International Summer School on Digital Library 2001 Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands

Citation

Rader, H.B. (2001), "International Summer School on Digital Library 2001 Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands", Library Hi Tech News, Vol. 18 No. 10. https://doi.org/10.1108/lhtn.2001.23918jac.002

International Summer School on Digital Library 2001 Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands

International Summer School on Digital Library 2001 Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands

Hannelore B. Rader

From August 5-10, 2001 TICER (Tilburg Innovation Center for Electronic Resources), Tilburg University in The Netherlands, sponsored the second course of the 6th International Summer School on the Digital Library on "Digital Libraries and the changing world of education". Forty participants and nine lecturers from 15 countries discussed the role of libraries in education, virtual learning environments, digital portfolios, the library as a learning space and information literacy. The weeklong course addressed new roles for librarians in the twent-first century, focusing on how librarians can maximize opportunities to become more actively involved in education and the digital learning environments.

Hans Roes (Economics and Computer Science Librarian at Tilburg University) discussed "Digital libraries and education: trends and opportunities". He summarized the changes occurring in education based on information from The Netherlands, including such topics as digital libraries and digital learning, information literacy, digital portfolios to assess student learning, collaborative designing and the relation between physical and digital learning environments.

Joseph Janes (Assistant Professor and Coordinator of the Masters program in Library and Information Science at the University of Washington, USA, as well as Founding Director of the Internet Public Library www.ipl.org) talked about digital libraries as learning tools in terms of faculty teaching and student learning. He also provided an intellectual history of the Internet Public Library, started under his guidance at the University of Michigan School of Information in 1995.

Christine Dugdale (formerly ResIDe Research Fellow at the University of West of England, Bristol, UK) discussed an electronic reserve system in a new learning environment, which she helped develop at the University of West of England. Issues involved in this and related project, dealt with copyright, cultural and organizational changes, costs and the ability to accommodate new learning environments.

Pieter Jan Boon (information specialist at Tilburg University Library and project leader of DEsite cwis.kub.nl/~dbi/instruct/eu , a Web-based instruction module that covers the decision-making process in the European Union) discussed DEsite as a didactic module on the decision-making process within the European Union. He focused on the history of the project and its implementation. This was a good example of cooperative course design where academics and librarians cooperated to achieve a very important outcome, namely to teach students about the European Union.

John MacColl (Director of the SELLIC Project (Science and Engineering Library, Learning and Information Centre) and Librarian at the University of Edinburgh, UK) discussed "Project ANGEL: the VLE and the library", a new project funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee in the United Kingdom. It involved both content management and presentation by Web delivery systems in higher education. He also spoke about the overlap between the virtual learning environment and electronic reserve systems in terms of libraries as resource information managers at their universities.

Richard Everett (Coordinator for Managed Learning Environment for the Joint Information Systems Committee and Team Leader for Arts, Social Sciences and Law, University of Birmingham, UK) spoke about the changing role of librarians in higher education to work in a new social, information and educational environment. He discussed how the training these professionals received in the past is no longer adequate, and has not prepared them for the present information environment. It will be interesting to determine if in the future the term "librarian" will have little relevance.

Howard Nicholson (University Librarian, University of Bath, UK) outlined the history of the development of buildings for converged library and information technology services in Britain during the last two decades. He used the library/learning center at the University of Bath and the University of Tilburg as examples. He provided ideas about the future of library buildings in an age of increasingly electronic delivery of information resources and e-learning and what changes will be needed.

Pat Maughan (Program Coordinator and User Research Coordinator, University of Berkeley Library, California, USA) spoke about information literacy in terms of history, assessment and new developments. Her comments were based on the experiences in the Teaching Library at the University of California Berkeley, where graduating students have been surveyed regarding their information competencies since 1994.

Elizabeth Dupuis (Head of the Digital Information Literacy Office, the University of Texas at Austin, USA) described TILT (Texas Information Literacy Tutorial) as a model of interactive, online library instruction. This tutorial can be utilized in a variety of ways to teach students information skill applicable to various disciplines. Her presentation discussed the history, development and use of TILT and how libraries in other institutions are beginning to utilize this model.

Richard Biddiscombe (Team Leader of Arts, Social Sciences and Law, University of Birmingham, UK) discussed the new library and information environment in terms of information technology and whether librarians are still needed. He talked about the need for retraining librarians to enable them to work with electronic information, metadata, online guidance, electronic learning and electronic archives, as well as become knowledge managers.

Hannelore B. Rader (University Librarian at the University of Louisville in Kentucky, USA) spoke about "Building faculty-librarian partnerships for information literacy". She emphasized the importance of teaching valuable information skills to all citizens so that they can function effectively at work and in the information society. She defined information skills and appropriate outcome measurements and provided ideas on how to incorporate information literacy components in the higher education curricula. Several dynamic information literacy programs in academic institutions were cited. She pointed out the importance of librarians as teachers and that new teaching skills will have to be developed to help librarians become successful in teaching.

Summary

The educational experience provided by TICER at Tilburg University was very valuable for several reasons:

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  It enabled librarians from different countries to discuss professional issues in a global environment and helped them realize how similar their problems are.

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  The group concluded that librarians need life-long learning and continuous education to stay effective in their jobs.

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  It made participants aware of the importance of information literacy and that librarians must form partnerships with their faculty to teach students information skills.

The experience of spending a week in Tilburg amidst the beautiful countryside within The Netherlands, watching all the people on their bicycles, eating meals in castles and other beautiful surroundings and participating in the Dutch every day life was certainly educational and most enjoyable.

Hannelore B. Rader (h.rader@ louisville.edu) University Librarian, University of Louisville, Louisville, Kentucky, USA.