Purdue Libraries tasked our team of six engineering technology seniors to examine the research and writing practices of current engineering technology students, with the goal to investigate and propose a solution on how to better prepare these students’ information literacy skills for the workplace after graduation.
Our team surveyed and interviewed students currently enrolled in TECH 120: an introductory course all engineering technology students take early in their studies at Purdue University that introduces information literacy skills in the technical realm. Students in this course work on assignments and projects that require information literacy skills to be applied.
By focusing on this course, our team could identify the research efficacy incoming engineering technology students have when picking an informational source during their research process. This allowed us to gather a baseline of the research efficacy incoming engineering technology students have, to see if students' performance in information literacy differs from their own self perception. The goal was to compare how students perceive their own research skills by issuing a survey, and compare results to their actual research skills by conducting an interview.
With this gathered data we compared the perceived versus actual research efficacy skills of incoming engineering technology students to determine the skills these students are proficient in, the skills they need more practice with, and overall propose a solution to Purdue Libraries on how to better prepare these students for the information literacy requirements of the workplace by understanding the skills they feel they have versus the skills they actually have.
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