LIS Education in a Pandemic Era: Innovative Teaching Methods, Strategies, & Technologies

The evident diversity in LIS programs around the globe calls for a suite of innovative methods and strategies that allow educators not only to impart the necessary content but also the technological and pedagogical know-how required to work across the LIS teaching and learning spectrum. To further explore these themes, the organizers of this panel facilitated an interactive and lively discussion on the topic at the ALISE 2019 conference. There was much interest on the part of the attendees about continuous engagement with, and deeper discussions about the topic. Hence, this is a follow up interactive panel discussion that focusses on lessons learnt and novel approaches to innovative teaching methods, strategies, & technologies for a shifting landscape in LIS education. While the 2019 lively session elicited important issues, including potential risks and challenges of innovative teaching methods, strategies, & technologies; competencies required of educators and students; ensuring student engagement, interaction, participation, collaboration, reflection, and creativity; and producing reflective practitioners, these issues are even more crucial now. Hence, they require continuous discussions, given that the current and similar future pandemics require a shift in how educators teach and students learn. We aim to facilitate a discussion where audience members can react to and provide opinions on questions/scenarios with respect to innovative teaching methods, strategies, & technologies in LIS education. Panelists will begin with an overview of the session to provide some context and set the stage for an interactive audience participation. Small groups will be asked to engage in a deeper discussion of the issues outlined with the ultimate goal of sharing ideas and practices among members of the audience. We aim to generate concrete and actionable ideas and recommendations with respect to: (1) potential risks and challenges of experimenting with and adopting innovative teaching methods, strategies, & technologies; (2) competencies required of both LIS educators and students; and (3) ways to ensure student engagement, interaction, participation, collaboration, reflection, and creativity, especially at a time when what is considered “normal” teaching and learning workflow is disrupted due to the pandemic. We will initiate the development of online shared crowd-sourced links and resources that will provide both summaries of the discussions from the 2019 and 2020 conferences as well as ideas and strategies