Background/Context: The management, processing, and transformation of information constitute central tasks in education. Education informatics intersects the theories and practices of both informatics and education. In particular, informatics aids in the systematic incorporation of technology as educational stakeholders represent, process, and…

The American Library Association's (ALA) "Library Bill of Rights" is important to school librarians because it provides the philosophical structure for intellectual freedom in school libraries and asserts the rights of minors. It states: "A person's right to use a library should not be denied or abridged because of origin, age,…

While interactive hands-on instruction is usually considered the best approach for engineering students for both their academic courses and for library instruction, the size of the engineering student population compared to the number of instructors and the available classroom space means that engineering librarians, like engineering faculty, may…

Today school library media specialists operate in an environment of daily challenges and controversies. "No Child Left Behind" established mandates that all educators are scrambling to meet. No matter how people feel about the way the legislation is being carried out, it is difficult to argue against its purpose--that all educators must…

"Empowering Learners: Guidelines for School Library Media Programs (American Association of School Librarians, 2009) continues to support the four original roles of the school librarian identified in "Information Power: Building Partnerships for Learning" (American Association of School Librarians/Association for Educational Communication and…

In 1978, the Board of Cooperative Educational Services, a consortium of public school districts in upstate New York, was sued by the Encyclopedia Britannica Educational Corporation because the consortium taped educational programs broadcast on local public television stations and provided copies to local schools. This case, known as…

Resource discovery tops the charts as the foremost issue within the realm of library automation. As a new year commences, the author sees a more pressing need to accelerate the pace with which libraries deliver content and services in ways that users will find compelling, relevant, and convenient. The evolution of the web advances relentlessly,…

Innovations in search and retrieval have provided librarians with some of their most exciting challenges as a profession. Yet even as new tools flood the academic library commons, direct, person-to-person information counseling is still needed, some would say more than ever. Consequently, it can be very useful to study how users conduct new…

This study examines potential correlates of business research database access through academic libraries serving top business programs in the United States. Results indicate that greater access to research databases is related to enrollment in graduate business programs, but not to overall enrollment or status as a public or private institution.…

"Research Library Issues" ("RLI") is a bimonthly report from ARL (Association of Research Libraries), CNI (Coalition of Networked Information), and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition). This issue includes the following articles: (1) ARL Encourages Members to Refrain from Signing Nondisclosure or…

The aim of this research was to investigate current issues faced by public library staff in rural South Australia and to examine some of the reasons why people choose to work in rural libraries. The study took a mixed methods approach, combining interviews and questionnaires to gain a fuller understanding of the issues and experiences of rural…

This article demonstrates how Facebook, a popular social networking Web site, provides libraries with the opportunity to develop an outreach presence and information portal within an online community. While much of the recent literature examines Facebook and defines its potential use within libraries, this article focuses on the use of Facebook's…

Developing and updating subject knowledge is an important and ongoing area of professional development. As well as formal subject-specific CPD, teachers can extend their pedagogical subject knowledge by researching and using curriculum materials. This article reviews the resources available from the National STEM Centre eLibrary to help teachers…

This paper aims to provide the reader with a comprehensive background for understanding current knowledge on Learning Analytics (LA) and Educational Data Mining (EDM) and its impact on adaptive learning. It constitutes an overview of empirical evidence behind key objectives of the potential adoption of LA/EDM in generic educational strategic…

This author contends that there never has been a need for the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), and there is no evidence that it will do students any good. The Common Core ignores the real problem in American education: poverty. The Common Core movement will be a disaster for libraries and will have a negative impact on nearly every aspect of…