Minutes from Student IT Fluency task force meeting 2/27/01

     JoAnn M Burke ,
     *Julie Long ,
     Julie Storme ,
     Karen Chambers ,
     *Tom Bonnell ,
     *Dan Mandell ,
     Doug Tyler ,
     *Gerry Gingras ,
     *Peter Smith ,
     Patrick White ,
     *Georgeanna Rosenbush ,
     Mary Connolly ,
     *Sue Wiegand ,
     *Dick Jensen 

The meeting opened with a review of the draft of the survey prepared by Julie Long and also a report by George of a partial set of computer skills which were utilized by students in various student government and student employment positions. We came to several realizations which are listed as follows:

1. Students will teach each other. It is not necessary for either faculty teaching a course requiring student use of technology or supervisors of student government or employment positions to teach students about technology, but these faculty and supervisors should know where students can go to learn the technology.
   
   
2. We are trying to create a culture at Saint Mary's in which students will take responsibility for their own learning, but in the meantime we need a process that will not just expose students to technology, but will insist that they make use of it.
   
   
3. A survey form, like the one Julie prepared, might uncover resources which help improve the technology skill level, but does not get at the imformation literacy component. We need directed questions or at least a column in the suggested grid labeled "Learning Goals of the Assignment."
   
   
4. It is very hard to teach students to evaluate web-based information resources because they do not have the background in the discipline to call upon. It is hard enough for experienced faculty to evaluate these resources. We spent a good portion of the meeting discussing what is reasonable to expect from students in evaluationg the quality of web-based information.

We concluded that the instrument we use to gather the resource list should focus on what students are expected to do in the course re growth in their IT fluency, not on the technology the faculty member uses to transmit the course information. For each course or other opportunity, three questions need to be asked:

• What kinds and levels of technology were students required to use in the course or position?
• What specific assignments were they given requiring use of technology?
• What were the learning goals of these assignments?

There was a healthy skepticism expressed that the survey would not uncover resources to help students improve their higher level critical thinking and assessment skills. Because we had a difficult time articulating exactly what we wanted from faculty who were to fill out the survey, we decided that we had better present it to the liaisons in person at a meeting soon after break. Dan was going to work on a draft of a questionnaire to get at information literacy resources and pass it by Julie before sending it to all of us by email for our suggestions before the next meeting on March 20.

While we were talking, Dick Jensen had filled in the grid for one of his courses to illustrate that it might not be as hard for faculty to work with as we might think. If fact, the resources he identified would be very apropos for any liberal arts course. We suggested that each of us take one of our courses and do the same so we would have a set of examples when we talk to the liaisons and they could use them when talking to the faculty in their departments.

Peter showed a draft of the email link which separated email competencies into the four levels: beginning, passic, active, and expert user. This explanation can be reached by clicking on email in the on-line form of the rubric. He will continue this work to add depth to the rubric. We discussed making the resource list available as links from the rubric, where a course would appear in the block(s) where it helps a student progress down the ladder. (I.e., it would not be listed at a level beyond which its opportunities would take the student, nor would it be listed in an earlier level.) This suggestion was met with skepticism from some participants who doubted that the growth in IT fluency would be linear.

Lacking any other suggestions we decided to move forward and revise direction if necessary. The next meeting will be at noon on Tuesday, March 20, in the Library media center classroom (Rm B11).

If there are any additions or corrections to these minutes please contact me.

Peter