Information Literacy & Academic Integrity

One core focus of this report is to look into how students are being taught to study and research in a campus environment that is increasingly connected to a vast, ever more easily accessible, sea of information. Campus efforts have included a concerted effort to promote information literacy and academic integrity. To see how these efforts are working and to learn where more might be done, we asked faculty to tell us about their students‘ information literacy skills and their own approaches to teaching these skills. We also asked students whether, and how often, they were learning the kinds of skills they need to appropriately acquire, interpret, and use information. The results were mostly encouraging, but revelatory of a few areas where our campus can improve.

As seen in the following chart, 86% of faculty respondents rated their students’ skill at searching the Internet as “excellent” or “good”, but the rating was sharply lower when it came to other information skills. Faculty most often rated students as “acceptable ” in their capacity to evaluate sources, to cite and paraphrase, and in their familiarity with electronic resources in their major. However, a worrisomely high number rated their students as “poor ” in these areas. More confidence was expressed in students‘ ability to use software important to their discipline.

Figure: Faculty response to Q10: “Please assess the following information literacy skills of upper-level students in your discipline.” (%)
… Excellent Good Acceptable Poor No Skills In This Area Don't Know Enough To Judge
Searching The Internet 47 39 11 1 0 2
Distinguishing Between Reputable And Mariginal Sources 6 19 37 28 2 7
Understanding Citation And Paraphrasing Of Sources 6 10 38 38 1 7
Familiarity With Databases, Electronic Journals And Other Resources In The Major 8 17 37 29 1 8
Ability To Use Important Software Applications Related To The Majorr 17 29 31 7 2 134

View the survey data, or to filter by college, rank, etc (See Q10)

As seen in the following chart, 86% of faculty respondents rated their students‘ skill at searching the Internet as “excellent ” or “good ”, but the rating was sharply lower when it came to other information skills. Faculty most often rated students as “acceptable ” in their capacity to evaluate sources, to cite and paraphrase, and in their familiarity with electronic resources in their major. However, a worrisomely high number rated their students as “poor ” in these areas. More confidence was expressed in students‘ ability to use software important to their discipline.

Figure: Faculty response to Q11: “Please indicate how frequently you...” (%)
… At Least 2-4 Times A Semester At Least Once A Semester Never
...help your students learn how to use the internet for research. 50 75 17
...design assignments that teach students how to distinguish between marginal and reputable sources. 23 53 33
...teach your students how to use technological tools and software applications most relevant to your field of study. 61 81 9
...teach your students about academic integrity, including how to cite sources and avoid plagiarism. 50 89 6
...take measures to deter or detect plagiarism. 50 77 13

View the survey data, or to filter by college, rank, etc (See Q11)

The correlation between faculty assessment of student information literacy skills (especially the skill of distinguishing between marginal and reputable sources) and the acknowledgment by many faculty that they do not teach such skills is striking. In other words, too many faculty perceive this skills gap but are not take measures to fill it.

Student responses to a similar set of questions demonstrate that a very large percentage of students are learning about academic integrity (79%) and have instructors who reinforce academic integrity (89%) in at least some of their classes. A similarly high percentage of students also responded that they are learning in class how to acquire, interpret, and use information in their field of study (87%) and how to use technological tools and software in their major (85%). However, a much smaller percent are learning in class how to use online databases, electronic journals, and digital resources in the major (59%) or how to distinguish between marginal and reputable sources of information (56%). It appears these skills, plus the ethical use of information, are most often learned in only a few classes or outside of class.

Figure: Student responses to Q9: ?Please indicate the best answer for each of the following statements.”
… In All Of My Classes In Most Of My Classes In Some Of My Classes Outside Of My Classes Never Not Relevant To The Classes I Take
I am learning how to use online databases, electronic journals and digital resources in my major. 8 16 39 19 9 9
I am learning how to distinguish between marginal and reputable sources of information. 8 17 31 22 11 9
I am learning the principles of academic integrity, including how to cite sources and avoid plagiarism. 22 26 31 13 4 5
My instructors actively reinforce academic integrity and take measures to deter and detect plagiarism. 34 31 24 3 3 5
I am learning how to acquire, interpret, and use information in my field of study. 26 35 26 8 2 2
I am learning how to use the technological tools and software applications that are most relevant to my major. 20 32 33 9 3 3
I am learning the legal and ethical use of information, including the role of copyright, intellectual property, laws surrounding downloading music, etc. 13 19 27 20 12 8

View the survey data, or filter by college, year, etc (See Q9 and 10)

To follow up on these quantitative results, we asked faculty to provide a brief example or two of how they teach or reinforce information literacy and academic integrity skills in their classrooms. The 125 comments reflecting many different and reveal considerable activity in this area. A number faculty cited the role of specific librarians in their courses, and others listed a wide variety of measures used to instruct students about plagiarism and other integrity issues. There were occasional expressions of frustration that there was not sufficient class time to cover these issues as well as necessary course material. Examples of comments:

“In a technical class already stuffed with information, I do not have time to be going over how to search the internet for reputable sources and other than a brief statement on plagiarism.” Professor, RCEAS
“Set assignments using combinations of structured and internet resources in response. Set formal case readings and ask students to update text with current history from web. Have students formally build and operate active websites to explain and communicate their achievements.” Professor of Practice, CBE
“I give my students a tutorial on literature searching; I demand full documentation (citation, etc.) in their reports, and I show them how to find journal articles/use Web of Science/PubMed in my class(es).” Assistant Professor, RCEAS
“Give them a plagiarism assignment and quiz so they know (and they know I know they know) what it consists of.” Assistant Professor, CAS, Social Sciences
“I should do more, particularly in the area of evaluating the relative importance of different sets of data or sources of information.“ Professor, CAS, Natural Sciences
“Reserve a computer room to teach students use of MLA for research assignments that require them to find articles and summarize and report on them; usually do it two days with them; then expect them on later research project to work on their own; design assignments so that they become familiar with other tools useful in the discipline (online OED). Explain plagiarism first day of class. Don't usually have trouble with it--but it has become harder to detect. Thus design assignments in which plagiarism is difficult--very specific ones that require stages or steps, all handed in.” Professor, CAS, Humanities
“Post and discuss current guidelines on fair use of multimedia resources in educational projects. Discussions regarding the use of appropriation in contemporary art and the 'tranformation' guideline used in copyright cases. Photography students and animation students produce original material in my classes and are discouraged from mining the internet for visual content. Proposals for independent work must include a bibliography and the resources must be varied (i.e., not all from the internet).” Associate Professor, CAS, Arts and Humanities

See all faculty comments on this topic

We also asked students to elaborate on how their instructors reinforced these skills in their classrooms. The majority of student comments dealt with classroom activity related to preventing plagiarism and support of academic integrity. Many mentioned that they were clearly informed of enforcement practices and the likelihood of sanctions. A number of students mentioned guest lectures by librarians. Some indicated that these topics rarely come up.

“All of my professors stress the importance of not plagiarizing in papers.” Junior, Arts and Sciences
“In most classes that involve research, instructors go over how to use databases. Also, they frequently remind students of ways to avoid accidental plagiarism? First Year, Arts and Sciences
“My instructors require that we always cite any sources used. They do not penalize for incorrect citation but rather assist us in citing information the correct way. Instructors also require copies of the articles or documents that we have cited to ensure academic integrity.” Graduate, Masters, College of Education
“Academic integrity statement included on syllabus. On each programming assignment, the statement is repeated as well as with common scenarios that are considered cheating..." Senior, Engineering
“Professors often give examples of how to access information in online databases and emphasize filtering information to make sure the sources used are valid.”Fifth Year, Arts and Sciences
“Teachers bring in librarians to help explain how to use online sources and the library.”First Year, Business and Economics
“We've just been threatened with severe consequences for plagiarism since day one of freshman year.”Sophomore, Arts and Sciences
“As a journalism major, most of these things are integral to my classes. Researching legitimate information is invaluable to what I am doing.”Senior, Arts and Sciences

See all student comments on this topic

The views of staff in the Office of Student Conduct, which handles academic integrity violations, reinforce the opinions of faculty and students. Although there is no simple way to track academic integrity cases, the impression of the Office staff is that the kinds of conduct cases are changing. For example, there appear to be fewer cases of students ?not knowing how to cite.” Most cases now involve more intentional acts of academic dishonesty (i.e., cheating on quizzes or exams, falsifying information, etc. as opposed to unintentional plagiarism and careless research). The Office of Student Conduct staff has also observed that the efforts of the campus to promote academic integrity and information literacy (mentioned above in section II.C.2.) seem to be having an impact. The Office has noticed an increase in faculty members who use Turnitin.com as a resource and who refer to the Information Literacy information provided by the library. Future discussions in this area should focus on how to continue these promising trends (fewer students committing unintentional plagiarism and careless research) while also helping faculty address the persistence of those more intentional acts of academic dishonesty.

Overall, pulling together these quantitative and qualitative results, we feel confident in reporting that our campus is, for the most part, effective at helping students gain the skills, attitudes and behaviors that are necessary for working with information in a digital age. Web resources, classroom visits, and efforts to help faculty develop effective approaches to teaching and reinforcing skills all seem to be working well. Work in this area will, however, need to continue. For example, the number of students who indicated that they are learning these crucial skills in only some classes indicates that we should continue working to increase the number of classes that teach information literacy and reinforce academic integrity. In addition, we should ensure that incoming students and new faculty are made aware of Lehigh?s policies and the many helpful resources available to them. Also, as the numbers above make clear, more could be done to help faculty design assignments that teach students how to distinguish between marginal and reputable sources. Lastly, it is anticipated that the Information Literacy Working Group will (a) create tutorials for incoming students that allow them to immediately receive help with skills gaps that are revealed in the assessment they take upon arrival to Lehigh and (b) continue to work with departments to design discipline-specific tutorials for students that will help teach these skills in a consistent, reliable, time-effective manner.