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An experience of FestivIL - Rebecca Royston, MA Librarianship

I recently had the opportunity to attend the information literacy (IL) conference organised by LILAC, called FestivIL. It was a three-day event jam-packed with lectures, interviews, and workshops of all kinds, and even though it's a busy time of year, I'm really happy that I went. This year's conference took place online because of the pandemic, but I think the organisers did a great job of making it as "normal" as they could. They even incorporated some asynchronicity by making the main stage speeches into Q&A sessions based on pre-recorded lecture videos, and I thought that worked really well. Unfortunately, I couldn't attend the second day due to a scheduling conflict (that day's events all took place in the morning, while the first and third days were in the afternoon), but I'd like to share my experience of the other two days.

Day One

I've never attended a professional conference before, and the first day was a whirlwind of ideas. Emily Drabinski's Q&A session on the main stage was a hit with nearly everyone I talked to. She talked about how to teach higher education students to examine the structures that exist in the world, by way of demonstrating the restrictiveness of the library catalogue and showing that it can impact everything from the information they access to the opportunities they get in life. She also introduced the idea that we define ourselves using the systems and language we're born with, even though they can't define us perfectly – but that "you wring what you need out of the system" and then advocate to get what you want or need on top of that. Honestly, I found this session really inspirational, and thought it was such a great way to start the FestivIL. I used to be quite the activist but in the last few years, with everything going on, it started to feel like a losing battle and I burned out. Just seeing someone out in the world doing social justice work was really healing for me in a way I can't quite explain in a blog post like this.

Afterwards, I went to a masterclass session run by Hossam Kassem, Benjamin Williamson and Greg Leurs about teaching online, with a heavy focus on inclusivity and accessibility. Having done almost all of my degree online, it was interesting to experience the opposite side of pandemic-era teaching! I really appreciated the information on accessibility, and it made me realise that if I end up teaching, it'll be helpful to become familiar with accessibility software so I can anticipate students' needs. For example, I didn't know that people who use screen readers can type in the names of buttons, so saying the actual name (instead of just "the top left button" or something), is really helpful for them.

My final session of the day was by Louise Frith and Sarah Webb, who described their experiences setting up a fake news workshop. This was a really practical session which seemed intended to help others set up similar sessions, because they talked about the structure of the class, the types of articles they choose as demonstrations, and the speed bumps they hit along the way. Their workshop seems like it's really fun and effective.

Day Three

This day started with a Q&A with Barbara Fister, which I was really looking forward to because I loved her article in The Atlantic, and found her pre-recorded session fascinating. She talked about how librarians might be partially to blame for the rise of QAnon and other conspiracy theories, because of our past emphasis on questioning the veracity of everything we read. Could the alternative networks of "trusted" information, and the culture of doubting everything published by institutional sources, have been nudged into existence by librarians' skepticism? She argued that instead of teaching "do your own research" and "question everything", we should instead teach people to ask the question, "why should we trust this piece of information?". Having grown up in the southern US, I'm not unfamiliar with this particular type of stubborn skepticism, and I found her talk so insightful. I thought it really demonstrated how information literacy can affect everything from daily life to global politics.

Fister also briefly touched on how some people doubt nearly everything they read, but then assume that what they read on Google is fine. That point made for a great transition into my next session, by Elizabeth Brookbank, who also shared her experiences setting up a workshop which teaches students about algorithmic bias in search engines. Her goal is to move students from understanding that an algorithm exists (which, she said, most students walk into the session already knowing), to understanding that the algorithm can treat information and people in an inequitable way. Like the first day's session about the fake news workshop, she also talked about her experiences and how she navigated the difficulties she encountered. One thing I thought was really effective is that she uses image search results in her sessions, which conveys her point in a way that's visual and immediate.

Takeaways

Overall, while it would have been wonderful to be able to attend in-person, I think the committee did a great job of moving the FestivIL online. The campfire chats, which were little talks in randomised groups at the beginning and end of each day, were one of my favourite parts. It gave us the chance to talk about the sessions, to find out what other people were working on, and it gave me the opportunity to do a bit of networking (which is pretty important at my stage in my career!). But more than that, I got to see how so many attendees already knew each other and were familiar with each others' work, so the chats really helped FestivIL feel like a community.

As I said above, I've never been to a conference like this before, and I don't think I anticipated just how exhausting they can be! There are so many new ideas to process – it's tiring, but it's also exciting. If I ever have another chance to attend, I'll definitely take it.

-Rebecca Royston, MA Librarianship student

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