Instruction & Research Support at Lavery Library

We continually assess students and services in order to improve library instruction, evaluate learning outcomes and information literacy skills, and provide evidence of the value of library instruction.

• We follow a three-year assessment cycle for the undergraduate Core instruction program, using a posttest designed to make evidence-based changes to our teaching.
• Liaison librarians conduct formative and summative assessments of students.
• Since 2015, programmatic assessment of undergraduate students has taken place through annual surveying of information literacy; this includes collecting longitudinal data of information literacy skills progression from incoming first-year students to graduating students.
• Librarians collect data related to individual and small-group research help, including capturing data on the School or course a student is enrolled in, length of the consultation, and notes about what information literacy skills they taught.

Librarians assess classroom learning in the Core Library sessions through the administration of a posttest.

Learning Communities

Research-based Writing 1299 (formerly 199)

Advanced Research-based Writing 3990

First-Year Seminar

Beginning in fall 2015, the Library began administering the Higher Education Data Sharing (HEDS) Research Practices Survey (RPS) to first-semester freshman, prior to library instruction, and to second-semester freshmen, after First-Year Program (FYP) instruction in the spring semester. Second-semester seniors are also surveyed during the spring semester.

The Higher Education Data Sharing Research Practices Survey allows for programmatic assessment of information literacy and longitudinal assessment of information literacy skills progression. The Library committed to a 10-year longitudinal assessment of Fisher students information literacy skills, from fall 2015 to spring 2026.

*In 2022 HEDS stopped administering the RPS, but shared the survey with schools for local deployment.

Librarians capture data about our individual and small-group interactions when they are related to information literacy. Annually, we conduct over 1000 individual or small-group research help interactions, with the average interaction lasting ~30 minutes. Below is a snapshot of these interactions.

*Includes Special Collections & Archives