Crossing boundaries and creating new spaces through an integrated academic literacies project

Abstract

This paper reports on a study based on a project involving a collaborative partnership between an academic literacy lecturer, an information literacy expert, an e-learning instructional designer and an HIV/AIDS expert. The rationale for forming a partnership was to include library information literacy and e-learning into an academic development (AD) course which is offered to students from the Faculty of Health Sciences at a Higher Education Institution in South Africa. The subject material used was based on HIV/AIDS topics that students had to debate within an online discussion forum. The aim of the study was to ascertain whether an integrated approach enhances the learning experiences of students and to evaluate the role of the different collaborating partners, as well as to assess the logistics of working together in a partnership with stakeholders from different sectors of the university community.