Colleges look to test Internet IQ

High tech has been a fixture of higher ed for some years.

A 2002 report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that 79 percent of college Internet users thought the Internet had a positive impact on their academic experience.

More than 70 percent used the Internet more than the library and 56 percent said e-mail improved their relationships with professors.

Of course, some of those text-messaging students are still being taught by professors whose idea of a personal data assistant is a fresh pad of Post-Its.

"The problem with technology and education is how do you fit the new technology into existing curriculum lesson plans. You can't add more class time and it's much easier to just keep teaching the way you were," says Steve Jones, a co-author on the Pew study and a communications professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Jones folds lessons on Internet use into his classes. And he doesn't mince words about students who try the "click, copy and paste" approach to homework.

"I tell the students, ‘Some of you are going to put off this paper until the night before. You're going to go to Google, type in search words and just look at the top five hits and use those. I'm going to grade you on this. I'm going to look at these sources and so let's talk about how to evaluate sources.'"

Which doesn't necessarily mean they all "suddenly become fabulous information evaluators and seekers, but it gives them a little bit of an idea that this isn't something that's apart from learning."

Jones also finds himself learning from students, who are trying out new things like blogs and collaborating with other students online to create new sources of information.

He thinks assessing students' Internet skills could be useful in figuring out ways to help them do better research but cautions that it's tough to test on something as changeable as the Internet.

Roth notes that the bulk of the assessment focuses on critical thinking skills, being able to analyze the legitimacy of Web sites, and knowing the difference between properly cited research and plagiarism, things that "haven't changed very much since I enrolled in college in 1969."

For today's students, working on the Net means not having the safety net of references vetted by campus librarians.

But Roth isn't nostalgic.

"Anybody want to go back to the bad old days when you had manual typewriters, and you had to get up and walk to the library to look up something?" she says with a laugh. "I don't think so."

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