Chesnutt Fellows Information Literacy Program (Dec. 10-11, 2012)

The Chesnutt Library Fellows Information Literacy Program was held December 10th-11th, 2012 in the J.C. Jones Board of Trustees Room.

Defined, information literacy is centered on "the ability to recognize when information is needed, then locate, evaluate, and put that information to effective use" (Head and Eisenburg). With guided help from their assigned librarians, faculty participants were responsible for incorporating ACRL literacy standards into their selected courses; producing a revised syllabus and assignment for the courses; creating and administering a pre- and post-test in the courses; and completing several other requirements.

The two-day event kicked off with presentations from the 2011-2012 fourth cohort faculty. The following faculty members presented on Monday, December 10th:

--Dr. Peter Eley (Middle Grades, Secondary and Special Subjects, School of Education)
Librarian: Mrs. Diana Amerson (Head of Government Documents)

--Prof. Jeremy Fiebig (Performing and Fine Arts, Theatre)
Librarian: Mrs. Evelyn Council (Associate Director for Collection Development)

--Dr.  Han Lheem (Government & History, Political Science)
Librarian: Mr. Velappan Velappan (Head of Circulation)

--Dr.  Juan Ma (Government & History, Political Science)
Librarian: Mrs. Jinong Sun (Head of Acquisitions)

--Dr.  Elizabeth Quinn (Criminal Justice)
Librarian: Ms. Vera Hooks (Head of Periodicals)

--Dr. Adam Simmons (Government & History, History)
Librarian: Mrs. Andrea Putnam (Bibliographic Instruction and Distance Education Librarian)

--Prof. William Thomas (Communications)
Librarian: Mr. Matthew Lawson (Head of Information Technology)

--Dr.  Kelli Walsh (Government & History, History)
Librarian: Mr. Craig Tuttle (Head of Archives and Special Collections)

In addition to faculty presentations, information literacy and transliteracy workshops were presented by three visiting facilitors:

(1) Professor Thura Mack, Coordinator of Community Learning Services at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in the John C. Hodges Library

(2) Assistant Professor LaVerne Gray, Learning and Outreach librarian at Texas A&M University

(3) Assistant Professor Allison Sharp, Instructional Services Librarian for Student Engagement and Learning Technologies at The University of Tennessee Libraries in Knoxville, Tennessee

The workshop topics and activities included the following:

--information overload
--ACRL Information Literacy Standards
--teaching information literacy through technology and collaborative tools (classroom polling, blackboard, social media, LibGuides)
--constructing instruction models
--evaluating information literacy based assignments

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Resources
Head, Alison J., and Michael B. Eisenberg. "College students eager to learn but need  help negotiating information overload." The Seattle Times 3 June 2011. Web. <http://seattletimes.com/html/opinion/2015227485_guest05head.html>