Engaging Conversation: Evaluating the Contribution of Library Instruction to the Quality of Student Research

Abstract

The study discussed in this article compared research papers before and after implementation of an inquiry-based library instruction program to assess the program's effectiveness and consider its future development. The new program appears to have made a small difference in the types of materials students chose and how they found them. Little change was seen in how students used their sources. The evaluation has fostered increased collaboration between the library and the English department, and suggests that the programs can be further improved by providing more training for instructors and placing greater emphasis on the rhetorical approach to research.his study was designed to examine the impact of a new library instruction program on the research processes of students in a first-year writing course. Three years after replacing a tool-based library instruction program with one based on inquiry, the authors ask what difference the new program makes and how the next steps can be designed to help students develop information literacy.In 1998, the library instruction program for first-year students at the University of New Mexico consisted of a series of workshops designed to teach users how to use research tools such as the online catalog, the most-used online indexes, and the Web. The program was a remnant of the early days of publicly available information technology when many students, staff, and faculty, familiar with the card catalog and printed indexes, were eager to learn how to use the new electronic versions of these tools. However, interest ebbed and these tool-based workshops were sparsely attended. Students who came to the university already familiar with computers assumed they could figure out how to work the systems on their own. Except where faculty required attendance, the library's certificate of completion had little appeal. And because more students used the Internet to do research before they came to the university, they saw little need for the tools the library could offer. These students came to campus highly computer literate, not realizing they were information illiterate.Across the nation, librarians had noticed similar trends. In 1989, the ALA's College & Research Libraries November 2002Presidential Committee on Information Literacy issued a report explaining the importance of information literacy to democracy in an information age. 1The report defined information-literate people as "those who have learned how to learn.[T]hey know how knowledge is organized, how to find information, and how to use information in such a way that others can learn from them." Librarians began to reduce emphasis on research tools and focus more on research processes and critical thinking, eventually publishing the Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education in January of 2000. 2It was in this context, with the availability of information resources outpacing the students' ability to sort and evaluate them, that the library approached the English department with a proposal to have each Engl...

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“…Numerous examples of such collaboration exist (Emmons and Martin, 2002;McCartin and Feid, 2001;Zhang, 2001;Huerta and McMillan, 2000;Farber, 1999;Evenbeck andWilliams, 1998, Clark, 1995;Gaunt and Nash, 1992, etc.). As Winner (1998) writes, librarians need to continuously:…”

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“…Where summative evaluations have been done, results suggest that undergraduates' grades and program completion rates improve as a result of IL instruction (Greer, Weston, & Alm, 1991;Hardesty, Lovrich, & Mannon, 1982;Selegan, Thomas, & Richman, 1983). Research also indicates that instruction increases students' ability to search effectively and to select relevant information sources (Emmons & Martin, 2002). It appears that library services are being modified as a result of systematic assessment (Seamans, 2002).…”

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“…Nevertheless, the authors conclude that the session was helpful because it fostered more communication between the librarians and English faculty members. Librarians now meet with English instructors to demonstrate the session they will be giving to students and discuss effective library-related assignments (Emmons and Wanda 2002). Librarians at Washington State University studied the bibliographies of students in a freshman seminar in order to determine if students were using librarian-constructed resource guides for the class that supplemented a library orientation session.…”

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