Credo, Arkansas State University Announce Partnership Designed to Improve College Readiness, Student Success

‘Winning partnership for everyone’ targets regional high school students

BOSTON, Nov. 3, 2016 — Credo – the industry leader for information literacy, critical thinking, and research solutions – and Arkansas State University are embarking on a partnership to bring information literacy resources and instruction to regional Arkansas high school students in support of their college readiness.

The Literati High School Partnership will be formally unveiled today by Ian Singer, Credo’s Chief Content Officer, and Jeff Bailey, Library Director at Arkansas State University’s Dean B. Ellis Library, during an afternoon session at the Charleston Library Conference in Charleston, S.C. The innovative collaboration is designed to provide research instruction to high school students to help prepare them for college success, even before they arrive on a campus.

The partnership will give students access to Credo's School Core Content Collection, with more than 400 ebook titles and millions of reference entries. The collection offers students in grades 7 to 12 level a wealth of insightful content covering topics related to secondary school studies, such as biology, physics, mathematics, social sciences, world cultures, world history, and more.

According to Bailey, the “Literati High School partnership is a win for everyone.”

“This is the perfect way for the librarians at the Dean B. Ellis Library to expand our work with area high schools,” Bailey continued. “At the high school level, the teachers and students are gaining access to all of the great Credo content and support that will help students earn higher grades, graduate and get accepted into college. At the college level, Arkansas State University will have incoming freshmen from those high schools who are better prepared, require less remediation, and are more likely to graduate. Plus, those students already will be familiar with using Literati to help them complete their assignments.”

Singer concurred and said the partnership represents Credo’s ongoing evolution as a company focused on positive learning outcomes for students.

“Programs such as this one will help students hit the ground running once they arrive on campus so they’re not overwhelmed by the college academic experience,” Singer said. “We are excited about the potential here, plus we’re looking forward to working with Jeff and the team at Arkansas State University. Of great significance, we will be interested in tracking how the students who had access to Literati performed versus those students who didn’t.”

Boston-based Credo has partnered with more than 2,500 libraries over the last 16 years to drive more effective and efficient student research activities. Since 2014, Credo has been developing instructional content while working with librarians to improve student research outcomes.

The Dean B. Ellis Library strives to meet the informational and research needs of Arkansas State University (enrollment 13,144) by offering a variety of services. Library personnel acquire and organize the library's physical and online collections in addition to providing desk services for research assistance and checking out materials. The library also offers one-on-one research consultations, library instruction for classes and a one credit hour library skills class.