#lilac24 Selling information literacy to the business school

Pam McKinney here live-blogging from the LILAC conference in Leeds. Information school graduate Laura Broadbent presented ‘Selling’ information literacy to the business school through alignment with the employability agenda in higher education" in the first session at this year's LILAC conference. There is a concern that university graduates don't have the skills they need to be effective in the workplace, and the political background to this in the UK is government scepticism about the value of degrees.
The recent Augur review outlined the 6 purposes of post-18 education, however, we need to also consider what students want from their university education, and there is evidence that students want their courses to be employment-relevant. Laura is based at the University of Huddersfield, which has a mixture of international and local commuter-based students.  Most students are young, and there are few mature students. 
Laura was involved in the re-design of the business school curriculum and worked with academic staff to identify modules where students could have information literacy support to link to their curriculum. The module was designed with the principle of constructive alignment to make sure that the activities and assessments are aligned with the learning outcomes. The level 3 curriculum was focused on commercial awareness as a key skill for employability, and it was identified that students needed support in being able to research companies prior to applications and interviews. 
Delegates took part in a sample exercise to identify external factors affecting the chocolate market, which was very much in my comfort zone as it was similar to an exercise I use with the students on my Business Intelligence module, using reports from IBIS World, Mintel and news stories.  It was easy to identify the additional value from the paid-for information sources. When Laura teaches this session with the students she only has 45 minutes which isn't enough, she would prefer a 2 hour session so that she can explore the issues in more depth.