University at Buffalo (UB)
Global Information Agents
Assist UB's global partners in finding quality, free or low-cost information and data by becoming information search experts.
Project description
Access to high-quality information, data and scholarly research is crucial to making business, organizational, and educational decisions.
Unfortunately, many of UB’s global non-profit, educational and community partners lack access to these resources. The University at Buffalo community has access to millions of dollars worth of valuable information through the Libraries’ subscription to various scholarly products as well as direct access to open resources not easily discoverable by the layperson. Furthermore, the United States has an expansive and advanced Internet infrastructure, allowing its citizens to obtain information at blazing speeds. Many of our global partners are from rural or developing areas where access to Internet technologies like Ethernet and WiFi are spotty at best or completely non-existent. The UB Libraries’ Education Services team is passionate about teaching and concerned about bridging the information gap our global partners face.
We are actively looking for students to join our team as Global Information Agents (GIAs). If you are a global-minded student and looking for training on open access, information literacy, and scholarly research/data dissemination, please contact us. Training takes approximately 5 weeks, then students will have opportunities to work with other UB students and global partners on projects in need of information, research or data.
Project outcome
- Identify the information needs of global “clients”
- Craft information/data needs search queries
- Employ information literacy skills to fulfill client needs
- Differentiate high quality sources from questionable sources
- Present findings to the client in the form of bibliographies, reading lists, data sets, reports, presentations or other formats as requested.
Project details
| Length of commitment | 5 weeks of online training, and then the student will be an information agent |
| Start time | Anytime |
| In-person, remote, or hybrid? | Remote |
| Level of collaboration | Individual student project |
| Benefits | Volunteer |
| Who is eligible | All undergraduate students |
Project mentor
Cindi Tysick
Director of Education Services (Research, Education and Outreach);
UB Libraries
Start the project
- Email the project mentor using the contact information above to express your interest and get approval to work on the project. (Here are helpful tips on how to contact a project mentor.)
- After you receive approval from the mentor to start this project, click the button to start the digital badge. (Learn more about ELN's digital badge options.)
Preparation activities
Once you begin the digital badge series, you will have access to all the necessary activities and instructions. Your mentor has indicated they would like you to also complete the specific preparation activities below. Please reference this when you get to Step 2 of the Preparation Phase.
- Students should watch a short video introducing them to the project.
- They will then complete an "advanced information literacy" microcredential online.
- Once completed, they will be entered into the GIA database as a resource for global partners who have an information gathering need for a project, grant, presentation, report, etc.
Global Information Agents
Research, Education, Outreach and Library