Academic library work is governed by sets of guidelines and standards originating from various professional organizations, including the American Library Association (ALA), the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL), and the Middle States Commission on Higher Education (MSCHE).
Intellectual Freedom
Libraries support the free exchange of ideas with collections that provide access to a selection of materials on all subjects that support the University's mission. The Library provides access in accordance with the ALA's Library Bill of Rights and Freedom to Read Statements.
Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education
The ACRL's Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education provides critical concepts in information literacy, which is the ability to recognize when information is needed and to effectively locate, evaluate, and use that information ethically. In brief, these frames are:
- Authority Is Constructed and Contextual
- Information Creation as a Process
- Information Has Value
- Research as Inquiry
- Scholarship as Conversation
- Searching as Strategic Exploration
Standards for Libraries in Higher Education
The ACRL's Standards for Libraries in Higher Education provides expectations for a library's contributions to institutional effectiveness. The standards relate to library instruction (information literacy), collections, staffing, and management. Principles include:
- Institutional Effectiveness: Library personnel define, develop, and assess outcomes that enhance institutional effectiveness, applying the insights gained to foster ongoing enhancement.
- Professional Values: Library personnel practice a code of ethics and uphold professional values such as intellectual freedom, equity, privacy, and respect.
- Educational Role: Library personnel lead the educational mission of the institution to develop and support information literate learners who can discover, access, evaluate, and ethically use information for academic success, research, and lifelong learning.
- Discovery: Library personnel enable users to discover information in all formats through effective use of technology and organization of knowledge.
- Collections: Library personnel continuously develop, maintain, and provide access to collections appropriate in quality, depth, breadth, diversity, and format to support the teaching and research missions of the institution.
- Space: Library personnel provide physical and virtual spaces where users interact with ideas, each other and library personnel to expand learning and facilitate the creation of new knowledge.
- Management/Administration/Leadership: Library leaders engage in internal and campus decision-making to effectively and efficiently advance the library’s mission through inclusive and ethical leadership, strategic planning, resource allocation, staff development, and collaborative partnerships.
- Personnel: A sufficient number and quality of personnel ensure excellence and to function successfully in an environment of continuous change.
- Campus and External Relations: Library personnel actively engage the campus and broader community through diverse strategies designed to communicate, advocate, educate, and celebrate their invaluable contributions to institutional success.
Middle States Commission on Higher Education
MSCHE is the regional accrediting body for institutions of higher education in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. Its Standards for Accreditation and Requirements of Affiliation situates information literacy as a Guiding Principle:
An institution’s student learning programs and opportunities must be characterized by rigor, coherence, and appropriate assessment of student achievement throughout the educational offerings, and institutions must offer a curriculum that is designed so that students acquire and demonstrate essential skills including at least oral and written communication, scientific and quantitative reasoning, critical analysis and reasoning, technological competency, and information literacy.