So it is no surprise that the first program I chose to go to at the NYLA Conference in Saratoga Springs was called 21st Century Information Literacy Standards for Digital Learners of New York. The presenter was Fran Roscello, of Roscello Associates Information Literacy Consultants and the co-chair of the NYLA Information Literacy Task Force.

The program was packed at nine o’clock in the morning. Ms. Roscello managed to keep us all awake and engaged. She presented us New York State’s standards, apropos to the title of the program, and where they came from.

Apparently, New York State has a Broadband Council that makes sure all citizens of the state have access to broadband internet. It’s a high level group in the state government, comprised of many powerful individuals. The Digital Literacy and Community Outreach Action Team is a subgroup of the NYS Broadband Council charged with developing digital literacy standards. Michael Borges, the director of NYLA, is appointed chair of this group. This group is also a powerful group of people from all walks of life.

The presenter, Ms. Roscello, was not a member of this group but a presenter to it. She was able to be a witness to the writing of the standards, but not participate in the creation of it.

Luckily for librarians, Mr. Borges was appointed the chair of the group. If he hadn’t, the definition of digital literacy New York State uses could have been drastically different. There are companies that had digital literacy standards, as Ms. Roscello explained, that seemed more like technological literacy standards, knowing how to use the computer. Instead, they chose to define digital literacy in broader terms. Mr. Borges and the rest of the Digital Literacy and Community Outreach Action Team decided to incorporate ideas from the national standards of AASL, ACRL, ISTI, and other state’s standards to make it easier on themselves (not “reinventing the wheel”) and so that librarians can use the state standards in tandem with the ones they are already using.

According to Ms. Roscello, the first information literacy standards in New York were in 1918, and they are still applicable to today. The common elements in the aforementioned standards (AASL, ACRL, ISTI, and other state’s) are:

• Inquiry, information seeking
• Technology
• Access
• Communication and collaboration
• Ethics
• Importance in a democracy (preparing students to be citizens, helping adult citizens get the information they need to make the right choices)
• Critical thinking: making meaning from information

So the Digital Literacy and Community Outreach Action Team used the AASL standards as the base, added elements of ISTI and ACRL, reworked standards to reflect what is important to New Yorkers, and added statements to reflect the Information Literacy Task Force’s needs. Digital learners will:

1. Inquire, think critically, and gain knowledge.
2. Draw conclusions, make informed decisions, apply knowledge to new situations, and create new knowledge.
3. Share knowledge and participate ethically and productively.
4. Develop an application for ideas and information in pursuit of personal growth.

In order to make sure that we understood each part of the Information Literacy Standards, Ms. Roscello had us, the audience, talk with our rows about one of the four standards to explain it in our own words. I worked with two other women, and we first discussed the third standard. “Share knowledge and participate ethically and productively” is a standard that might be a librarian’s most challenging task; he or she must lead by example. Sharing knowledge and how to obtain that knowledge with a patron will hopefully set a good example for that patron and they, in turn, will share with the people they know. Efficiently giving credit where credit is do, with copyright, allows the sharing of knowledge to be ethical and productive.

I really liked this program and everything about it. I liked the speaker (knowledgeable and enthusiastic), the topic (NYS information literacy standards are new to me), the size of the room (relatively small to ALA’s standards), the PowerPoint presentation (an example of a nearly perfect presentation), the handout (appropriate and useful), and the audience (insightful and talkative, but respectful). It was pretty early in the morning and a great start to the day.