Faculty: M. Saif Rahman, Assistant Professor of Economics
Librarian: Joy He, Public Services Librarian
Description of the project
We propose a project that would systematically integrate information literacy into the course in Economic Development. This course, taught by Saif Rahman, provides an economic analysis of the problems and prospects of development with a special focus on contemporary less developed countries. It deals with analytical and policy issues relating to economic growth performance, structure of production, income distribution, the incidence of poverty, population growth, unemployment, the role of women, international trade, and international capital flows. It is therefore a natural forum for students to be exposed to both a large volume and a large variety of information, including but not limited to cross-country data and existing academic or journalistic research. In fact, given that the context and the process of development usually vary across countries, an adequate appreciation of the development issues requires that the students of this subject be aware of some basic information about less developed countries and also of additional material available for further academic exploration.
The current format of the course attempts to go beyond the basic textbook and lecture-oriented approach by incorporating student reports on basic country data and by encouraging optional research papers. However, the typical student's training with respect to information sources (data and research), ability to use the internet for the purpose of academic research, and knowledge of information presentation tools is usually limited. Consequently, under the current format, the instructor would frequently need to provide guidance to students on an individual basis, and time constraints thus place a limit on the learning potential of the described projects. Since the volume of information that is relevant to the subject and readily available through our library resources is large, it would be of great benefit to students if they learn how to access, utilize, and present such information. Being able to teach them in a group setting and in a systematic way would also be a more efficient means of instruction.
The proposed project, if successful, would ultimately develop the students' knowledge of information resources, research skills, and presentation skills. This would involve multiple training sessions, in which students will be exposed to the information resources and taught the skills relating to the use of this information, followed by assignments during the course. The sessions will be jointly designed by the participants listed under item A and will be presented to students by Joy He, who has had substantial experience in working with students and faculty regarding information resources. We have not identified all the resources to be used for the course, but some possibilities include the following:
In addition to teaching students how to locate useful information electronically or in print, we hope to develop the students' skills in
As part of the course requirements, the students will have assignments for which they will have to collect development-related data and present them in the form of a written or an oral report. In addition, the course will feature a writing option, which will involve writing an in-depth research paper using EconLit and, as appropriate, various data sources incorporated into the project. Finally, we plan to prepare a location on either ERes or the Web to make the relevant materials for this project available to students.
Timeline
Fall 2001: development of course material
Spring 2002: information literacy instruction and corresponding assignments and projects
Summer 2002: evaluation
Faculty time
The faculty time required to select and organize the material would be relatively significant. A rough estimate of the time spent would be about two weeks of preparation prior to the semester of instruction, four hours each week during the semester of instruction, and a week to process the evaluation.
Other sources of support
At this point, we are not aware of any other funding sources for this project.