Convincing administrators and teachers of the essential role information literacy instruction plays in students' success is often a trying task. Consider these strategies for convincing teachers and administrators to support the school library, information literacy instruction, and a field trip to an academic library.

Connect with Teachers and Administration

• Introduce yourself
• Attend faculty meetings and in-services
• Advertise your services in person and via staff email
• Ask to collaborate on developing research papers and assignments
• Work with faculty and administrators most receptive to your message
• Conduct workshops for faculty and/or parents
• Update faculty on new services and resources
• Solicit faculty recommendations for purchases 
• Volunteer for committees
• Remain positive

Offer Data

• Assess your students using TRAILS: Tool for Real-time Assessment of Information Literacy Skills
• Collect and share library statistics such as number of visitors, database usage, and item circulation
• AASL Resolution -- School Libraries and Librarians are Critical to Educational Success
• The New Jersey Study of School Libraries (CISSL Study)
• School Libraries Impact Study Project (Mansfield University of Pennsylvania)
• Library Staffing and Reading Performance (Library Research Services)
• Testing Information Literacy in Digital Environments: ETS's iSkills Assessment
• Project Information Literacy
• The Conditon of College and Career Readiness (ACT report)
• Scores Show Students Aren't Ready fro College (Washington Times)
• Consult the sources listed on Good Reads tab.

Connect with Students

• Talk to your students and get to know them 
• Advertise your services and resources
• Get students involved in planning library events
• Form a student library advisory board
• Meet with student government leaders and ask for feedback on the library
• Survey students to find out how satisfied they are with the library and to solicit suggestions
• Allow students to make purchase requests and actually purchase the items
• Offer assistance researching careers and colleges

Connect with Parents/Guardians

• Plan a library open house 
• Offer parent workshops or informational sessions
• Provide college selection resources 
• Create a library newsletter (students can help)  
• Advertise the libraries services and resources (flyers, email, school website)

Connect with an Academic Librarian

• Identify nearby college and university libraries with high school outreach programs
• Get to know the academic librarian(s) in charge of outreach
• Invite an academic librarian to speak to your administration
• Ask an academic librarian to conduct a faculty workshop or in-service 
• Invite academic librarians to serve on the library advisory board
• Find an academic librarian willing to come to the high school
• Inquire about planning a field trip

More than 25 percent of the students mentioned they chose a Web site because the search engine listed it as the first result, suggesting to the student there was considerable trust in the Web search via the search engine.

EszterHargittai, Lindsay Fullerton, Ericka Menchen-Trevino and Kristin Yates Thomas, Northwestern University, “Trust Online: Young Adults’ Evaluation of Web Content” International Journal of Communication 4 (2010), 468–494.

        
They (students) tended to overuse Google and misuse scholarly databases. They preferred simple database searches to other methods of discovery, but generally exhibited “a lack of understanding of search logic” that often foiled their attempts to find good sources.

Reporting on Ethnographic Research in Illinois Libraries (ERIAL)
Steve Kolowich, "Searching for Better Research Habits," Inside Higher Ed, September 29, 2010
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/09/29
                                               

They (students) tended to overuse Google and misuse scholarly databases. They preferred simple database searches to other methods of discovery, but generally exhibited “a lack of understanding of search logic” that often foiled their attempts to find good sources.

Reporting on Ethnographic Research in Illinois Libraries (ERIAL)
Steve Kolowich, "Searching for Better Research Habits," Inside Higher Ed, September 29, 2010
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/09/29
                                                        

Librarians were tremendously underutilized by students. Eight out of 10 of the respondents reported rarely, if ever, turning to librarians for help with course-related research assignments. “They’re basically taking how they learned to research in high school with them to college, since it’s worked for them in the past,” Alison J. Head.

“Lessons Learned: How College Students Seek Information in the Digital Age,” Alison J. Head and Michael B. Eisenberg, Project Information Literacy First Year Report with Student Survey Findings, University of Washington's Information School, December 1, 2009