You use information to make decisions every day!
In the workplace, you have "workplace information literacy."
In your life as a student, you have to develop "information literacy in higher education."
Hopefully, this class will help you as a student and as a professional, and maybe even in your life outside of work or school.
Information literacy is more than simply knowing which online resources to use to find information for a research project. That's just "tool literacy," which is a part of information literacy. Information literacy is more than that.
Below are some links about information literacy.
The definition of an information literate person extends beyond school and application to academic problems--such as writing a research paper--and reaches right into the workplace. Information literacy is also important to the development of an effective and enlightened citizenry, and has implications that can impact the lives of many people around the globe.
The ability to use information technologies effectively to find and manage information, and the ability to critically evaluate and ethically apply that information to solve a problem are some of the hallmarks of an information literate individual. Other characteristics of an information literate individual include the spirit of inquiry and perseverance to find out what is necessary to get the job done.
Just because so much information is so easily and quickly available does not mean that all of it is worthwhile or even true.
Because of resources like the Internet, finding high-quality information is now harder than ever, not easier. Finding the good stuff is not always quick! And the good stuff does not always come cheaply. (In short, to make it in today's Information Age, you have to be even smarter--not dumber--than your typewriter-schlepping predecessors).
To make matters worse, just because you know how to use a particular information technology today does not mean that there is not another one right behind it that you will have to learn how to use tomorrow. Once seemingly exotic technologies like "word processing" and "electronic mail" are now commonplace, but at one time, they were amazing and revolutionary. (To some of us, they still are).
Today's employers are looking for people who understand and can adapt to the characteristics of the Information Age. If a student has "learned how to learn," upon graduation, they are a much more attractive job candidate. An information literate individual--with their strong analytical, critical thinking and problem-solving skills--can be expected to be an adaptable, capable and valuable employee, with much to contribute.