Transitioning to College: The Top Five Things Students Need to Know to Succeed

TRANSITIONING TO COLLEGEThe Top Five Things Students Need to Know to SucceedMissouri School Boards’ Association Conference, Sept. 28, 2012Ngaire Smith, Reference and Instruction Librarian, Missouri State University Libraries

ngairesmith@missouristate.edu

DIGITAL NATIVES

Incoming college freshmen areTech savvyAdept at using the Internet for social

purposes

Incoming college freshmen lackSkills in finding and using scholarly

informationFamiliarity with libraries as

information sources2

TOP FIVE THINGS COLLEGE FRESHMEN NEED TO KNOW

1. The information cycle2. What is a scholarly source? When

(and why) should I use one?3. Why not Google?4. How do I find information efficiently

and effectively?5. Who can help me when I run into

problems?

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1. THE INFORMATION CYCLE

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2. WHAT’S A SCHOLARLY SOURCE?

Journals Scholarly databases Scholarly books Reference sources

Why do students need to know this?5

USING SCHOLARLY SOURCES FOR COLLEGE LEVEL RESEARCH

Sample research assignments: My professor told me to find three peer reviewed

articles on the effects of chronic wasting disease on deer populations in Missouri. How do I find them?

Where would I find the 10K report for Dell Inc.?

I need five original research articles on nutrition and kidney disease for my dietetics class. Where should I look?

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3. WHY NOT GOOGLE?

Everything’s online, right?

(The Criminal Minds Effect) So why does Google ask me to pay for articles?

The authority problem: who wrote this? Do they know what they are writing about?

Many scholarly sources are unavailable through Google

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4. EFFECTIVE SEARCHING

Using library databases and catalogs, users can:Narrow and focus their searchesInstantly access scholarly sourcesFind other sources in the bibliographySave time and frustration

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5. LIBRARIANS AND MEDIA SPECIALISTS CAN HELP!

58% of students “not sure” whether library offers access to online databases (De Rosa et al. 2006)! Morenet

Librarians and media specialists can: Point students towards high quality sources they

may not know about Teach students efficient and effective search

techniques Guide students towards self-sufficiency 9

RESEARCH SUGGESTS….

Library use increases academic performance Goodin (1991) found that high school students

who received library instruction at an academic library: Produced work that was acceptable at the college level

Library use improves student retention Haddow and Joseph (2010) found that students

who used the library in their first semester were more likely to stay in college

Information literacy skills smooth the transition to college

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THE “SO WHAT?” FACTOR

Why is this important in college?Time management and stress reductionBetter papers and assignmentsGood gradesGood job!

Why is this important in the long run?Keeping up with your fieldResearching life’s challengesParticipating in democracy 11

REFERENCE LIST DeRosa, Cathy, Joanne Cantrell, Janet Hawk, & Alane

Wilson. 2006. College Students’Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources. Dublin, Ohio: OCLC.

Goodin, M. Elspeth. 1991. “The Transferability of Library Research Skills from High School to College.” School Library Media Quarterly. 20 (1): 33-42.

Haddow, Gaby, and Jayanthi Joseph. 2010. “Loans, Logins, and Lasting the Course: Academic Library Use and Student Retention.” Australian Academic and Research Libraries, 41 (4): 233-244.

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