Mixed or Complementary Messages: Making the Most of Unexpected Assessment Results

Abstract

Grinnell College participated in ACRL's first cohort of Assessment in Action (AiA), undertaking a mixed-methods action research project to assess the effectiveness of librarian-led research literacy sessions in improving students' research skills. The quantitative data showed that the quality of students' sources did not markedly improve following a research literacy session, while the qualitative data indicated that many students were able to state and describe important research concepts they learned. This article profiles the development of Grinnell's AiA project and discusses how Grinnell's librarians responded when the initial results led to more questions rather than to satisfactory answers. BackgroundGrinnell College, a highly selective residential liberal arts college that enrolls 1,600 fulltime undergraduate students, is located in central Iowa. Grinnell's AiA team included members from across campus, including three librarians, a religious studies faculty member with assessment experience, and a professional from the Office of Analytic Support and Institutional Research. In abidance with AiA guidelines, this team conducted action research, a methodology concisely defined by McMillan and Wergin as research undertaken in a practice setting for the purpose of better understanding professional work and how to improve it.

Using assurance of learning data to assess business students’ research skills

“…Research skills investigations in non-business disciplines are also available to add to our understanding of the complexity associated with improving students’ research skills. Library-based research literacy sessions do not necessarily work well (Jones et al , 2016). While students learned to find sources during these sessions, their ability to evaluate sources did not improve.…”

Library instruction and information literacy 2016

“…Other pertinent topics include assessment (Jones et al, 2016;Rui, 2016;Smith, 2016) pedagogy (Maddison and Kumaran, 2016;Cisse, 2016), information literacy within the disciplines (Gauder and Jenkins, 2016;Bausman and Laleman Ward, 2016), diversity, social justice and pedagogy in IL instruction (Accardi, 2016;Irvin, 2016;Mathuews, 2016, Pagowsky andMcElroy, 2016), ESL and international students (Aytac, 2016) and librarians as teachers (Drabinski, 2016).…”