Innovations and Challenges in Teaching Information Ethics Across Educational Contexts

Abstract

Renewed attention to integrating information ethics within graduate library and information science (LIS) programs has forced LIS educators to ensure that future information professionals – and the users they interact with – participate appropriately and ethically in our contemporary information society. Along with focusing on graduate LIS curricula, information ethics must become infused in multiple and varied educational contexts, ranging from elementary and secondary education, technical degrees and undergraduate programs, public libraries, through popular media, and within the home. Teaching information ethics in these diverse settings and contexts brings numerous challenges and requires new understandings and innovative approaches. In keeping with the 2011 Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE) conference theme of “Competitiveness and Innovation,” a diverse panel of educators and researchers were convened to foster a discussion in how to best incorporate information ethics education across diverse contexts, and how to develop innovative educational methods to overcome the challenges these contexts inevitably present. This article reports on that panel discussion and offers recommendations towards achieving success in information ethics education.