Information Commons provides opportunity to influence infolit experiences.

Initiative 1:

The opportunity to engage students arises as a result of the installation of our information commons.

Goals:

• help students to locate, evaluate, synthesize and use information from a variety of sources

• help students to understand and use basic research techniques appropriate to the course discipline

• help students to understand the various ways in which information is organized and structured

• help students to understand the ethical issues involved in accessing and using information.

Assessment:

• We assess student learning through pre- and post-tests that are offered in all sections of the courses. This allows us to determine, for each student, whether learning has taken place, and also alerts us to areas that might require more or revised instruction.

• In addition, IL courses are assessed as part of the campus general education assessment initiative every three years. While not every course is included in this initiative, those that are work with the administration to develop course-specific methods of assessment.

Initiative 2:

Students will understand the different attitudes and norms connected to the research process in different cultures, and will become aware of expectations in this regard in the United States students will become familiar with the tools available to them as they engage in research.

Goals:

Same as Initiative 1.

Assessment:

Students will know who to come to if they have difficulty when doing research. Students are assessed through pre- and post-tests, given in the first and second classes respectively.

Podcast tours of library in various languages.

We have recently developed podcasts of library tours in a variety of languages: English, Chinese, Korean, Russian, and Spanish. They can be found at http://liblogs.albany.edu/podcasts/

Goals / Assessment:

NA