What Faculty ThinkExInformation Literacy DUndergraduate Educati

by Claire McGuinness

Available online 31 July 2006

This paper reports findings from a recent Irish-based study into facultylibrarian collaboration

for information literacy (IL) development.Qualitative analysis of comments made bySociology and Civil Engineering academics

shows how entrenched beliefs and perceptionsmay adversely affect the potential for

collaboration, and prevent the inclusion ofinformation literacy in undergraduate curricula.

the pedagogical structures that they have always supported. For

innovation within the post-secondary sector, in many cases the

ClaireMcGuUn

bclaire.mcguinness@ucd.ieN.The Journal ofrepresents the apotheosis of the collaborative ideal, drawingtogether the disparate academic support services departmentssuch as the library, teaching faculty and computing services inan organizational model, with the aim of supporting a rangeof learning styles and student interaction with [. . .] resourcesand services.6 The traditional support role of library staff isthereby reconstructed within a more integrated framework.

However, despite an ideological commitment to pedagogicalinness, School of Information and Library Studies,iversity College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Irelandpopular idea of the campus library as learning centereffectively supplants the traditional, static image of the libraryas materials storehouse, and replaces it with a dynamic pictureof an interactive learning environment where information isselected by users as the basis for problem-solving, rather thanstrictly prescribed by academic faculty. In many ways, thisinstance, in respect of physical changes, the increasinglyAcademic Librarianship, Volume 32, Number 6, pages 573582ploring the Barriers toevelopment inon

INTRODUCTION: THE FACULTY PROBLEM

In recent years, the restructuring of undergraduate curricula toensure an integrated approach to information literacy develop-ment (ILD) for students has emerged as a critical objective forpost-secondary institutions, and features increasingly in collegeand university mission statements and teaching charters for the21st century. The notion of targeted collaboration betweenlibrarians and key university constituents in pursuit of this goalis not a novel concept, but is viewed as the most effective routeto success.14 In particular, calls have been made for therestructuring and formalization of the existing instructionalarrangements that exist between librarians and academicfaculty, as well as the development of newer, more powerfulinitiatives, which recognize the changes required for bothparties to engage in full information literacy (IL) partnerships.5

These include the transformation of pedagogical practice tofacilitate a more active, student-led approach to learning, aswell as the physical redevelopment of learning space toencourage collaboration between students, and more varieduse of resources for information problem-solving. For infor-mation professionals, these changes mark a welcome shift withregard to the way in which their roles in the academiccommunity have traditionally been viewed by non-librarycolleagues, and the net effect has been to move them closer toNovember 2006 573

inclusion of IL, both as a desired outcome and as a tool ofundergraduate education, remains an aspiration rather than afully realized ideal. In seeking to account for this apparent lack of

whose support is assured only as long as they remain in theircurrent position;13 a change of personnel or a shifting ofdepartmental priorities can, and often does, signal the end of anprogress, a common thread in the LIS literature has largelyfocused on the perceived reluctance of the academic teachingstaff to instigate the appropriate structural program changes,which would permit the integration of ILD with the teachingcurriculum. Information professionals, who are eager to collab-orate with faculty for ILD, frequently vent their frustration withwhat has been dubbed the faculty problem,7 deeming facultyeither apathetic or even deliberately obstructive towards theirefforts to initiate joint instructional arrangements. Librariansanger with their academic colleagues, and with their ownapparent lack of political leverage within the academic com-munity in general, is visible in highly charged descriptions suchas the following: Academic pariahs, whom legitimate facultymay denigrate or merely tolerate, but do not generallycompletely embrace, librarians continue to wage an uphill battlefor intellectual respect among colleagues in other departments.8

...despite an ideological commitment topedagogical innovation within the

post-secondary sector, in many cases theinclusion of IL, both as a desired outcome and asa tool of undergraduate education, remains anaspiration rather than a fully-realised ideal.

Recent studies, such as that carried out by Julien andGiven,9,10 seem to confirm this apparent rift; their analysis ofpostings by information professionals to the ILI-L listservbetween 1995 and 2002 demonstrates a hostile relationship,with some posters expressing the view that faculty areterritorial and possessive about their courses, as well as beingrude, uncooperative, arrogant and uncaring with regard to theirstudents needs. Other authors have written about facultysapparently limited conception of the role played by librarians inthe academic community, which relegates them to supportservices, rather than active contributors to the educationalprocess. Markless and Streatfield,11 in a survey of elevencolleges of further education in England and Wales, found thatthe library was perceived by most faculty as primarilyinformation stores (p. 50), while there was little evidence ofsystematic collaboration between lecturers and librarians overinformation skills teaching (p. 53). Similarly, Julien andBoon12 discovered a difficult relationship between librariansand faculty in their survey of three case study sites in Canada,with library staff complaining of apathy on the facultys part, aswell as their apparent belief that students can develop goodinformation skills without the assistance of librarians. Theseare views which stand in stark contrast to informationprofessionals own self-conception of modern professionalidentity, which embraces a more integrated teaching role,including collaboration with key university constituents inpursuit of a student-centered vision of learning. Librariansclaim that their efforts to implement and sustain ILD practiceswithin undergraduate curricula are frequently thwarted by theirdependence on individual library-friendly faculty members,

574 The Journal of Academic Librarianshipestablished IL program and a subsequent return to square onefor the participating library staff. The continuing relevance ofthis problem is affirmed by DAngelo and Maid,14 who notethat: A great deal of time and energy are spent on advocacy,and frequently individual efforts are not sustainable beyond thework of the individual librarians or librarianfaculty team.

While views such as this are widespread in the LIS literature,hard evidence supporting this claim is, however, overwhelm-ingly restricted to anecdotal accounts and descriptions of reallife or how we did it case studies, rather than founded onsystematic empirical research.1517 To date, the actual voices offaculty have been featured to only a marginal extent in LISpapers in general and in those dealing with IL in particular,which are written largely by librarians for librarians.18

Consequently, our knowledge and understanding of facultyattitudes towards, and perceptions of, information literacydevelopment, have been shaped primarily by second-handaccounts of their behavior, relayed by the information staffwho work with them. While valuable at one level, in that thesedescriptions offer an interesting, although one-sided, insight intolibraryfaculty relations, their usefulness is, however, compro-mised by the absence of the faculty perspective. Identifying thebarriers to facultylibrary collaboration for ILD requires anapproach which carefully examines the motives and conceptionsof both parties, rather than relying on evidence conveyed by oneside, however grounded in fact that evidence purports to be.Kotter, in his criticism of research into facultylibrary relations,makes the point succinctly: If evaluation of the quality oflibrarianfaculty relations were to rest on anecdotes, librarianswould face an intractable dilemma: do such stories truly reflectthe overall quality of relations at the institution, or do they reflectisolated events?19 (p. 296). He suggests that methods ofevaluation must be found that are less subject to suchdistortion. The critical importance of gaining insight intoacademics conceptions of IL, as well as their work practices, ishighlighted by the title of a recent seminar given by SheilaWebber and Bill Johnston for the CAVAL Reference InterestGroup in RMIT University, Melbourne: Lifting the Lid:Information Literacy and AcademicsChallenging theAssumptions of Librarians, in which results from an ongoingUK-based study on academics conceptions of pedagogy for ILwere presented to the participants.20

...our knowledge and understanding of facultyattitudes towards, and perceptions of,

information literacy development, has beenshaped primarily by second-hand accounts oftheir behavior, relayed by the information staff

who work with them.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Although relatively rare, a number of studies over the yearshave endeavored to convey the faculty perspective on library-related matters, and this research has contributed greatly to the

body of knowledge concerned with facultylibrary collabo-ration. Broadly, studies of faculty in the LIS literature haveinvestigated the following phenomena:

consider course assignments to be the main vehicle by whichstudents develop IL skills, although no structures for formal ILDhad been established within any of the curricula that they! faculty attitudes towards librarians, and perceptions oflibrarians role and status;

! faculty conceptions of IL, plus attitudes towards ILD andpedagogical practices; and

! faculty ratings of institutional library services.

The various objectives, which provided focus to the studies,indicate the areas in which librarians perceive academic influenceto be most salient, namely: the nature and extent of campuslibrary usage, the question of awarding faculty status to librarians,the success and acceptance of teaching programs, facultylibrarian relations, and the general role and status of the campuslibrary and information staff within the academic community.With regard to the topic currently under investigation, facultyattitudes specifically towards information literacy developmentremain a comparatively under-researched phenomenon. Themost comprehensive research to date remains Hardestys 1991study, which involved the development and application of anextensive Library Educational Attitudes Scale, to measure theattitudes of selected faculty towards the role of the library inundergraduate education, including the instructional role.21 Otherkey papers in this area include Maynard,22 Cannon,23 Thomas24

and Leckie and Fullerton.25 Academics conceptions of IL havebeen explored in twomajor studies, namely Doyle26 and Bruce,27

while, as mentioned above, a study of academics conceptions of,and pedagogy for, IL in post-secondary education is currentlyunderway in the UK.28

Taken together, these studies offer some insight into howfaculty conceive of information literacy, and into how theybelieve that it is, and should be, facilitated within undergraduateeducation. A finding that proved common to all studies was thevariation that exists between different disciplines with regard tohow IL is conceptualized by academics, and in the methods bywhich students are engaged in ILD during their education. Forinstance, Cannon29 discovered a greater tendency among Artsand Humanities faculty to invite a librarian to instruct theirclasses, than among Mathematics and Statistics faculty. Morerecently, Boon, Johnston and Webber30 described varyingconceptions of IL and of pedagogy for IL among academics inthe disciplines of Marketing and English. Hardesty,31 however,suggested that it is local institutional culture rather thandiscipline alone, that accounts for variation among facultyattitudes with regard to the library and ILD. Common to thestudies by Cannon32 and Leckie and Fullerton33 was a findingthat ILDmodules with input from library staff are favored less byfaculty than those which they (faculty) can facilitate themselves.For instance, librarian-delivered modes such as subject-specificclasses, demonstrations and general research classes are used toa much lesser extent than faculty-controlled methods, such assetting assignments which incorporate information skills anddevelop critical-thinking, discussing the research process inclass, and explaining discipline-specific resources to thestudents. Similarly, the studies also revealed low support amongfaculty for instructional methods requiring a high degree oflibraryfaculty collaboration, such as credit courses, team-teaching and jointly designed assignments. In their study,Markless and Streatfield34 reported that teaching facultysurveyed. In her earlier study of Canadian libraries, Julien35

referred to the difficulties encountered with faculty and studentattitudes that hinder positive relationships with librarians as amajor barrier to the establishment of ILD programs in theinstitutions surveyed. Her later research into ILD in Canadianacademic libraries36 also points to a general lack of support forILD within the various institutions, with library staff describingfaculty as apathetic towards their instructional efforts, as well asharboring a belief that students can develop efficient informationskills without librarians assistance.

From a general perspective, a number of studies have alsosought to explore faculty attitudes towards librarians and theirrole in the academic community, including Cook,37 Ivey,38

Withnell,39 Divay, Duchas and Michaud-Oystryk40 and Oberg,Schleiter and Van Houten.41 These studies reveal that, althoughfaculty express appreciation for the work carried out byacademic librarians, they do not consider their teaching roleto be particularly important, and view their overall contributionto undergraduate education as limited. Library staff appear tobe valued by faculty primarily for the support services theyprovide, including collection development and referenceassistance. While they perceive library staff as professionalswithin their own domain of information services provision,they do not, however, rate them as academic equals; it appearsthat this is a view which is largely engendered by a perceptionthat librarians do not publish sufficiently in the scholarlyliterature to be considered bona fide faculty members. Theirlack of formal teaching experience is also mentioned as alimiting factor. A recent informal study of Social Sciencefaculty affirmed academicsT service-oriented view of librar-ians, but also suggested that the professional disconnection thatexists between the two groups is due to organizational issuesand status differences that combine to maintain their separate-ness. The authors suggest that, unlike librarians, faculty do notnecessarily perceive this disconnection to be a problem.42

STUDY AIMS

This paper reports a section of the results from a larger study ofthe barriers to collaboration for ILD in post-secondaryeducation, which was carried out in the Republic of Irelandfrom 19992004. Based on the premise that facultylibrarycollaboration is one of the critical elements for establishingsuccessful IL programs in undergraduate education, the studysought to uncover the internal and external factors in theacademic environment which disrupt the potential for suchcollaborations, and therefore the potential for integrated ILD inpost-secondary institutions. In particular, the research problemzeroed in on the issue of faculty culture and the theoreticalproposition advanced by Hardesty,43 and supported byBadke,44 who suggested that the entrenched beliefs, percep-tions and work practices, which are characteristic of academicsin post-secondary institutions, may prevent them from engag-ing in collaborative initiatives with external parties, includinglibrarians, particularly with regard to their teaching activities.For instance, Hardesty observes that academics are typicallytime-poor, attempting to combine teaching, research andadministrative responsibilities, as well as keeping up-to-datewithin their fields. He suggests that they are protective of theprofessional autonomy afforded by their position and as a

November 2006 575

result, tend to be resistant to change, particularly when imposedfrom outside. Furthermore, he notes that faculty culture ingeneral currently places a greater value on published research

The choice of research design was informed by the casestudy and grounded theory frameworks, both of which offera flexible approach and do not require the identification of aat the expense of teaching, which is not rewarded to the sameextent as research activities. Therefore, academics who appearhostile or apathetic towards librariansT efforts, may simply beoperating within a different set of norms, which divergesubstantially from the professional ethos that characterizeslibrary and information work. Arguably, understanding thenature and origin of faculty culture may help librarians touncover the common goals, practices and perceptions, onwhich successful partnerships can be based. Accordingly, thepresent study aimed to provide insight into the perceptions,beliefs and practices of members of two selected academicdisciplines, in order to identify the areas of conflict andculture clash that may hinder the establishment of ILprograms in the institutions surveyed.

This paper presents a cross-section of the study findings,providing a unique insight into the perceptions and beliefs ofacademic faculty with regard to the facilitation of ILD withinundergraduate curricula. It is shown that the participatingacademics harbor a number of beliefs that are at odds withlibrarians visions for an information literate curriculum, andwhich may to some degree account for the lack of collaborationin this regard. Undergraduate education was selected as animportant transitional stage for students, who are leaving thecomparatively structured environment of secondary schooling,and entering the world of academia, which requires a differentapproach to learning.

...the present study aimed to provide insightinto the perceptions, beliefs and practices ofmembers of two selected academic disciplines,in order to identify the areas of conflict and

culture clash that may hinder the establishmentof IL programs in the institutions surveyed.

METHOD

As stated previously, the problem explored in this study is onethat has received comparatively little attention in the LISresearch literature to date. Consequently, the absence of anestablished theoretical framework to guide the research processsuggested that an exploratory approach was called for, ratherthan one which aims to test pre-defined variables. The currentliterature on research methods suggests that, for studies of thiskind, a qualitative research design may best serve the aims ofthe researcher, since the variables are largely unknown, andthe researcher wants to focus on the context that may shape theunderstanding of the phenomenon being studied.45 Asprevious research on this problem is limited, the decisionwas thus taken to adopt a primarily qualitative approach.Furthermore, the complex nature of academic life, which wasthe principal context for the research, dictated that an approachbe selected that attempts to preserve the context in which theparticipants carry out their work. Finally, the need forflexibility and openness to unexpected themes cemented therequirement for a qualitative research design.

576 The Journal of Academic Librarianshiprigidly pre-formulated list of variables to test. The datacollection instrument selected was the semi-structured inter-view, which allows exploration of unexpected themes, while atthe same time permitting the imposition of a degree ofstructure on the participantresearcher conversation, in theform of key topics or questions. The sampling frame wasselected on the basis of purposive criterion sampling, whichaims to identify participants who are likely to be the mostinformative in relation to the research questions, rather thanstatistically significant. Both academic and subject librarianparticipants were chosen, based on pre-defined lists of criteria,which aimed to exclude participants who were unlikely tooffer much insight on the topic under investigation, and toinclude those who were. The two disciplines chosen for thestudy were selected for maximum contrast according to thehard-soft, pure-applied categorization developed by Biglan:46

Sociology, an academic, research-oriented discipline falls intothe soft-pure category, while Civil Engineering, a voca-tional, practice-oriented discipline, conforms to Biglansnotion of hard-applied. Interviews took place on a phasedbasis over a two-year period. In total, twenty faculty membersfrom each discipline participated, as well as nine subjectlibrarians.

Analysis of interview transcripts conformed to the proceduresassociated with thematic coding, an approach designed toidentify and expand key themes discussed by the participants,and ultimately to suggest new theoretical insights into theproblem under investigation. Reporting of research resultsmainly involved the exploration of key themes, using participantquotations as illustrative examples, although a degree ofquantification was necessary, in order to accurately describethe frequency with which themes occurred within the samplegroups.

WHAT FACULTY THINK: WETRE ALREADY DOING IT!

One of the most striking results to emerge in the study was thebelief, expressed by most of the participants, that the prevailinginstructional paradigm for both disciplines is fundamentallydesigned to encourage the development of information skillsamong students, although no formal IL structures were foundto exist: Its not addressed directly, but itTs not omittedeither. By and large, faculty suggested that students graduallybecome information literate through participating in one ormore of eight existing learning situations:

1. through completing a series of information exercises [at oneinstitution];

2. through Research Methods courses and seminars [inSociology only];

3. through core skills modules that incorporate informationskills [in Civil Engineering only];

4. through Computer Skills classes, including Internetsearching;

5. through library-based modes of instruction, such as librarytours, orientation sessions and lectures from library staff;

6. through feedback received from tutors or lecturers forproject and essay work;

depends almost entirely on personal interest, individualmotivation and innate ability, rather than on the quality andformat of the available instructional opportunities: I think if7. through the process of completing the final year disserta-tion; and

8. through general direction from lecturers and library staff,who recommend important sources of course-relatedinformation that students should use.

For both disciplines, the process of researching, writing andpresenting coursework assignments represented the key contextfor IL development among students. In particular, the final yeardissertation, which is a required component of all under-graduate degree programs in both disciplines, was referred toby participants as an opportunity for students to takeownership of their subject, and develop an independent viewof the discipline and the structures of scholarly communicationthat underpin it. This process, however, appeared to besomewhat unreliable, as students received very little formaltraining in how to research and write academic dissertationswhile the Sociologists focused primarily on instructing studentsin the practical application of empirical research methods, thecivil engineers included just one or two research sessions intheir core skills modules. Consequently, students wereexpected to approach their dissertations in learn by doingmode, guided by their supervisors on a semi-regular basis.While faculty expressed the hope that, in negotiating theresearch process, students would develop such competencies asa critical approach to the scholarly literature, the ability tocritique theoretical propositions and the ability to analyzeinformation and draw conclusions, there was no clear sensehow, or if, this would actually come about. The same reasoningwas applied to the minor essays and projects that students werealso required to submit as part of individual modules, which byand large included an information-seeking component. Theidea of constructive feedback as an effective instructional toolalso emerged in several of the participantsT comments: And interms of giving information, I mean, certainly in the reportsthat they do, we are constantly giving feedback, like you know,that report is badly structured, and that isnt the way you writea report. There was a tacit assumption among faculty thatstudents would somehow absorb and develop the requisiteknowledge and skills through the very process of preparing apiece of written coursework, and by applying the advice metedout by their supervisors. In the present study, just one facultymember, a sociologist, actively questioned the validity ofassuming that students will learn by doing, while receivingminimal direct guidance:

You know, the more I think about it. . .in my head, Im criticizing thosestudents for not doing it [researching properly], but maybe its not a fair

criticism because maybe theyTre not taught it well enough. To me, itsobvious. . .And itTs probably a failing in us alright, that we dont do it, youknow.

WHAT FACULTY THINK: THE EFFECT OF STUDENTMOTIVATION

One of the more striking themes to emerge from the dataanalysis was the pervasiveness of the belief that the extent towhich students develop as information literate individualsthey are [information literate], its because they did itthemselves. Rather than suggesting that it should be a desiredlearning outcome of undergraduate programs, a number ofparticipants observed that students can become informationliterate only if they proactively and independently choose topursue the opportunities that are available to them during thecourse of their education. As a corollary, therefore, failure tobecome information literate is viewed principally as a functionof a students personal decision not to focus on developing hisor her information competence: If they wanted to beinformation literate at the end of coming out from here, theyreally could be, right? If they dont prioritize that, or think thatits important, they just will come out of here not knowing howto. . . The idea of individual responsibility for self-develop-ment and learning is a powerful one, and is viewed by facultyas a strong indicator of whether a student will benefit from theireducational experience as a whole, not just in the IL arena. Inparticular, personal interest in a subject area is considered acritical determinant of success: How students develop mostthings is out of interest. . .you can lead a horse to water, but youcant make it drink. So, if youre interested, youll learn, and ifyoure not, youre wasting time. The idea of personal, or life,interest, versus the students interest in successful completionof coursework assignments was explored by one sociologist,who suggested that students become information literatethrough the intersection of these two strands:

I think people are developing [IL] in their own lives, whether they have

need of it out of interest, or facility, or whatever. . .But then I think forthose then who are following a certain. . .whether it be a project or

whatever. . .when youre actually working on a project, or when you

need something for your own argument, for what youre doing. . .so Ithink there are two different ways in which you proceed in that.

One of the more striking themes to emergewas the pervasiveness of the belief that the

extent to which students develop as informationliterate individuals depends almost entirely onpersonal interest, individual motivation andinnate ability, rather than on the quality and

format of the available instructionalopportunities.

However, the question of individual motivation, whileviewed on the one hand as a noble and important characterattribute in the context of student learning, also emerged as asource of considerable frustration for some faculty, whoexpressed despair at their perceived inability to stimulateindependent learning activity among their student groups: Iwould suspect that with a number of them, it doesnt matterwhat you do, theyre never going to be that. . .theyre probablynot that interested anyway, they probably dont see the valuein it. The study found that this belief permeated the faculty

November 2006 577

psyche to such an extent that it affected almost every aspectof pedagogy, including the facultys choice of teachingmethod, the assessment schedules imposed by them and the

for themselves with regard to ILD is articulated in the sink-or-swim model described by one sociology academic, whichis premised on the central assumption, or hope, that studentsreading lists prepared for each module. For example, despitean expressed preference for small group teaching among themajority of faculty, the actual extent to which the method wasused in practice was extremely limited, with lectures remain-ing the primary teaching approach. Several participantsattributed this directly to lack of student motivation, citingsuch stumbling blocks as the students frequent failure to dorequired reading in advance, their deliberate reliance on othergroup members to carry the workload and their refusal toparticipate actively in group discussions. Similarly, theinclusion of textbooks at the expense of more varied resourceson course reading lists was attributed to the perceivedreluctance of students to do more reading than is required toachieve a pass grade: I mean if you teach one course, what[students] want is any textbook that will give them most of theinformation very quickly. This belief, which at one level istantamount to a fear of how the students will react to anymooted change in the curriculum or pedagogy, represents atangible problem for those wishing to modify existingprograms to facilitate information literacy. Faculty, who areuncertain as to how their students will respond to innovation,are perhaps less likely to wish to commit to collaborativearrangements with librarians. In some of the participantscomments, there was a sense of resignation and powerlessness,which is often the root cause of inertia. For instance, one civilengineer expressed his frustration at students perceivedlaziness in doing research, which invariably led him toperform the required task for them:

Theyre not able to [perform adequate literature searches], they

havent the patience to do that, they want you to point them directly at

the article. Like for example, those projects, I end up telling them the

key article. . .or else the thing would fall apart completely. There

would be a number of key articles, but inevitably ITd end up tellingthem what it is.

WHAT FACULTY THINK: THEYTLL dPICK IT UPTOVER TIME

The academics belief that a students path to ILD is, bynature, a solitary one was reflected in comments illustratingtheir expectations that the students will pick it up as theygo alonga number of the study participants suggested thatthere is a tacit assumption among faculty that an informationliterate mindset is developed in this haphazard manner. To anextent, it appears that these expectations are linked to theacademics personal experiences of university education,where they developed information skills gradually, andusually without much direct assistance: I think its thenway I learned iton my own! One sociologist recalled herown undergraduate experience of being exhorted by lecturersthat she and her classmates should be copping on toinformation skills by a certain point, although they hadreceived no instruction. She suggested that her approach as alecturer, and that of her colleagues, undoubtedly derived fromthose early experiences: we sort of expect [students] to reada book and to notice how a reference is cited, we expectthem to spend time in the library, and learn how to use eventhe file card system. The idea of expecting students to fend

578 The Journal of Academic Librarianshipare sufficiently independent-minded to seek assistance ifnecessary:

And you know, perhaps its a sink-or-swim model, and people would,

if the need arose, if there was no other option, theyd surely beg, borrow

or steal someones computer or find a friend who could help them, or

whatever. . .I mean, in a sense, thats how most people, I think, have

learnt about the Internet. . .they kind of pick it up as opposed to somesystematic form of training.

Accordingly, a number of the faculty stated their belief thatIL is developed in a largely inconsistent, ad-hoc manner orthrough a process of trial and error, as students applyvarious strategies to problems before arriving at the optimalsolution. Equally, some suggested that it occurs according tothe law of exposure, as students repeatedly encountersituations in which they are required to draw on their ILability, however limited it may be. The extent to whichstudents will adapt and modify their information-seekingstrategies is viewed once more as a function of motivationand ability. As one sociologist observed:

I think theres a good deal of ad-hoc stuff, that they just ransack

readily available sources. . .it is a common and useful method of

proceeding. Some stop at that. Some have an ability to move beyond

that to a limited extent, by looking, using bibliographies and citation

indexes, and asking around. . .to a broader pattern.

It was clear from some of the facultys comments that,although they believe that students do eventually becomeinformation literate, they were generally unable to explainthe mechanism by which it occurs: ITm never too surehow! A consequence of this belief is, therefore, theassumption that no formal structure is necessary to encourageILD among studentsit is seen as a natural, almost intuitiveprocess, whereby students will somehow work it out forthemselves through encountering and resolving informationproblems throughout the course of their education. In asense, this finding echoes observations made by Leckie47

about facultys tendency to create assignments that are toodifficult for undergraduate students. In her paper, she refersto the unreasonable expectations that academics have interms of the information sources they think students shoulduse, and the research process they believe students shouldadhere to in completing the assignment. Academics, most ofwhom have completed a PhD, and who are regarded asexperts in their chosen fields, have become accustomed toparticular information seeking strategies, which may notinvolve the library, but rather depend on a network ofpersonal contacts, and a system of following citation trails,neither of which are suitable for the novice researcher who isexperiencing the process for the first time, and has no senseof who is regarded as important in the field: Unlike faculty,undergraduates do not know what they want for theirresearch paper, except to complete it in a way that satisfiesthe professor.48 In the present context, it seems thatfacultys personal experiences of becoming informationliterate as students also influence their attitudes to how itshould be facilitated in the curriculum.

WHAT FACULTY THINK: ILD AS A SOCIAL PROCESS

Another theme to emerge from the interviews with faculty was

applying theory to practice, which is predicated on thenotion that teaching in itself is essentially futile, unless it isaccompanied by opportunities to apply the skills that arethe belief that students learn how to be information literatemainly through working with their fellow students, and turningto their peers for assistance when difficulties are encountered.This view was expressed particularly by civil engineeringfaculty, whose enthusiasm for social learning in this contextcan be attributed to their perception of the undergraduate civilengineering student body as an unusually close-knit community,imbued with a strong team-work spirit and sense of collegiality.Opportunities to work with fellow students did appear greater inthe civil engineering programs, where small groups of studentsfrequently collaborate on design projects, and in laboratorysessions. By contrast, as one sociologist observed, there seemedto be less of a pattern of co-operation among undergraduateSociology students: it tends to be quite atavistic and lessweighted that way [for our students]. However, one sociologistwho taught smaller classes, and had adopted a seminar style ofteaching, described the synergistic effect of this type of grouplearning situation in developing information skills:

With small groups you have a fairly good sense of how theyre getting

along because if your learning and teaching situation is discussion-

based, you have a good sense of what information is going in

there. . .you know whether things are understood, whether theres

accuracy, whats going on there. And then you also move into then

different levels of comprehension, so. . .how well are students inter-rogating the information, you have a good sense of that, because your

sounding board is happening in the class and also youre not waiting

until the very end, lets say in the examination.

Another theme to emerge from the interviewswith faculty was the belief that students learnhow to be information literate mainly through

working with their fellow students...

The strength of social learning in fostering ILD lies in theopportunities it presents for students to share both information,and information-seeking strategies. Sometimes, this can simplybe a function of physical proximity. As one civil engineer noted:If theyre in our PC lab working away, theyll be sharinginformation, you know, that is a good site to go to for that orwhatever. In most of the comments, however, participantsseemed unsure as to the mechanism by which this occurs,observing vaguely that, they sort of pick it up from theirfriends, and they develop them, or I think they probably learnquite a lot from each other. Once again, this belief points to anassumption that ILD should constitute a naturally occurringprocess, when the appropriate conditions prevail. However, it isalso indicative of a lack of awareness among faculty with regardto the degree of intervention and guidance that is necessary forIL to develop, and therefore a problematic finding in the contextof ILD as a structured approach to pedagogy.

WHAT FACULTY THINK: PROBLEM-SOLVING FOR ILD

A further context, in which participants perceive that studentscome to develop an IL mindset, centers on the concept oflearned:

You develop them by using, by doing it, its the only way you learn

anything, as far as Im concerned! I mean, you can read about it all day,

you can sit and listen to courses, and people telling you how to do it, but

the only way you learn how to do a design or to anything, is to sit down

and have an actual example that you have to research, some particular

topic, and you go and find out.

From this perspective, IL is seen to develop through theexperience of being confronted with an unfamiliar situationor a seemingly intractable information problem, and in theprocess of gradually working out how to achieve asatisfactory solution or find an appropriate answer to aquestion: By actually finding a problem where they cantfind good information, they use the information skills theydidnTt know they had! This essentially task-oriented viewof ILD is central to the constructivist ideology of self-directed and self-paced learning, where students learn to takean active approach. The central assumption underpinning thistheory is that it is the value and meaning that students attachto particular tasks, which determines how receptive they areto learning the skills associated with task completion. Thisassumption was echoed in an analogy, adopted by onesociologist to convey her conception of how studentsdevelop an IL mindset, in which she described her personalexperience of learning how to use a computer, explaininghow her ability to use the word processing packageprogressed and receded according to how much shepracticed:

Id liken it to something like me learning the computer. When I got my

first computer, I learned a program to word-process on it. And, I only

learned that one program, because I actually used it. And as soon as I

stopped using it, I forgot how to use it.

The academics viewed the connection between practicalproblem-solving and ILD in a number of ways. For onecivil engineer, the process represented the defining momentwhere knowledge and application are brought together toachieve a desired end. Conceptually, for the students, itserves to clarify the distinction between information-gather-ing, and information use, where previously the line wasblurred:

And I think its done through problem-based type learning, where they

see scenarios, they see case studies, they see situations, theyre asked to

solve a problem. And its not until then that they actually make the

mental connections between the knowledge and the processes that are

required to convert that knowledge into use. . .into design, into

whatever.

Active engagement with a research task was viewed byanother civil engineer as an opportunity for students to learnhow to construct an effective information strategy, through theiterative process of making mistakes and seeking assistancefrom qualified sources. In her description, she differentiatedbetween the technical problems of accessing information,and the more subtle conceptual difficulties involved in

November 2006 579

locating relevant information, for which she suggested theexample of keyword-searching:

terms of the level of mastery they are expected to reach.Secondly, they argue that the lack of direct learning supportprovided to students in doing research may lead to them toBut maybe if its something more subtle, if its something to do with

the keywords that theyre using, maybe theyre not getting very

fruitful. . .sometimes it would happen to myself, that Id put in what I

think are the most obvious keywords, and getting rubbish back. And I

just try some completely different tack, and youre getting all this stuff

back, you know.

While this belief does suggest an inherently more structuredapproach, the question of whether ILD is a process whichoccurs intuitively still remains; in this case, while facultyviewed problem-solving as the key context for development,there was no reference to the degree of instructor interventionthat might be necessary for success, or the extent to which ILDshould be included as an explicit objective of the problem-solving tasks.

CONCLUSION

Although providing just a snapshot of what faculty believe aboutILD in two disciplines, a common thread running through theseobservations is facultys belief that information literacy developsgradually and intuitively, through participation in a number ofdifferent scenarios. The concept of learning by doing featuredstrongly in facultys comments, although the need for structuredintervention and guidance was not a key theme. Paradoxically,students personal motivation emerged as both a positive and anegative influence on facultys approach to pedagogy. In the firstinstance, the belief that intrinsic motivation is a key determinantof ILD constitutes a reasonable assumption, and serves as areminder that learning tasks should be constructed that willengage the student in a meaningful sense. However, the degreeto which faculty also appeared to consider themselves bound bytheir expectations of the learning situations in which studentswill, or will not, participate, is a troublesome finding, andsuggests that the persistence of the traditional, passive learningframework is at least partially based on facultys reluctance torock the boat, and incur student resistance. This paradox ishighlighted further by the facultys apparent belief that the roadto ILD is essentially a solitary journey, driven by the studentsown personal interest. On the one hand, the student is expectedto identify, and avail of, the existing opportunities for ILDwithinthe curriculum. On the other, students are perceived as extrinsi-cally motivated by the desire to simply pass a course, and to dono more than is required to achieve an acceptable result.

The findings, which revealed how faculty appear to relyheavily on coursework assignments and dissertations as aprimary vehicle for ILD, are similar to those reported byMarkless and Streatfield,49 who also questioned academicsabout their pedagogical practices for information skills devel-opment in post-secondary institutions the UK. However, intheir report, the authors expressed concern about the facultysapparent dependence on coursework assignments as a vehiclefor information literacy among students, noting a number ofpotential problems with this approach. In the first instance, theysuggest that assignment protocols, for the most part, do notspecify clearly enough the information skills that studentsrequire to successfully complete the projectrather, the use ofvague, overly generalized terminology such as researchskills or information gathering in assignment outlines failsto provide sufficiently clear guidelines for the students, in

580 The Journal of Academic Librarianshipgrading assignments almost always focus on the final outcome,rather than the information processes that led to the completedproject. As a result, students receive no useful feedback onwhether their research approach was effective: How cananyone be sure which particular skills have been mastered andwhich used inefficiently to produce a particular end result?51

An additional point for consideration concerns the informationbehavior of the students themselves, and their tendency topull together just enough dat randomT information to supportthe requirements of the paper.52 Overworked students, whorecognize that their information skills are unlikely to be gradedseparately, are unwilling to spend time in developing com-petency in this areainevitably, they will put in the minimumamount of effort required to gain a pass grade. In the presentstudy, facultys comments pointed towards an assumption thatstudents would develop competence in this way, although therewas no direct attempt to design assignments specifically withthis outcome in mind.

What is clear from these findings is that IL has not yetbecome a priority for academic faculty. The comments made byfaculty in the present study were, to an extent, exploratory innature, as they grappled with an unfamiliar question. Inparticular, the assumption that IL was already accounted forin the learning situations that prevailed at the time of theinterviews, demonstrated a lack of awareness of the issuessurrounding pedagogy for ILDperhaps understandable, con-sidering the publishing domain for IL papers, which is virtuallylimited to Library and Information Science. This suggests thatdespite the extensive promotional work undertaken by infor-mation professionals, IL remains an undiscovered country foracademics. A number of potential strategies are suggested toresolve this issue:

! the inclusion of IL on the list of professional developmentmodules offered to teaching faculty in post-secondaryinstitutions;

! specific targeting of journals in the educational researchfield for the publication of articles on pedagogy for ILD;

! specific targeting of educational conferences for thepresentation of papers on current ILD research;

! organization of discipline-specific workshops, seminars andconferences on ILD for faculty; and

! increase in the level of promotional activities for ILD atinstitutional level, particularly with regard to the lobbying ofuniversity governors for the inclusion of ILD as a criterionfor promotion and tenure.

What is clear from these findings is that IL hasnot yet become a priority for academic faculty.reinforce inappropriate or incorrect execution of the skill.50

Their overriding concern is that students do not receiveappropriate guidance, as their lecturers assume that they arelearning by doing, a belief which they describe as acommon trap. Finally, they suggest that the criteria for

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(Phoenix, AZ: Oryx Press, 1998).582 The Journal of Academic Librarianship

What Faculty Think-Exploring the Barriers to Information Literacy Development in Undergraduate EducationIntroduction: The Faculty ProblemLiterature ReviewStudy AimsMethodWhat Faculty Think: Were Already Doing It!What Faculty Think: The Effect of Student MotivationWhat Faculty Think: Theyll Pick it Up Over TimeWhat Faculty Think: ILD as a Social ProcessWhat Faculty Think: Problem-Solving for ILDConclusionNotes and References