No Magic in the Evening Hours: Academic Library INFO LIT Workshops

Tracking usage is something all libraries need to do to ensure they are meeting patron/student demand for resources and services.  We attempt to track everything we possibly can, and I can't imagine any library that doesn't attempt to do the same.  Although we have had numbers decline in areas such as circulation and other predictable areas (in recent years), our foot traffic and building usage has increased quite a bit.  Our library, which services around 1200 liberal arts students, is the social and academic center in the evening hours on this primarily residential campus.  Over the past few years we have noticed that our busiest hour, in terms of library building traffic, (calculated by headcounts and gate counter) lies somewhere between 7:30pm and 9pm, Mon-Thurs.

Logan Library Schreiner University

Having offered drop-in lunchtime workshops in the past that were mildly successful, we thought that we would offer a series of "information literacy" or library workshops throughout the spring term that would span in focus from the very basic (finding a book on the shelf, navigating databases, etc.) to more focused sessions (Searching CINAHL for Nursing students, or How to be a Research Pro) in the peak evening hours.  Our thinking was that if sweetened the pot with popcorn and a chance to win an iPad 3, that we would have some students interested in taking a break from their studies and friends to perhaps learn a thing or two on research or how to use the library.  We were largely wrong.

Four librarians with three different workshops each (12 in total), spread out over the semester was the master plan.  The first librarian to teach her session reported the morning after that no students had showed up- she had even tried wrangling some before the session was set to begin, but no dice.  I was up next and was determined not to strike out.  I had decided to take along with me a budding librarian undergraduate student who was to handle the OPAC/Find a Book on the Shelf portion of my session.  I thought that having a peer might work to my advantage in getting students to come to my workshop.  I also enlisted a Work Study student that was stationed at the circulation desk, to start advertising the session to every student that walked through the door.

As the budding undergraduate librarian and I sat near the front entrance waiting for our session to start, we talked about the time and whether or not students would be interested in receiving some library instruction.  The student informed me that almost everyone he knew was at a Anime club meeting on campus, and also added that students had been in class all day and maybe didn't feel like attending any more instruction sessions in the evening.  That last part resonated the most with me, and I vowed to make the session quick and informative as possible.  After all, this was their time. 

I ended up with three students in total for that first session and it went great.  The last part of the session consisted of students retrieving a book from the stacks by themselves, which they performed flawlessly.  I love to see the look in students' eyes when they "get it"- it is empowering for the student to realize they now have the power to use a library, and of course it is rewarding for the librarian as well.

Sadly, my first session was my most successful.  The other librarians didn't have much luck either in the evening with the rest of their sessions despite the prizes and marketing efforts- and that was really that.

We did however host a table in which students had to retrieve a book or an article for a chance to win a iPad during an afternoon fair.  This event was in coordination with Dept. of Student Success (held in the library) and we managed to run 80+ students through our mini assignment (highly successful).

In the case of the Student Success fair, there were tables offering food, LinkedIn Photos, and other student services that attracted many types of students over to the library at one time.  We are now planning more of these types of events during the day hours, and of course trying to figure out how to offer some library instruction at the same time.

*Information contained within these pages do not necessarily reflect the opinions or views of Schreiner University.

Information Literacy. Not without Caring, Time, and Experience.

Information Literacy is a trendy catchall buzzword that is not very self-explanatory.  Maybe info literacy doesn’t even exist.  Don’t worry though, research skills are still important in this day and age but they can’t really be forced.


We have to remember that college students and anyone else with access to information (commonly the Internet) and time (motivation is also vital) are potentially professional researchers in the areas of interest to them.  

How are college student's information literacy skills for topics outside their areas of interest? Probably not so good (at least in my experience).  You really have to care to have good information literacy skills because it involves an investment of time.  Going just half way in any sort of research doesn't usually do the job. 

From my experiences teaching freshman seminar courses I often see text in papers and assignments “cut and pasted” directly from the 1^st or 2^nd result on Google from a search that broadly relates to the paper's topic.  Do students care about going deeper in their web search on a subject that doesn't really strike their fancy? No.  Do they know how to go deeper for information that is important to them?  Yes, I believe so.  

Well, just like a local library regular who has been using our computers (for months) to find off-shore high paying contract jobs in the Middle East (for hours), college students probably at one point in time were passionate about a subject that interested them. They may have mined away exhausting all web resources on that particular topic. They just kept going and going until they reached the end (coming across the same web sites and pages).  In many ways, this "reaching the end" in Google or Bing is a monumental learning experience. Of course, this is not to say that the students have the query skills to reach the "end", but for that particular session and individual it was the end.

Does the library regular searching off-shore contract jobs have good info-lit skills?  Probably not, he types in all CAPS, which is an indicator of a person who may be considered by other Internet users as "low-information". However, the library regular is probably an expert (by now) of knowing which websites offer good information on high paying contract jobs in the Middle East better than anyone else in this library. 

I almost believe that once you go down one of the "rabbit holes" of the web a la “high middle east paying jobs” that you are going to encounter all there is to know about it simply because if you spend enough time on any type of website, blog, or forum, there will be other users and sites (w/ Google) that will direct, filter, and link you to everything related to the topic.  Maybe I am overestimating the skills of the library regular, but you get the idea. 

Do college freshman spend enough time researching for their classes and assignments?  No, I think not, and I would go a step further to say that they probably don't have the experience in having to find accurate information.  Many new college students are coming from a home where their parents have done almost everything for them, which includes many things, but also information literacy.  Non-traditional students (generally older than 21) have already tasted independence and perhaps have had to find information to a problem that they had to take care of themselves (repairing an automobile or looking up a medical problem they are experiencing).  In my experience, non-traditional college students are generally more proficient in finding and evaluating relevant information electronically than their digital native counterparts.

After much thought on the subject and dilemma of young people and their lack of information literacy skills I have come up with the following statement.

Caring + Time = Information Literacy.  Ok that statement might be oversimplified, so let's add experience in there as well.  Most people are valued professionally by their experience alone.  What type of person do we have when we strip away experience?  A novice.

I do think that evaluation plays a big part, but it also has a lot to do with experience, which goes back to time spent and caring about the subject matter.  I am a firm believer that while the information skills of our 18-20 year old college students is pretty bad, that they will improve in time along with their maturity, time management, and life management skills.

*Information contained within these pages do not necessarily reflect the opinions or views of Schreiner University.