The Role of the Trustee in the Proposed National Telecommunications Highway

Ezequiel Vargas

First, let me share with you some thoughts from a January, 1989 ALA Report on Information Literacy, developed by an ALA's Presidential Committee on Information Literacy. The goals of this committee were:

1. To define information literacy within the higher literacies and its importance to student performance, life-long learning, and active citizenship;

2. To design one or more models for information literacy development appropriate to formal and informal learning environments throughout people's lifetimes; and,

3. To determine implications for the continuing education and development of teachers.

Although five years have elapsed since this report was released, what it says continues to be very relevant in today's constantly changing, evolving Information Age. Five years ago we were not talking about the information superhighway, and very few of us knew anything about the Internet. Yet, the report lays the groundwork for what was to come . . . for what we are experiencing today, and for what the future may bring.

From the report (selected quotes):

"No other change in American society has offered greater challenges than the emergence of the Information Age. Information is expanding at an unprecedented rate, and enormously rapid strides are being made in the technology for storing, organizing, and accessing the ever growing tidal wave of information."

"In an information society all people should have the right to information which can enhance their lives."

"To be information literate, a person must be able to recognize when information is needed, and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and effectively use the needed information."

"Information literate people are those who have learned how to learn. They know how to learn because they know how knowledge is organized, how to find information, and how to use information in such a way that others can learn from them. They are people prepared for lifelong learning, because they can always find the information needed for any task or decision at hand."

"Information literacy is a means of personal empowerment. It allows people to verify or refute expert opinion and to become independent seekers of truth. It provides them with the ability to build their own arguments and to experience the excitement of the search for knowledge."

"It is unfortunate that the very people who most need the empowerment inherent in being information literate are the least likely to have learning experiences which will promote these abilities. Minority and at-risk students, illiterate adults, people with English as second language, and economically disadvantaged people are among those most likely to lack access to the information that can improve their situations. Most are not even aware of the potential help that is available to them. Libraries, which provide the best access point to information for most U.S. citizens, are left untapped by those who most need help to improve their quality of life."

"Citizenship in a modern democracy involves more than knowledge of how to access vital information. It also involves a capacity to recognize propaganda, distortion, and other misuses and abuses of information. Information literacy provides insight into the manifold ways in which people can be deceived and misled. Information literate citizens are able to spot and expose chicanery, disinformation, and lies."

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"To say that information literacy is crucial to effective citizenship is simply to say it is central to the practice of democracy. Any society committed to individual freedom and democratic government must ensure the free flow of information to all its citizens in order to protect personal liberties and to guard its future."

"Libraries, which provide a significant public access point to information, usually at no cost, must play a key role in preparing people for the demands of today's information society."

"To any thoughtful person, it must be clear that teaching facts is a poor substitute for teaching people how to learn, i.e., giving them the skills to be able to locate, evaluate, and effectively use information for any given need."

"Now knowledge—not minerals or agricultural products or manufactured goods—is this country's most precious commodity. People who are information literate—who know how to acquire knowledge and use it—are America's most valuable resource."

These quotes lay the background for what I want to share with you in relation to the information superhighway, and the role library trustees should play. Let me say that I found quite a bit of information on the information superhighway, on NREN, the National Research and Education Network and the impetus it has received from Vice President Gore, on the national information infrastructure, the data superhighway, the Internet, etc. My intent is not to define or explain what these things are, what is needed to access the Internet, Internet's services and main capabilities, etc., because of all people, you as librarians are at the forefront on technology and already know how to use the technology. In this respect, you are ahead of me. All I want to do is share with you a few facts that, as a layman, fascinate me.

As you know, Internet evolved from a computer system built 25 years ago by the Department of Defense to enable academic and military researchers to continue to do government work even if part of the network was taken out in a nuclear attack. It eventually linked universities, government facilities, and corporations around the world, and they all shared the costs and technical work of running the system. It is now defined in terms such as:

1. Computers all over the world linked by high speed telecommunications lines . . . networks acting in concert.

2. The international network of networks base on Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)/ Internet Protocol (IP), enables computers of all kinds to share services and communicate directly, as if they were a part of one giant, seamless, global computing machine,

3. The world's largest computer network and the nearest thing to a working prototype of the information superhighway.

4. A global network of networks that links together the large commercial computer-communication services like CompuServe Prodigy, America Online, as well as tens of thousands of smaller university, government, and corporate networks.

Its informal rules of behavior are:

1. Access to computers should be unlimited and total.

2. All information should be free.

3. Mistrust authority and promote decentralization . . . actually, no one runs it.

Facts that fascinate and/or amaze me:

1. Richness of Internet changes on a daily basis as more data resources, computer resources and human resources join those already active on the network.

2. Incredibly fast growth: it now reaches nearly 30 million people, 25 million computers, 23,000 databases, over 25,000 networks and over a hundred countries . . . and the use is doubling every year ... or growing at the rate of about 8% per month.

3. Vision: to link every business, home, school, library, college agency, etc, on a communication network.

4. Cost to provide basic Internet access to the nation's 15,000 + main and branch public libraries is about $75.25 million dollars.

5. 21% of public libraries are now on the Internet.

6. 3/4 of the nation's larger libraries—those that serve a population of 250,000 or more—are connected.

7. No limitations as to what may appear on the Internet.

8. Management by consensus ... no one really runs it!

Finding information that links the telecommunications highway with library trustees was not easy.

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The thoughts that follow, therefore, are pretty much my own, and make sense to me. At the ALA Miami 94 conference I attended a couple of sessions dealing with the subject. Also, at this Black Caucus Conference I attended one session on the Internet. What follows also is based on information obtained and notes taken from these sessions. I call this last section of my presentation: Implications for Trustees on the Superhighway of Information.

1. As trustees, we need to promote, encourage, even demand access to the Internet through our libraries. Otherwise, we'll find ourselves exacerbating the haves and the have nots. The haves (a minority at this point in time), are those who have access through their home computers, at places of employment, etc. The have nots (a majority at this point in time), are those who don't have access and must rely on the library. Public libraries must be the computer place for those who cannot have a computer at home. Librarians must ensure that the information is available to all, in all its facets.

At the 1992 ALA Conference in San Francisco, Gloria Steinem called the public library "the last refuge for those without modems." The implications are, first, as already mentioned, that the library must be the information provider for those unable to get their information through home computer telecommunications connections; and second, that the library must act as an electronic information center, providing public modems and telecommunications, alongside books and videos, an interpretation in line with the public library's longstanding commitment to intellectual freedom and the individual's right to know.

2. As trustees, we need to be knowledgeable, and able to use the information in our own lives. We need to know about the technology. We may have to depend upon our libraries' professional staff and/or consultants, but so be it.

3. Speaking of staff, we need to be conscious and aware of competent information literate staff members in our own libraries and value them for what they know and what they do.

4. Trustees need to support and help the library director and administration in facilitating and encouraging staff training.

5. As trustees, we need to ask ourselves questions such as:

A. Are we helping to foster a nurturing environment for the staff?

B. Are we helping to foster positive relationships with other agencies, such as schools, health care providers, business, private industry, government, etc.?

C. Do we expect the services of our library to be all-encompassing, and responsive in the needs of the community?

D. Are we willing to support funding needed to provide information services to all members of the community?

E. Do we really expect the library to be not only on the information superhighway, but to be a major conduit or hub for information?

6. As trustees, we should expect and want the library to be at the center of government and the community, and expect to use it as an information source.

7. As I understand it, most Internet use is on evenings and weekends, on people's free time. Will the library be able to meet this need by being open for Internet use when most needed? Can we, as trustees, encourage and support this?

8. Trustees need to promote the idea of connecting all the schools and all the libraries, thus being able to get through vast quantities of information . . . being able to sort the valuable from the trivial, etc.

9. Libraries have been pioneers on the Internet. Librarians need to take a leadership role in the development of the information infrastructure, and trustees need to provide the needed policies, guidance, encouragement, and resources.

I close with this quote: "A promising future awaits the public library that can be proactive, rather than reactive, to technology. Information technology is driving the future, and librarians should be at the wheel."

*Ezequiel Vargas, Trustee, Rockford Public Library. These remarks were presented by Mr. Vargas at the Black Caucus of the American Library Association National Conference of African American Librarians in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, August 7,1994.

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