“I asked chat gpt” “Okay well I made my own AI Use: Personal Statement”
Samantha is a Research Services Librarian at CUNY Hunter College.
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Gina Levitan (she/her) is a Reference and Instruction Librarian (Assistant Professor) at Hunter College, CUNY. Her research interests include critical pedagogy and information literacy instruction, outreach and student engagement, and sometimes working with zines.

Addressing AI use in coursework is a thorny issue, especially when you are trying to avoid an outright ban but want students to submit original work. College-wide codes of conduct and guidelines are still being developed. An important facet of this emerging technology is that we are all experiencing its rapid growth together- it is just as new for our students as it is for us. At the start of the semester in our asynchronous Information Literacy course, we asked students to develop their own AI Policy Statements to guide their use of AI tools in our class and beyond. We provided information on the emergence of AI tools designed for research, an example of guidelines for the effective and responsible use of AI in academic work, and information about academic integrity in higher education. After students reviewed this information, they were asked to develop their own “AI Use: Personal Statement” and were given a few guiding questions. Students produced thoughtful guidelines that emphasized using AI as a partner in their research process, and not a text generating tool. Importantly, many students also stated that they would always double-check AI information as it is known to be incorrect. Our presentation will not only provide a practical step by step for reproducing this activity within a course or one-shot, but also an informative overview of our Spring 2026 students’ AI personal statements.

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“Why Can’t the Disability Services Office Just Take Care of It?”: Making Accessibility a Shared Practice in Information Literacy Instruction
Ingrid Conley-Abrams is the Reference and Digital Initiatives Librarian at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY. Her work focuses on digital accessibility, Neurodivergent inclusion, and Universal Design in Higher Education. She is currently pursuing an MS in Disability Studies at CUNY School of Professional Studies.

The Title II of the ADA deadline has been extended to 2027, but approaching accessibility as a deadline-driven task results in superficial compliance rather than substantial change. This session challenges the misconception that accessibility is solely the Disability Services Office’s responsibility. Instead, inclusion should be framed as a shared, iterative practice essential to information literacy. Moving beyond “bare minimum” retrofits, this presentation will explore Universal Design for Learning (UDL) practices, which embeds accessibility from the start rather than patching flawed systems later.

The shift from relying upon an accommodations-only model to a design-first approach reduces barriers for disabled students, Neurodivergent learners, individuals with multilingual backgrounds, and those with fluctuating cognitive load or mental health needs. By recognizing student variability as the norm and not the exception, librarians can implement low-barrier, high-impact strategies that foster meaningful participation for all.

Participants will learn to use instructor and student feedback to continuously refine their materials, understanding that perfection is unattainable but progress should be constant. We will discuss how even partial accessibility efforts significantly reduce the administrative burden on campus offices and speed up access for students who cannot wait for formal accommodations. Ultimately, this presentation invites librarians to view accessibility not as a legal checkbox, but as a matter of social justice. Library instruction should aim to be a responsive, equitable space where access is built-in, not ineffectually appended as an afterthought, ensuring every student can meaningfully participate.

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Teaching Beyond the Stacks
Fatoma Rad is an Associate Librarian at Farmingdale State College, where she serves as the Collection Development Librarian. In this role, she oversees the physical collection, provides reference services, teaches library instruction sessions and supervises library student employees.

This presentation will highlight the importance of being actively involved on campus and collaborating with campus partners and students to help create a welcoming space for library users. The library has been actively involved with the Summer Bridge Programs, this relationship has created space for approaching Information Literacy and introducing the library in a creative a manner. Additionally, the library has a Student Employee program with students who take pride in their position, and they have unofficially become library ‘influencers’. Drawing insights from these relationships and experiences of a Collection Development librarian, we will explore lessons learned from different approaches used to teach first-year students and highlight library services in information literacy sessions.

Beyond the ACRL Framework: Applying a Framework for Information Literacy Instruction in Reference to Classroom Library Instruction

The conceptual and procedural knowledge framework was proposed by LIS scholar Amy Vanscoy in 2019 to analyze point-of-need information literacy instruction, that is, the teaching that takes place during reference interactions. This presentation by two librarians at Lehman College (Head of Reference and Information Literacy Coordinator) will discuss the application of this framework to traditional one-shot library instruction. The presentation will start with a brief overview of the conceptual and procedural knowledge framework, its origin in Education research, as well as its emergence in Reference Services scholarship. The Head of Reference will share concrete examples of how she has recently applied the conceptual and procedural knowledge framework in her one-shot library instruction sessions, finding it a helpful guide for lesson planning. Meanwhile, the Information Literacy Instruction Coordinator will discuss her reaction to how her fellow librarian is applying this framework and consider its potential to simplify librarians’ preparation for library instruction, particularly compared to ACRL’s Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education. The presenters will also attempt to compare the two frameworks, highlight their similarities and differences, briefly referring to the new draft iteration of the ACRL information literacy framework. Moreover, the presenters hope other instructional librarians in the room will join them in a conversation about the conceptual and procedural knowledge framework and whether we should consider this or any other framework in our instructional praxis.

Embedding Information Literacy in the Curriculum: Librarian-Faculty Collaboration
Alexandra Hamlett is an Information Literacy Librarian and Assistant Professor at Guttman Community College. She has been a librarian for 17 years! As an Information Literacy Librarian, she is passionate about empowering students to critically evaluate information and to recognize themselves as scholars and knowledge producers. Her research interests include exploring the intersection between information literacy instruction, technology, and student interaction. Specifically, she is interested how the rapidly changing culture of our information society has urged educators to assess information literacy instruction and alter the ways we use innovative pedagogy to impact student success.

“The pandemic necessarily forced educators to embrace digital learning technologies and distance learning. However, as an outcome, it has become more difficult for librarians to embed information literacy (IL) instruction into the curriculum and there is now a greater onus on faculty to plan and deliver information literacy (IL) instruction themselves. This has also revealed inequalities in education, particularly with respect to the Digital Divide, which just further underscores the importance of students acquiring these skills.

During this session, an urban community college librarian will explain how she collaborated with an interdisciplinary professor to integrate IL skills across a hybrid Criminal Justice course. During the project, the professor received professional development pertaining to teaching IL, completed a syllabi review, adjusted the curriculum accordingly, and utilized lesson plans, student-facing online tutorials, and handouts to teach these skills in an online environment to improve students’ critical thinking skills.

This presentation will describe how these strategies can be adapted to create a culture of “shared ownership of IL instruction” at other academic institutions. It will demonstrate ways to frame conversations with faculty about IL and include qualitative data analyzed from a mixed-methods approach from samples of students’ work, student surveys, and faculty feedback. It will also showcase examples of librarian-created, student-led tutorials on multiple IL skills. By demonstrating how this approach has contributed and improved students’ learning, the hope is to inspire attendees to reevaluate their IL programming and consider this shared approach so that their instructional efforts maximize impact on student learning.”

Student Success Workshops and York Library: The Creation of the First Year Experience Information Literacy Digital Badge Program
Jessica Jackson is the Outreach & Assessment Librarian at York College.

For the past two years, York Library has been collaborating with York College’s First Year Experience program to offer a series of Information Literacy (IL) student success workshops. To encourage students to participate, the collaboration offers students the opportunity to earn a “digital badge” or “micro-credit.” While not a formal credit that appears on students’ transcripts, these digital badges recognize that first-year students have put forth extra effort to quickly establish their IL and research skills. To earn the badge, students must complete a minimum of 3 hours of IL workshops and submit an online IL skills assessment within their first two semesters at York College. Students can highlight their IL skills to prospective employers by adding the badge to their LinkedIn profiles or listing it on their resumes. The collaboration has been extremely successful. In 2024-2025, a total of 167 students attended 21 workshops, and 23 students earned the badge. So far, in 2025-2026, a total of 27 students have earned the badge. The collaboration will continue in 2026-2027, where these workshops will additionally help serve as a pipeline for encouraging students to enroll in York College’s first ever credit-bearing IL course, LIB – 100, a 1-credit course to be offered starting in fall 2027. Finally, the IL skills assessment submitted by students who have earned the badge allows York Library to directly assess the development of students’ IL skills, as directly related to instruction from a librarian.

Zine Your Pedagogy: a Zine-Making Workshop
Gina Levitan (she/her) is a Reference and Instruction Librarian (Assistant Professor) at Hunter College, CUNY. Her research interests include critical pedagogy and information literacy instruction, outreach and student engagement, and sometimes working with zines.

For the past two years, York Library has been collaborating with York College’s First Year Experience program to offer a series of Information Literacy (IL) student success workshops. To encourage students to participate, the collaboration offers students the opportunity to earn a “digital badge” or “micro-credit.” While not a formal credit that appears on students’ transcripts, these digital badges recognize that first-year students have put forth extra effort to quickly establish their IL and research skills. To earn the badge, students must complete a minimum of 3 hours of IL workshops and submit an online IL skills assessment within their first two semesters at York College. Students can highlight their IL skills to prospective employers by adding the badge to their LinkedIn profiles or listing it on their resumes. The collaboration has been extremely successful. In 2024-2025, a total of 167 students attended 21 workshops, and 23 students earned the badge. So far, in 2025-2026, a total of 27 students have earned the badge. The collaboration will continue in 2026-2027, where these workshops will additionally help serve as a pipeline for encouraging students to enroll in York College’s first ever credit-bearing IL course, LIB – 100, a 1-credit course to be offered starting in fall 2027. Finally, the IL skills assessment submitted by students who have earned the badge allows York Library to directly assess the development of students’ IL skills, as directly related to instruction from a librarian.