British and Irish Association of Law Librarians (BIALL) Legal Information Literacy Statement

The Association hosts an annual conference which features a members’ ‘Have your say’ session. At the 2011 session, a BIALL member based in the commercial sector voiced their concern at the legal research competency of recent joiners to their firm, stating that senior partners were asking in-house law librarians to verify the research presented by new trainees. This member also queried the role of academic law librarians, questioning how legal research skills are being taught at academic and vocational level and stating clearly that the legal research skills of new joiners are not meeting the expectations of employers. The following debate prompted one of the authors to propose that BIALL should investigate the issue in depth, with the aim of producing legal IL guidance in the form of a toolkit, similar to legal IL guidance devised in the United States and IL initiatives within the NHS (Choolhun 2012)

Google: to use, or not to use. What is the question?

AbstractThis article by Natasha Choolhun, with input from Emma Harris and colleagues, considers how the proliferation of freely available legal information has affected standards of information literacy and research capability in the current legal environment. Real life examples are given to illustrate how staff in law firms are using resources such as Google and Wikipedia in preference over authoritative legal material. The phrase “Google Generation” is explored and consideration is given to how law schools and commercial firms are attempting to instil in their lawyers principles of good information literacy and research skills.</jats:p

British and Irish Association of Law Librarians (BIALL) Legal Information Literacy Statement

The Association hosts an annual conference which features a members’ ‘Have your say’ session. At the 2011 session, a BIALL member based in the commercial sector voiced their concern at the legal research competency of recent joiners to their firm, stating that senior partners were asking in-house law librarians to verify the research presented by new trainees. This member also queried the role of academic law librarians, questioning how legal research skills are being taught at academic and vocational level and stating clearly that the legal research skills of new joiners are not meeting the expectations of employers. The following debate prompted one of the authors to propose that BIALL should investigate the issue in depth, with the aim of producing legal IL guidance in the form of a toolkit, similar to legal IL guidance devised in the United States and IL initiatives within the NHS (Choolhun 2012)