| Student Learning Outcome | Corresponding SUNY General Education Information Literacy Competencies | Corresponding Frame from ACRL Framework |
| 1. Students will be able to understand, use, and reflect on research techniques in order to locate information. | 1. Locate information effectively using tools appropriate to their need and discipline | Research as Inquiry, Searching as Strategic Exploration, Scholarship as Conversation |
| 2. Students will be able to evaluate information, in order to select the best resources for their information needs. | 2. evaluate information from a variety of sources with an awareness of authority, validity, bias, and origin; and | Authority is Constructed and Contextual, Information Creation as a Process, Information has Value, Scholarship as Conversation |
| 3. Students will recognize the ethical dimensions of information use, creation, and dissemination in order to responsibly create content, whether from traditional sources or emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence. | 3. Demonstrate an understanding of the ethical dimensions of information use, creation, and dissemination, whether from traditional sources or emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence. | Information has Value, Scholarship as Conversation |
Note: General Education Competencies revised, effective Fall 2026; underlined language is new.
The student learning outcomes above define our information literacy curriculum, framing our core instructional goals and practices (via backward design). They serve to promote a community of practice among librarians, meaning they promote a shared language, teaching, and understanding of information literacy. Although these represent our knowledge domain, they are also designed to define and assess an infused curriculum, meaning it is taught within other discipline-based departmental curricula, and assessed periodically as part of the GE program. These outcomes are written generally, and are designed to be mapped to specific class outcomes as needed. The accompanying rubric is used to vertically assess our curriculum via the Composition Library Instruction Program (CLIP), discipline-specific information literacy classes, and the SUNY Cortland GE program (via a sample of writing intensive coursework).
These outcomes are adapted directly from the SUNY GE information literacy competency student learning outcomes, bringing our curriculum and assessment into alignment with the existing structures and culture of assessment in SUNY as well as our own campus.
Last review by librarian faculty: November 2025
Last update: November 2025
Our goal as an information literacy program is to ensure that graduates of SUNY Cortland are information literate by teaching students the agency and ability to navigate the current complex and interdependent information world.
We help encourage and build the foundation of:
1) the critical evaluation of information sources
2) the knowledge of different information formats and cycles of production
3) the skills to navigate the many tools of information retrieval
4) the ability to ethically situate one’s own work within the larger information world
Programmatic Goal 1: Increase campus-wide committee/office collaboration to enhance and promote the general education competencies of information management.
Programmatic Goal 2: Collaborate with faculty and staff to prepare students for lifelong learning by providing opportunities for acquiring information literacy skills.
Programmatic Goal 3: Library faculty, in conjunction with campus partners, develop pedagogical avenues and methods for teaching information literacy.
Programmatic Goal 4: Librarians and campus partners work together with campus-wide offices and committees to provide programmatic/campus-wide assessment of information management outcomes.
Programmatic Goal 5: Communication of information literacy outcomes, goals, and initiatives between librarians campus partners both internal and external to SUNY Cortland.
Programmatic Outcome 1: Librarians communicate to faculty and to each other a shared understanding of informational literacy core competencies in order to support the stated goals of the information literacy program.
Programmatic Outcome 2: Librarians and faculty collaborate to teach the general education competency of information management that is directly mapped to the new ACRL framework, inside and outside the classroom.
