An information school (sometimes abbreviated I-school or iSchool) is a
university-level institution committed to understanding the role of
information in nature and human endeavors. Synonyms include school of information, department of information studies, or information department. Information schools
faculty
Faculty may refer to:
* Faculty (academic staff), the academic staff of a university (North American usage)
* Faculty (division), a division within a university (usage outside of the United States)
* Faculty (instrument)
A faculty is a legal in ...
conduct research into the fundamental aspects of information and
related technologies. In addition to granting
academic degree
An academic degree is a qualification awarded to students upon successful completion of a course of study in higher education, usually at a college or university. These institutions commonly offer degrees at various levels, usually including unde ...
s, information schools educate information professionals, researchers, and scholars for an
increasingly information-driven world.
Information school can also refer, in a more restricted sense, to the
members of the iSchools organization (formerly the "iSchools Project"), as governed by the iCaucus.
The iSchools Welcome Nanjing and Tampere as New Additions; Now Boast 33 Members Worldwide
Members of this group share a fundamental interest in the relationships between people, information, technology, and science. These schools, colleges, and departments have been either newly established or have evolved from programs focused on information systems, library science, informatics
Informatics is the study of computational systems, especially those for data storage and retrieval. According to ACM ''Europe and'' ''Informatics Europe'', informatics is synonymous with computer science and computing as a profession, in which ...
, computer science, library and information science
Library and information science(s) or studies (LIS) is an interdisciplinary field of study that deals generally with organization, access, collection, and protection/regulation of information, whether in physical (e.g. art, legal proceedings, e ...
and information science.
Information schools promote an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the opportunities and challenges of information management
Information management (IM) concerns a cycle of organizational activity: the acquisition of information from one or more sources, the custodianship and the distribution of that information to those who need it, and its ultimate disposal throug ...
, with a core commitment to concepts like universal access and user-centered organization of information. The field is concerned broadly with questions of design and preservation across information spaces, from digital and virtual spaces like online communities, the World Wide Web, and databases to physical spaces such as libraries, museums, archives, and other repositories. Information school degree programs include course offerings in areas such as
data science
Data science is an interdisciplinary field that uses scientific methods, processes, algorithms and systems to extract or extrapolate knowledge and insights from noisy, structured and unstructured data, and apply knowledge from data across a br ...
, information architecture, design, economics, policy, retrieval
Retrieval could refer to:
Computer science
* RETRIEVE, Tymshare database that inspired dBASE and others
* Data retrieval
* Document retrieval
* Image retrieval
* Information retrieval
* Knowledge retrieval
* Medical retrieval
* Music informati ...
, security
Security is protection from, or resilience against, potential harm (or other unwanted coercive change) caused by others, by restraining the freedom of others to act. Beneficiaries (technically referents) of security may be of persons and social ...
, and telecommunications; knowledge management, user experience design, and usability
Usability can be described as the capacity of a system to provide a condition for its users to perform the tasks safely, effectively, and efficiently while enjoying the experience. In software engineering, usability is the degree to which a soft ...
; conservation and preservation
Preservation may refer to:
Heritage and conservation
* Preservation (library and archival science), activities aimed at prolonging the life of a record while making as few changes as possible
* ''Preservation'' (magazine), published by the Nat ...
, including digital preservation; librarianship and library administration; the sociology of information; and human–computer interaction.
See also
* Education for librarianship Education for librarianship, including for paraprofessional library workers, varies around the world, and has changed over time. In recent decades, many institutions offering librarianship education have changed their names to reflect the shift from ...
* Information age
* List of information schools
* Outline of information science
The following outline of information science is provided as an overview of and topical guide to information science:
Information science – interdisciplinary field primarily concerned with the analysis, collection, classification, manipula ...
* Outline of library science
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to library science:
Library and information science (LIS) is the scientific study of issues related to libraries and the information fields. This includes academic studies r ...
* Systems science
References
{{reflist
Bibliography
* Cronin, B. (2005). An I-dentity crisis? The information schools movement. ''International Journal of Information Management, 25:'' 363–365.
* Debons, A. & Harmon, G. (2006
The I-Conference in Retrospect
''Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science and Technology'', April/May.
* Larsen, R. (2005)
An interview with Ron Larsen about I-schools
Coalition for Networked Information, 27-minute audio recording.
Library science education
Information science