Projects Funded for Round Two

(PDF Format)

Birmingham-Southern College
Continuation of integrating fluency standards into the curriculum
Bruess, Ford, Baxter
Abstract:
Faculty and students on the Birmingham-Southern College campus would meet one day to continue the conversation for information fluency across the education curriculum. A second day would showcase uses already in place among the general faculty and serve as models for others to create their own methods within their disciplines to foster better use of technology for information fluency within classes. The results of these efforts would be shared with all faculty and with the ACS membership.

Progress Report
IF Education Plan
Final Report

Centenary College
Centenary College Information Fluency Project: A Full-Campus Approach
Alexander, Shelburne, Newtown, van Hoosier-Carey, Becker, Fleck, Provost, Martin
Abstract:
After one year of successfully implementing an IF grant, Centenary's project seeks to strengthen and expand its scope through a series of new projects. The IF Web site (http://www.centenary.edu/~balexand/if/) will be expanded considerably to include a steady news update, more interactive materials, and further downloadable texts. A partnership with the Frost School of Business will create Knowledge Management (KM) materials for business classes, while developing the college's first Management of Information Systems (MIS) class for the 2003-2004 academic year. New IF materials will be developed aligned with the college's new core education requirements, instilling literacies according to their articulation in that document's language. A new course, Introduction to Digital Communication (Communication 180) will embody IF principles. ACS involvement will increase. The previous year's IF offerings will be repeated.

Progress Report
Final Report

Centre College
Technology Dreams: Building Information Fluency at Centre College
Marshall, McAllister
Abstract:
This project request funds for a symposium promoting the information fluency of the faculty and, ultimately, the students of Centre College. This working symposium will first showcase various applications of technology to instruction that have been developed by Centre College faculty and professional staff. Building upon this collection of inspirational ideas, the symposium participants will then engage in hands-on training sessions to develop the skills and understanding required to implement their own ideas.

Final Report
Project URL: http://web.centre.edu/mat/techdreams/

Furman University
Assessing the "Computer Generation" in Liberal Arts Colleges and Universities
Allen, Jr., Dunigan
Abstract:
Helping our students achieve information fluency is both a challenging and dynamic goal. Chief among these challenges is that our goal itself is a moving target. The rapid pace of change in information technology has likewise affected the preparations and expectations of our undergraduate students. In order to design more effective and engaging educational programs to achieve our goals, we need a more precise and current understanding of our students' backgrounds and attitudes about using information technology.

Recently, we conducted a survey of Furman University undergraduates. Over 500 students responded to an anonymous questionnaire that asked them about their backgrounds, computing experience, and current practices. In the proposed project, we hope to extend this work to establish a baseline describing computing experiences and attitudes for the liberal arts students across ACS institutions. This will be accomplished by soliciting the assistance of colleagues within at least five additional ACS schools. Each would administer the survey in order to collect additional data and participate in the analysis of the results (for at least six schools, including Furman). The survey instrument would be made available both in printed and on-line forms. We would assist cooperating institutions to conduct local surveys during the spring, 2002. The group would publish a final report (results and analysis) that would be made available to all interested parties-again, both in printed form, and on the Web-during the summer, 2002. We believe that this information would be extremely useful to our colleagues throughout the ACS and would hopefully lead to cooperative efforts developing new and innovative programs in information fluency. Further, we would hope that such collaboration would enable us to secure additional funding to support educational programs in information fluency.

Hendrix College
A Journey into Information Fluency: Integrating Information Fluency into the Hendrix College Journeys Course
Fought, Fraser, Johnsen, Moore, Schantz
Abstract:
A one day IF workshop led by a notable expert will increase faculty awareness of the intellectual significance of IF and will consequently provide future impetus for faculty to integrate IF into the curriculum. Moreover, the tangible desired outcomes will hopefully strengthen the conviction that IF successes will benefit the entire Hendrix College community. As Hendrix moves its academic calendar from a trimester to a semester system, the entire general education curriculum is undergoing revision - including the development of the Journeys course. This time of significant curricular change seems a natural opportunity to introduce IF into the curriculum, and the Journeys course is the perfect vehicle to ensure all entering students develop IF skills (through the collaborative efforts of the Journeys faculty, IT, and the library) necessary for academic and life-long success. This project can, with the proper dissemination of results, serve as an excellent model to future IF endeavors at Hendrix and other ACS institutions.

Progress Report
Final Report

Rhodes College
Project #1
Integration of Information Fluency into a Two-Semester Introductory Biology Laboratory Series
Lindquester, Johnson, Olsen, Brooks, Blundon, Hill, Jaslow, Jaslow, Kesler, Miller, Stinemetz, Becker, Burks
Abstract:
This project is a follow-up to a 2000 ACS Information Fluency proposal on Fostering Information Fluency in the Introductory Biology Laboratory. That project involved modifying exercises that had been in practice for several years and integrating library instruction and pre- and post-course assessment of the information fluency of some 120 students enrolled in one semester of introductory biology. The course will be taught in the Spring of 2002, so the work is still ongoing at the time of this writing. However, since last year's proposal, a unique opportunity has presented itself. The Department of Biology is restructuring its introductory curriculum and is preparing to develop entirely new syllabi for its two-semester introductory laboratory series. Herein, we propose a half/day workshop that would function to focus discussion and foster ideas on how to fully integrate the objectives of the information fluency initiative into the laboratory exercises and assignments. We will also continue the use of an entrance survey assessing information fluency background and skills, and an exit survey assessing the success of the program in advancing those skills that will begin this spring. The ongoing assessment will provide extended data with a similar population of students to better monitor programmatic success. The model we develop will serve to inform other departments at Rhodes and ACS member institutions. Workshop format and materials and final syllabi will be readily available and exportable.

Final Report

Project #2
Integrating GIS into the Liberal Arts Curriculum: A Cross-Campus Seminar
Steve Ceccoli, Ekstrom, Kesler
Abstract:
We propose to offer a seminar at Rhodes College to explore way to integrate GIS, Geographic Information Systems, into the liberal arts curriculum. The seminar will foster collaboration between faculty, students, librarians, and information technologists to increase the use of spatial analysis across the campus. We will share the results with the consortium and the larger community by use of the ACS web page.

Progress Report
Final Report
Evaluation Questions for Rhodes College GIS Seminar
GIS Seminar Rhodes College September 14, 2002
GIS Seminar Rhodes College October 12, 2002
GIS Day Open House

Rollins College
Integrating Information Fluency into the Curriculum
Cohen, Lloyd, Lairson, Mays, James, Friedland, Casey
Abstract:
Information fluency is vital to critical thinking and workforce readiness skills. Understanding how information is stored, accessed, processed, and evaluated is essential to the academic and career success of our students. The basic principles of information fluency are flexible and transferable. Our objective is to seed a number of courses throughout the curriculum with a strong element of information fluency and technology issues. Students who participate in such courses will acquire practical knowledge of information fluency which can be applicable to further study and transferred into the workplace.

Rollins College is proposing a two-week seminar to provide faculty with training on techniques to seamlessly integrate information fluency into their course syllabi. Faculty will be provided instruction on how to redesign traditional syllabi and research projects to require students to apply critical thinking skills and information technology. Participating faculty members will implement this syllabus in a course during the 2002-2003 academic year.

Final Report

University of the South
Sewanee Theology and Religious Studies (STARS)
Dunkly, Phillips, Sells, Wood
Abstract:
As part of an overall effort to foster information fluency, the University of the South will undertake the development of a program to identify, describe, and train students in the use of electronic and audiovisual resources in theology and religious studies. This program, to be called Sewanee Theology and Religious Studies (STARS), will replace the present library orientation for the School of Theology and will introduce field-specific orientation to resources in religious studies for the Department of Religion in the College of Arts and Sciences. Creation of a STARS website is to be the primary outcome, together with the development of staff expertise in using the website as a teaching tool. This website will provide on-demand coaching to students (and secondarily to other library patrons interested in the subject area), tailored to the specific demands of courses being offered currently.

Final Report

Washington and Lee University
Collaboration to Manage Spatial Information on ACS Campuses: prototyping an information infrastructure
Blackmer
Abstract:
Collaboration between ACS institutions can be built by face-to-face meetings to work on common problems. This proposal seeks travel funds to connect five ACS campuses in a project to develop software to support fluency with spatial data. External funding for further development will be sought once prototypes have been built and tested.

Progress Report
Final Report

Furman University and Millsaps College
Developing Follow-on Information Fluency Experiences for Students Completing a Computer Literacy Course
Abernethy, Shive
Abstract:
In today's environment, it is impossible to divorce information from technology. Thus, we must deal with how technology influences work with information. With each passing year, students come to college with a greater knowledge of computing tools. Thus, their technology skills are improving. As mentioned earlier, many take computer literacy courses (under a variety of names and guises) at our institutions.
Our proposal focuses on how to extend these technology skills to create information fluent graduates. Such graduates will be in increasing demand as we move fully into the digital age. Faced with unprecedented needs for an information-fluent workforce, we believe the existing pipeline of liberal arts graduates is a substantial and highly talented resource that should be playing a much more prominent role in addressing this critical national need. More innovative and expanded educational strategies in information fluency will help facilitate this outcome.

Interim Report
Final Report

University of Richmond and Washington and Lee University
Assessing Student Awareness of Core Library Resources
Rettig, McCulley, Brown, Merrill, Stanley
Abstract:
The University of Richmond and Washington and Lee University will bring an underrepresented and essential constituency into the ACS information fluency project. That constituency is our undergraduate students. They will participate in the project by completing a brief survey which will give these two institutions, and by extension all ACS members, valuable information about student awareness of fundamental library resources. This information can be used for IF program planning and as a tool for engaging faculty interest in IF.

Progress Report
Final Report

Projects funded for round 1
Projects funded for round 2
Projects funded for round 3
Projects funded for round 4
Projects funded for MEPG