Information Literacy Assessment: Alfred Observations

Alfred Campus Observations

1. ACRL Frame:  Searching as Strategic Exploration
   1. On average, 63.64% of the Alfred campus students in the classes that participated in the assessment were able to choose the correct answer to questions linked to this ACRL frame.  For example:
      1. Many students did not understand the use of Boolean connectors (Q.12; 56% chose correctly).
      2. Many students did not seem to understand the importance of subject searching (Q. 10; 41% chose correctly) or field searching (Q.18; 39% chose correctly) and were not clear on how “truncation” of terms affects search results (Q. 14; 54% chose correctly).
      3. When they were asked the simple question) about how to locate an item on the shelf (answer: by call number), only 47% chose correctly (Q.16); only 44% knew that call numbers are organized by subject (Q.17).
      4. Only 67% gave the correct answer to the question about using the Advanced Search option in Google to limit by domain (Q.15).
2. ACRL Frame: Research as Inquiry
   1. On average, 66.67% of the Alfred campus students in the classes that participated in the assessment were able to choose the correct answer to questions linked to this ACRL frame.  For example:
      1. Many students demonstrated a poor understanding of search term selection and Boolean logic (Q.1; 64% chose correctly).
      2. Some students seemed unsure about what to do with conflicting research conclusions (Q. 26; 66% chose correctly; also linked to Scholarship as Conversation).
3. ACRL Frame: Information has Value
   1. On average, 67.67% of the Alfred campus students in the classes that participated in the assessment were able to choose the correct answer to questions linked to this ACRL frame.  For example:
      1. Only three questions were linked to this frame.
      2. Most students did not know the purpose of a DOI (digital object identifier) (Q.30; 41% chose correctly).
4. ACRL Frame: Scholarship as Conversation
   1. On average, 68.67% of the Alfred campus students in the classes that participated in the assessment were able to choose the correct answer to questions linked to this ACRL frame. For example:
      1. Many students had difficulty determining whether an MLA citation referred to a journal article, a book or a magazine article (Q. 21; 46% chose correctly).
      2. Some students had difficulty identifying a list of references as a characteristic of a scholarly article (Q.7; 64% chose correctly; also linked to Information Creation as a Process).

5. ACRL Frame:  Authority is Constructed and Contextual
   1. On average, 68.86% of the Alfred campus students in the classes that participated in the assessment were able to choose the correct answer to questions linked to this ACRL frame. For example:
      1. Many students could not determine that a peer-reviewed article, as opposed to a news program featuring a lobbyist, or an annual report from a manufacturer, would provide the most objective information (Q. 22; 51% chose correctly)
      2. Some students had a shaky understanding of what constitutes a primary source (Q. 6; 61% chose correctly).
      3. When asked to identify a source that would not be appropriate for a college paper, only 65% correctly chose a web page (Q.5).
6. ACRL Frame: Information Creation as a Process
   1. On average, 72.67% of the Alfred campus students in the classes that participated in the assessment were able to choose the correct answer to questions linked to this ACRL frame. For example:
      1. Only three questions were linked to this frame.
      2. Some students had difficulty identifying a list of references as a characteristic of a scholarly article (Q.7; 64% chose correctly; also linked to Scholarship as Conversation).