Information & Visual Literacy Resources for Faculty

Information Literacy is:

• the ability to assess the information requirements of complex projects;
• to identify potential textual, visual and electronic resources;
• to obtain the needed information;
• and to interpret, evaluate, synthesize, organize, and use that information, regardless of format
• while adhering strictly to the legal and ethical guidelines governing information access in today’s society.

"Visual literacy is a set of abilities that enables an individual to effectively find, interpret, evaluate, use, and create images and visual media." 

In an interdisciplinary, higher education environment, a visually literate individual is able to:

• Determine the nature and extent of the visual materials needed
• Find and access needed images and visual media effectively and efficiently
• Interpret and analyze the meanings of images and visual media
• Evaluate images and their sources
• Use images and visual media effectively
• Design and create meaningful images and visual media
• Understand many of the ethical, legal, social, and economic issues surrounding the creation and use of images and   visual media, and access and use visual materials ethically.

ACRL Visual Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education  Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL)