Standard 15

Information Management

Being exposed to information is not enough to gain understanding of the information or use the information to perpetuate any sort of learning. Bringing ideas together, recognizing themes and connections between multiple sources, and the ability to analyze the meaning of the available information are all parts of information management. Individually, as we all think differently and experience world differently identifying my own personal style of interacting with information was vital in continuing my learning. Completion of library strategies class confirms the nuts and bolts ability to navigate large amounts of information with some level of competency. The skills I gained from this experience was the catapult for further competency in information.

Three succinct examples of gathering, analyzing and integrating information are present in the following research projects. Deaf culture- (Appendix A), Challenge Day at SWHS- (Appendix Q) and Media reform- (Appendix P).
Additionally, my abilities to integrate information into functional and useful tools for people and communities are displayed in the following Community Proposal (Appendix R) and Program Analysis (Appendix S).

In order to functionally use my skills of information management I had to gain an understanding of my own way of thinking and my approach to learning and analyzing. Through being exposed to many different people and styles of learning and teaching, I quickly recognized my tendency to make sense of things through mind-mapping. I quickly molded together my own personal mix of traditional approach to research and writing and a more messy/chaotic style of recognizing links between ideas etc. The connections are not always glaringly obvious at first, but once I begin to dump information and compile key words, phrases and ideas, a new fresh idea and/or perspective always becomes clear to me.

In my personal life, I used this approach a lot for my journaling. During certain periods of distress, and in my desperate need to identify and communicate my position, I began journaling. Not with my ideas already figured out, but in a chaotic way. I followed the jumbled path of my own thoughts until some sense of clarity (or at least release) was gained.

Both in the sense of research and my own inner journey through self, I’ve been able to identify my own very useful style that allows me to discover new ideas and make my own sense of the world and information around me as well as share those perspectives with others in a cohesive and often times confidently persuasive manner.