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Information Literacy: QEP Outcomes: SAILS Assessment

Project SAILS

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In 2011, the University of Montevallo chose to use SAILS as the chief form of assessment for information literacy. SAILS data has been collected each year since that time.

SAILS is administered to students in the English 101 (Composition) course at Montevallo, usually in their first year of college.  Since 2014, SAILS has also been administered to juniors or seniors in their Mastery information literacy courses (usually the capstone course for a major).  The results of the SAILS tests have shown not just an improvement in students’ information literacy skills during their time at Montevallo, but also that they are able to outperform students at comparable institutions by the time they are ready to graduate. 

Below are summary tables of SAILS data from Foundational (first-year) and Mastery (senior) students, along with links to the full assessment reports.

In 2019, Carmichael Library switched to a new information literacy assessment known as TATIL (the Threshold Achievement Test for Information Literacy).  TATIL assesses students’ information literacy skills based on a new framework that’s being used at colleges and universities.  Stay tuned for results from the TATIL test!