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Last Update
18 June 2013
Introduction
See also Digital liaison | Emerging technology librarian | Health librarian competencies (draft) | Social media evaluation | Media literacy
This wiki entry is a listing of the top ten competencies for social media-literate librarians and archivists who are providing access to collections and services using social media. To begin, you may wish to get a broader perspective on the issues by reading the entry on media literacy. The ten competencies listed below are talking points rather than prescriptive competencies; they undoubtedly branch off into all kinds of other competencies, knowledge and skills. All of this is worth (re)consideration as we move further into developing our social media literacy knowledge and skills. Murphy & Moulaison (2009) have written a fine document on this topic, and related the framework back to the ACRL information literacy competencies.
Top Ten (10) Social Media Competencies for Information Professionals
- Understand, explain and teach others about the principles and trends of social media, web 2.0 (and library 2.0 / archives 2.0)
- List major tools, categories and affordances of social networking
- Apply social media to solve information problems, and communicate digitally with users
- Use social networking sites for promotional, reference and instructional services in libraries
- Navigate, evaluate and create content on social networking sites
- Follow netiquette, conform to ethical standards and interact appropriately with others online
- Explain copyright, security and privacy issues on social media to colleagues and user communities
- Understand the importance of digital identity and reputation management using social media
- Explain related terminology such as collaboration 2.0, remix and open source
- Renew social media competencies, advocate for institutional strategies and policies and build evidence base in social media
References
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- Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL), a division of ALA and Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education.
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