Getting+started


 * DEVELOPING RELATIONSHIPS:**

Rationale: Academic and school librarians serve as liaisons to their respective institutions. They perform parallel functions at their sites: collection management and instruction to support curriculum. They also theoretically serve all their parallel respective constituencies: students, faculty, administrators, and selected community members (e.g., parents, alumni, local agencies, etc.).

Steps: 1. Identify counterpart librarian: - feeder schools/ school for graduates - library staff contact information

2. Make initial contact - schedule meeting - find common ground - share informal needs and successes

3. Librarians gather data about their respective institutions: - library mission, resources, facilities, staffing, instruction (including documents), library usage - clientele demographics, information literacy competency, curriculum, typical library-related assignments - analysis of data if possible, such as information literacy gaps - means to address information literacy gaps

4. Set up follow-up contact meeting: - share data - share information literacy instruction/learning activities - determine juncture of information literacy competencies - design method of informing respective faculty of issue (e.g., speak to each other’s faculty about information literacy needs and gaps; include IHE students who can talk with their high schools about information literacy needs)

5. (optional) Set up regional librarians meeting: - each librarian identifies and contacts peers - arrange meeting time/place/PR/supplies - agenda: discuss efforts to this point by original librarian pair, set up way to communicate and coordinate efforts regionally

6. Librarians work with their respective faculty - share information literacy standards and issues with respective faculty through staff development/meetings - identify curriculum - design instruction - implement instruction and assess process and results

7. Set up follow-up contact (F2F or online) - share efforts and results - bring a faculty member (and student) to the meeting to share experiences and broaden support base - discuss how to involve more faculty and articulate information literacy instruction - develop a database or repository structure to gather information literacy instructional documents (e.g., assignments, presentations, assessments)

8. Follow-up faculty meeting between sites - share information literacy efforts by subject domain - articulate information literacy standards, instruction, and assignments

9. Librarians and teachers work with their respective site personnel - develop a school wide information literacy initiative: standards, learning outcomes, scope and sequence - develop a repository of learning activities and assessments

10. Hold regional summit about information literacy - assess student learning (improvement, hopefully) - train others in use of repository/database

Information literacy audit checklist: