A new information literacy report entitled Information literacy in the age of algorithms: Student experiences with news and information, and the need for change was published on 15th January 2020. This new report was supported by the Knight Foundation, Harvard Graduate School of Education, ER&L, a leading library conference in the USA, and the School of Library and Information Science at the University of South Carolina.
This year-long research study, which was co-authored by Alison Head, Barbara Fister, and Margy MacMillan, examines how U.S. college students navigate a changed and challenged information landscape in the age of algorithms – their experiences, concerns, and widespread scepticism where targeted ads are the norm, and objective news coverage gets harder to tell from opinion. Recommendations for moving forward are provided as well as brief reflections from a small group of prominent thinkers in education, libraries, computer science, and media studies convened to discuss the implications of this study’s findings.
The authors welcome comments and are keen for the report and its supplementary resources to reach a wider audience, and so share away!