The Effect of Online Distance Education on LIS Programs

Distance education is experiencing rapid growth in academic institutions. Faculty and students accept Distance Education (DE) as an alternative to classroom instruction. In this chapter, the authors discuss emerging issues concerning DE and how they have affected traditional education in the LIS school. Regardless of the form of education delivered, the essential purposes of instruction remain unchanged: disseminating knowledge and providing quality education for students.

“I Love Being Able to Have my Colleagues Around the World at my Fingertips:”

Teacher-librarians are often “lone wolves” in schools. This chapter explores how Canadian teacher-librarians are participating in life-long learning in the 21st century using Web 2.0 technologies. It also explores how one online distance education program implemented changes to help prepare teacher-librarians to participate in local and global personal learning networks. Findings from a Canadian survey on this topic found that teacher-librarians often seek out other teacher-librarians for advice and support, as well as relying on regular interaction (both face-to-face and online) with their colleagues. Other informal professional learning occurs through listservs, online networks, Elluminate sessions, webinars, TED talks, podcasts, Nings, blogs, and Twitter. New and emerging technologies are helping teacher-librarians connect to one another locally and, more importantly, globally. It is this combination of both local and global personal learning networks that helps teacher-librarians move from being lone wolves to members of the pack.

What’s In It for Me?

Virtual worlds offer synchronous (simultaneous) real life participation through virtual reality, combining the two to provide convenient and low-cost options for librarians’ professional development. This chapter explores the use of virtual worlds for meetings, training, conferences, discussions, mentoring, networking, and peer-to-peer information sharing, with a focus on the 3D virtual world of Second Life. Definitions of “professional development” and “virtual worlds” precede discussion of the issues surrounding the use of this type of environment for a variety of training events and activities to support and encourage ongoing expansion of knowledge, innovation, and creativity among librarians. This chapter also includes information about planning and implementing professional development sessions in this arena, along with information on effective methods for publicizing these activities for parties interested in using virtual worlds for professional development. For those interested in attending professional development opportunities in virtual worlds, the chapter provides information on how to discover and choose useful activities and events in virtual worlds.

Use of Internet among Students and Researchers at Alagappa University

The fast growth of information and communication technology and particularly the Internet has changed traditional methods of research, storage, retrieval, and communication of information. Internet has emerged as the most powerful medium for storage and retrieval of information. The Internet facility has enabled teachers and students to enhance their academic excellence by providing them the latest information and access to worldwide information. The present study highlights the existing situation of Internet services provided by the various departments of Alagappa University. The study shows that female respondents constitute more in number than male respondents, corroborating the greater number of women in higher education in Tamil Nadu state. It also reveals that most respondents (56.76%) use the Internet for educational purposes, while 36.49% use online services for research purposes.

Blended Learning in a Digital Library Learning Programme

This chapter introduces a blended learning approach within a joint international Erasmus Mundus master programme on Digital Library Learning (DILL) at the Institute of Information Studies (IIS) of Tallinn University. IIS has experimented with technology-based teaching and learning methods and tools since the early 1990s. The DILL programme has been designed to offer ways to integrate traditional strategies with methods offered by the current technology for teaching and learning. The pedagogic approach used advocates using a variety of technology and media for content delivery, communication, collaboration, and student support to meet the needs of diverse student groups and improve the quality of teaching. The chapter introduces using the virtual learning environment, social media tools, open educational resources, and video interactions with remote experts within this programme. A virtual collaboration initiative (Entrepreneurship Seminar on European Virtual Venturing) between the Ecole Supérieure d'Informatique, Réseaux et Systèmes d'Information (ITIN) in Cergy-Pontoise, France, and IIS in Spring 2010 and 2011 within the Human Resource Management Module of this programme is also considered.

The Master’s in Library and Information Studies Program via Distance at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

A narrative history of the development of the online Master’s degree at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, School of Library and Information Studies (SLIS), from its inception in collaboration with an Illinois public library system, to its current, fully online iteration is given. In addition, course delivery methods, from videoconferencing to Web-based methods, are outlined, and other details of the program are described.

Assessment of Student Learning Outcomes in Distance Education

Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) are becoming the norm for all types of accreditation decisions by regional and specialized agencies. SLOs and student assessment norms and best practices are described, as well as a path to establish SLOs. Analyzing and using the data collected about student assessment to enrich student learning is also described. Special attention is given to LIS instruction, but several comparisons to other disciplines are also made.

Faculty Experience of Online Teaching

Online education is growing rapidly and outpacing research efforts in this area. Online teaching in particular has received little research attention. Grounded in existing literature and empirical research, this chapter aims to describe the key dimensions of the faculty experience of preparing and teaching online courses. The differences between online and traditional teaching are highlighted, emphasizing time/effort cost, technology and support needs, as well as the relationship between online teaching technology and pedagogy. The shift in faculty role is discussed. Special attention is given to using various Web resources for online teaching and the impact of this trend on library services. Real-life examples and direct quotes from faculty who teach online are used to illustrate each of the themes and suggest directions for future research.

Technology Competencies

This chapter presents a case study on how incoming students are prepared to be technologically competent at the School of Library and Information Science at San Jose State University. A one credit hour, self-paced course is offered that covers online instructional technologies students will be using to receive their education, helpful online information resources for their coursework, and skills that are essential to being able to learn in an online educational environment. Students were positive about the value of the course and considered it important to their success in the program. The peer mentors participating in the course were also positive about their role in helping new students receive this preparation. I am grateful to Debbie Faires and Emily Weak for their help in completing this work. Note: Transcriptions of students’ comments are entered verbatim.

Evolving Technology, Evolving Roles for Distance Education Librarians

This chapter explores technologically driven changes to distance education librarianship and their impact on the job responsibilities of librarians. It examines the necessary skills in the areas of technology, communication, networking, and roles that have emerged in distance education librarianship both globally and at Appalachian State University (ASU). These include: virtual reference librarian, Web librarian, course-integrated and/or instructional librarian, avatar librarian, and marketing librarian. Also discussed are collaboration and leadership opportunities for distance education librarians within the library and campus-wide, as a result of knowledge and expertise gained from providing library support to distance education students. This chapter will be relevant to administrators and practitioners as they make choices concerning library science curricula, hiring, and continuing education decisions.