Board 94 : Engineering Graduate Student Information Literacy: Are We Meeting the Need?

Abstract

Library instruction for engineering graduate students at the University of Michigan (U-M) has historically been ad hoc; librarians respond to requests for instruction, but to date they have not provided instruction as an intentional program of information literacy topics.Engineering librarians promote library services at department orientation sessions and have worked with the College of Engineering's Graduate Education Programs office to present instruction on topics including literature reviews, data management, finding funding, and reading retention.Attendance at and response to these instruction sessions suggest that a formal program of instruction can be beneficial to engineering graduate students.Considering that individual students approach the librarians for instruction on topics such as strategies for literature reviews, or that individual faculty members approach the librarians for instruction to the students in their labs on topics such as best resources for researching specific subjects or instruction on citation management applications, one might reasonably conclude that there is an unmet need for a broad instruction program.In this project, the engineering librarians of the U-M disseminated a Qualtrics survey to engineering graduate students on their needs for library instruction.The survey differentiated between students who are writing theses and those who are not.By looking at students who are doing research and those who are not as two separate populations, the survey may identify needs for instruction that go beyond common library instruction topics such as literature reviews and the library had not previously considered.This paper will summarize the results of the survey and discuss plans for implementation of an instruction program of information literacy topics. BackgroundIn fall semester 2017, a group of graduate students in the College of Engineering (CoE) at the University of Michigan (U-M) were awarded a community grant from the U-M Rackham graduate school.The students' grant proposal was a "Grad School Boot Camp," and it sought funding to sponsor a series of events on topics pertinent to succeeding in graduate school.For one of these events, the group contacted the library to ask for a presentation called "How to Conduct a Proper Literature Review."Clearly, these students saw engagement with the library as a step toward succeeding in graduate school.At the same time, the engineering librarians at the U-M Art, Architecture & Engineering Library (AAEL) were looking for ways the library could better engage with CoE graduate students.The library's resources and services help students in many ways, such as support for literature reviews, citation management, data management, and publishing, but the librarians wondered how well students took advantage of these resources.For fall semester 2017, the U-M CoE enrolled 3,637 graduate students in 15 departments and programs.This represented 27% of the total U-M graduate student enrollment of 13,415

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