The internet navigator: an online internet course for distance learners

Library Trends, Summer, 2001 by Carol Hansen

ABSTRACT

THE INTERNET NAVIGATOR (www-navigator.utah.edu) ONLINE COURSE is a cooperative effort to use new technologies to teach information literacy competencies. The Internet Navigator has been used successfully by thousands of students since 1995. A team of librarians and Web development professionals in Utah continue to work together to develop the Web course for online and distance learning students. This article describes the history and recent developments of this course. In 2000, the course was redesigned and revised to meet changing needs of students, to include the latest information resources and technologies, and to focus on information literacy competencies, particularly for distance learners. New developments to manage the ongoing maintenance and funding of this multi-institutional online course are also described.

INTRODUCTION

Librarians are at the center of the intersection of new technologies, products, and services. Librarians select, provide, and deliver the information resources critical for academic education and scholarship. Librarians not only provide access to resources but also teach students, faculty, academic staff, and the general public about information literacy--i.e., how to find, evaluate, and effectively use information. For distance and other online learners, this information is primarily made available on the World Wide Web. Instruction librarians develop detailed information literacy competency programs and methods for teaching and assessing these educational programs (Oberman, Lindauer, & Wilson, 1998). Librarians increasingly use online resources to support information literacy competencies and basic library and Internet skills instruction. Students increasingly access library resources at a distance, and library instruction programs must meet the needs of distance learners (ACRL, 1998).

A major challenge facing reference and instruction librarians is providing students with excellent quality and up-to-date Web-based library and Internet skills instruction while not duplicating time-intensive efforts at every academic institution within a state or region. This is important in Utah where academic institutions cooperatively purchase and share a core group of online information resources through the Utah Academic Library Consortium (UALC). Utah librarians have found cooperative efforts to be a practical alternative in this era of dynamic change (Kochan & Lee, 1998). The Internet Navigator course, cooperatively developed by UALC librarians, was created to meet this challenge (Hansen & Lombardo, 1996).

In 1995, although many library catalogs were accessed via the Internet, primarily through Telnet, moss traditional library resources, such as periodical indexes, article databases, or online reference resources, were not available on the Internet. From 1995 to 2000, many traditional library research tools, including major periodical indexes, article databases, and many important reference books have been republished for access on the World Wide Web alongside millions of new and unique Web site information resources. Distance learners are able to access many more scholarly academic resources through library Web sites than they were five years ago. New technologies and trends in collection management regularly impact instruction programs. For example, after the widely used Infotrac article database announced its remote access service to home patrons on June 1, 1997 (Rogers, 1997), students needed to learn about remote access to full-text article databases. Since 1995, many students, faculty, and the wider community are exposed to the Internet for e-mail, entertainment, business, and shopping through mass media. Students in 2000 have a much better understanding of the Internet--what it is and how it works. These same students may still have difficulty understanding how to use the Internet to access valuable library resources such as article databases and reference resources not found through popular search engines and Web directories.

Utah's population of distance learners has grown significantly, and the medium of instruction has changed. In 1995 there were several hundred distance learning students at Weber State University (WSU), primarily engaged in correspondence courses. In 2000, there were over 2,000 students enrolled in WSU Online, Weber State's online campus for distance and online learners. On campus students are also using remote access services to access online resources. The numbers of students physically entering the library are decreasing while Web usage is steadily increasing at Weber State University's Stewart Library. At WSU, most students work off campus more than thirty hours a week. At WSU and many other similar campuses, "on campus" students engage in the library experience as if they were distance learners, and the line between distance and not distance students becomes very blurred. Most of the students enrolled in online courses at WSU live in the local area but choose online education for reasons other than distance. Accurate statewide data on the actual numbers of distance learning students in Utah are unavailable; newspaper accounts have estimated that more than 25,000 students were enrolled in distance education courses in Utah in 1998, with more than 8,000 distance students enrolled at Utah State University (Egan, 1999, C1).