Information Literacy Toolkit

Employers' comments

The information literate person would need:

"The ability to research, to analyse and to interpret and a knowledge of local repositories, so if I had to ask them to go and research x, y and z, they know there are places beyond the University library, they also know how to get in through a web, and use a catalogue." (Employer of Griffith Graduates, 2003)

"Research and report writing - obviously for skills on the job they need to know how to research, they need to know how to put it into a format that is obviously understandable. And then basic communication, such as the use of email, Microsoft office packages and technical equipment, how to use overhead projectors, how to use the computer, for instance - those kinds of skills so that they can get in there and easily pick up the role." (Employer of Griffith Graduates, 2003)

"Mostly what we do is applied research......you have got to know initially where to look for the information. While that can be guided, the person has to be self-directed so they trundle off and gather this massive amount of information." (Employer of Griffith Graduates, 2001)

"To be able to access both internal and external databases and networks around the world to gain the latest ideas from the internet, from academic institutions. They need to be able to build networks, and that requires give and take, communication skills again, and IT skills, and, slightly to our surprise, we find that a lot of graduates do not have the IT skills that we might now expect of today's generation."

Employer interviewed in Harvey, L., Moon, S., & Geall, V. (1997). Graduates' Work: Organisational Change and Student Attributes . Retrieved from the World Wide Web 24 October, 2006:
http://www.uce.ac.uk/crq/publications/gw/gwch6.html

Students' comments

The following quotes are from Lupton, M. & Bruce, C. (forthcoming). Students' ways of experiencing information literacy.

The information literate person would be:

"An ideal information user would be able to take all the information they've picked up from wherever and link it all together and be able to see how everything relates to everything else." (First year student)

"Ideal information user. One who does not assume things I guess. Yeah one, someone who relies more on not necessarily cold, hard facts because they're often not available but, there's so many different instances in which you need information it's hard to say what is the best....you're not afraid to use information. You have to go out and find the information, you can't just let it sit there." (First year student)

"I suppose an ideal information user would be someone who goes in a very broad spectrum who does television, radio, newspaper, journals, websites, books, anything else, but who just uses all the different media. So it's someone who goes out to different types of media but also over the different opinions or streams in media representation, and someone who does it continuously, who continuously updates and not just on one little thing. Just kind of starts maybe from one little point but then fans out until the whole global perspective and can get involved, depending on what you're looking for of course. I suppose that would be the ideal information seeker. " (First year student)

Why we need to be information literate:

"I suppose I think it's just important to question, so you learn more, I suppose you can look at information in all different ways by observing or listening to how different people see the same situation. They're looking at different spins on the same information which helps you to understand that information better because there's a whole lot of different views about it, or values that come into it or whatever....because looking at one source all the time would be very narrow and it wouldn't give you much information. I mean it would give you what it had to offer but there's a lot more, there are many more layers that need to be looked at if you want to find out more and learn more." (First year student)

"Just being able to think about it critically and intelligently and pull it together, and sometimes there might not be a right or a wrong answer, but showing clear thinking is important." (First year student)

"I think information builds on knowledge you already have and I suppose information is the kind of key to the knowledge that they're building all the time." (First year student)

"I suppose I am information literate because I can like question the information that I'm getting and analyse it." (First year student)

"Being able to understand the storyline and understanding where the author is coming from. To be able to pull out the main arguments and the main points very quickly. To understand what I suppose are the main theories or the main thrusts of the article and where it fits into a context with all the other stuff that's been written in that area." (First year student)

"Because you get so much information you've got to really work out where it goes and put things together. I know when I do an essay in my room it's like a bomb. Like I've done things all right, like I'll stick pieces of paper to the wall so I can see where the layout of my essay is going and I can organise information the right way, and there's no use getting some of the question and not knowing where it's from and how to how to reference it. So that's one thing I have actually learned how to do, is the first thing you do is write down your reference and then you start looking at the information and being able to keep all that information together and tidy so that it's easy to use. Different folders, everyone uses different techniques but I think keeping the physical information organised is a big part of, you know, using the information." (First year student)

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