Skip to Main Content

Research Guides

Making Information Literacy Assessment Sustainable Through Collaboration: Home

a presentation by Diane Prorak at Library Instruction West, 2014, Portland, OR

LIW Presentation Abstract

Making Information Literacy Assessment Sustainable Through Collaboration 

We collaborate on course-integrated instruction – why not on assessment? The University of Idaho Library was applying (successfully) for the ACRL Assessment in Action (AiA) Program at the same time that the UI General Education Program was beginning formal assessment of its recently adopted curriculum. We joined forces with General Education for a sustainable, collaborative assessment project in which first-year students in Integrated Seminar courses write two essays on the University “common read” book -- one essay at the beginning of the semester and one at the end (with library instruction in between). Students are required to find and cite outside sources. A faculty team from across the university volunteered to assess the essays and bibliographies. This presentation will cover the collaborative assessment process and research results, our experience in the AiA program, and the tools and procedures we developed.

Project Background

Assessment in Action Program

In March 2013, the UI Library applied for and was selected to be part of the ACRL Assessment in Action Program, a competitive national program to support library assessment projects 2014. Since acceptance, the AiA team, led by Diane Prorak, has been collecting student artifacts to study the impact of UI library instruction on first year student success, retention, and perceptions.  The research is still in progress, but some results are available.

We collaborated with three groups of first-year courses: Integrated Seminars (ISEM101), Interdisciplinary Studies (INTR101) “College Success” courses, and freshman composition (English 102).  

The presentation at Library Instruction West focuses on the collaboration with ISEM101 and General Education in assessing student growth in UI Learning Outcomes.

Assessment in Action

This project is part of the program “Assessment in Action: Academic Libraries and Student Success” which is undertaken by the Association of

College and Research Libraries (ACRL) in partnership with the Association for Institutional Research and the Association of Public and Land-grant

Universities. The program, a cornerstone of ACRL's Value of Academic Libraries initiative, is made possible by the Institute of Museum and Library Services.