INFO 287-15
Seminar in Information Science
TOPIC: Evidence-Based Practice (1-Unit)
Fall 2018 Syllabus

Dr. Lorie Kloda
E-mail
Other contact information: See course site
Office Hours: TBD

Canvas Information: Courses will be available beginning August 21st at 6 a.m. Pacific Time unless you are taking an intensive or a one-unit or two-unit class that starts on a different day. In that case, the class will open on the first day that the class meets.

This course runs from September 10th - October 10th. Class will open on Canvas on September 10th. This is a one-unit course.

You will be enrolled into the Canvas site automatically.

Course Description

This course provides an overview of evidence-based practice (EBP) for librarians and demonstrates tools and strategies for applying evidence in practice. Students will apply the steps of evidence-based practice to a case for decision making.

Course Requirements

Assignments

• Class participation and discussion posts: Every week, students are expected to post to the discussion thread for the week in response to the discussion topic or question for that week. In addition, students are expected to post comments and questions in response to others' posts. Each week, participation counts for 5% of the total course grade for a total of 20% - CLOs 1-6
• Assignment #1: Burning questions and SPICE question - CLO 2
• Assignment #2: Sources of evidence and literature search - CLO 3-4
• Assignment #3: Critical appraisal of a research publication - CLO 5
• Assignment #4: Using Evidence in Practice report - CLO 6

Course Calendar
Dates subject to change with fair notice.

Grading

• Online discussion posts (20%)
• Assignment 1 (15%)
• Assignment 2 (15%)
• Assignment 3 (25%)
• Assignment 4 (25%)
• Late submissions will be deducted 20% per day unless prior arrangements have been approved by the instructor. Due to the short timeline for the course and the cumulative nature of the assignments, delayed assignment completion will have a negative impact on your experience in the course so it is strongly recommended that you complete the work on time.

Other Relevant Information:

The instructor will provide links to all readings for each week. All readings are open access and available online. Each week will also be introduced by a short lecture, typically accompanied by a slide presentation.

The instructor will provide guidelines for the discussion posts for each week, and a thread will be created for each of these. Questions or additional comments related to each week's readings, lecture, activities, and assignment should also be posted in the associated weekly discussion thread.

Since this is a one-credit course, with a duration of 1 month, please try to review the work requirements at the beginning of each week to ensure you can meet the deadlines. Questions about requirements or course content should be posted to the discussions unless they are of a private or specific nature, in which case please email me. I aim to respond to email messages within 1 working day at the very most.

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Course Workload Expectations

Success in this course is based on the expectation that students will spend, for each unit of credit, a minimum of forty-five hours over the length of the course (normally 3 hours per unit per week with 1 of the hours used for lecture) for instruction or preparation/studying or course related activities including but not limited to internships, labs, clinical practica. Other course structures will have equivalent workload expectations as described in the syllabus.

Instructional time may include but is not limited to:
Working on posted modules or lessons prepared by the instructor; discussion forum interactions with the instructor and/or other students; making presentations and getting feedback from the instructor; attending office hours or other synchronous sessions with the instructor.

Student time outside of class:
In any seven-day period, a student is expected to be academically engaged through submitting an academic assignment; taking an exam or an interactive tutorial, or computer-assisted instruction; building websites, blogs, databases, social media presentations; attending a study group;contributing to an academic online discussion; writing papers; reading articles; conducting research; engaging in small group work.

Course Prerequisites

INFO 287 has no prequisite requirements.

Course Learning Outcomes

Upon successful completion of the course, students will be able to:

1. Describe the steps in evidence-based practice.
2. Formulate answerable questions in the field of librarianship.
3. Argue as to what constitutes "evidence" in the field of librarianship.
4. Identify strategies for locating evidence.
5. Evaluate the reliability, validity, and applicability of a research publication using a critical appraisal tool.
6. Apply the steps of evidence-based practice to a real-world case in librarianship.
7. Describe barriers and facilitators to evidence-based practice.

Core Competencies (Program Learning Outcomes)

INFO 287 supports the following core competencies:

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Textbooks

No Textbooks For This Course.

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Grading Scale

The standard SJSU School of Information Grading Scale is utilized for all iSchool courses:

In order to provide consistent guidelines for assessment for graduate level work in the School, these terms are applied to letter grades:

• C represents Adequate work; a grade of "C" counts for credit for the course;
• B represents Good work; a grade of "B" clearly meets the standards for graduate level work or undergraduate (for BS-ISDA);
  For core courses in the MLIS program (not MARA, Informatics, BS-ISDA) — INFO 200, INFO 202, INFO 204 — the iSchool requires that students earn a B in the course. If the grade is less than B (B- or lower) after the first attempt you will be placed on administrative probation. You must repeat the class if you wish to stay in the program. If - on the second attempt - you do not pass the class with a grade of B or better (not B- but B) you will be disqualified.
  
• A represents Exceptional work; a grade of "A" will be assigned for outstanding work only.

Graduate Students are advised that it is their responsibility to maintain a 3.0 Grade Point Average (GPA). Undergraduates must maintain a 2.0 Grade Point Average (GPA).

University Policies

Per University Policy S16-9, university-wide policy information relevant to all courses, such as academic integrity, accommodations, etc. will be available on Office of Graduate and Undergraduate Programs' Syllabus Information web page at: https://www.sjsu.edu/curriculum/courses/syllabus-info.php. Make sure to visit this page, review and be familiar with these university policies and resources.

In order to request an accommodation in a class please contact the Accessible Education Center and register via the MyAEC portal.

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