About RIT

Information Technology
Research & Instructional Technology
About RIT

Research and Instructional Technology is a cross-disciplinary team of LITS instructional staff – technologists and librarians with wide-ranging expertise in the areas of information, data, media, and digital literacies.

Mission

The mission of Research and Instructional Technology is to promote information and digital literacies in order to support students in their coursework and ongoing vocational exploration. Research and Instructional Technology does this by providing extensive classroom instruction in areas of research and technology, creating professional development opportunities, and providing research and technology consulting services to the St. Olaf community.

Areas of Focus

Research & Technology workshops and classroom instruction
Classroom technology design and support
Information literacy
One-on-one consultations and training with faculty, staff or students.
Open access/Open educational resources and alternative forms of scholarly publishing
Supporting digital scholarship projects
Educating the academic community on new developments in research and technology practices
Managing the Digital Scholarship Center at St. Olaf (DiSCO)
Supporting Moodle and other academic technologies
Liaising with the Community

Our Pedagogy

We use a literacies framework to teach skills and habits of mind that build the concepts students need to be savvy users and producers of information and lifelong learners. Our instruction draws from these fundamental principles and is shaped in collaboration with faculty.

A Liaison for Every Department

Every academic department has a dedicated Research and Instruction librarian and Instructional Technologist liaison for faculty (see below). Liaisons consult with faculty on projects involving research and help to train students in related areas.

What We Ask of Faculty

Two-week notice – Due to high demand and limited staff, we encourage you to contact your liaison librarian/technologist as early as possible to arrange for class instruction in order to ensure their availability, and a minimum of two weeks prior to your desired instruction date. If your liaison is at capacity during your class time they will share some online resources to support your course, and may be able to schedule an instruction session for a later date.
Consultation with your liaison for all new assignments or courses – We believe that in order to set your students, and ourselves, up for success it is important to discuss the project in advance to allow us time to tailor our instruction for your students. Please plan on making an appointment with your liaison well in advance of the desired instruction session.
Assignment Description/Syllabus – In order to ensure a high-quality, pedagogically sound instruction session with your class, we ask for the completed assignment description or syllabus describing the assignment at least two weeks prior to the instruction session. We understand that there may be tweaking up until the assignment is introduced, but the general assignment description and desired learning outcomes are extremely helpful for us in planning our instruction.
Make student consultations optional – Librarians and Technologists often consult with students one-on-one or in small groups for specific project support. Due to the high volume of these consultations, we ask that meeting time be reserved for students that seek it out, and not as a course requirement.