"Life In The 21st Century"

It's so hard for adults to grasp the idea that students these days (21st century students) don't value libraries the way 19th or even 20th century students once did. It's like an elephant in the room, when digital information and library issues are mentioned at the same time. People really get offended when a student utters "I go online for my information". Even in my own school library, our students do use the library resources, but it's by no means their primary source for research. They also access online library databases. But the main point they love to share is "the ease of the internet." At some point, we'll have to swallow the hard pill fact that our young people will not be as inclined to use print resources as a primary means of research. I bet centuries ago when books came into existence, it phased out the wise elders who spoke history to the young people. Everything has its time and novelty. However, in regards to searching the web, we educators owe it to our students to teach them information/internet literacy and the effective ways of searching the web. Too many students graduate from high school and are overwhelmed by how much they don't know in regards to the online databases and catalogs they will need to access. My feeling is...it should be mandatory for every student to have some form of information literacy at some point in their upper school experience. This will smoothen out their transition from high school to college research and more importantly set them up for success in college.
Students shun search for information offlineNEW YORK (AP) -- Go to Google, search and scroll results, click and copy.

"When students do research online these days, many educators worry, those are often about the only steps they take. If they can avoid a trip to the library at all, many students gladly will."