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (