Researcher Spotlight: Amanda Hovious Explores How Libraries Can Impact Data Literacy

Last year, Emporia State Assistant Professor Amanda Hovious received a $50,000 First Award seed grant from Kansas NSF EPSCoR to investigate how public libraries can improve data literacy. 

She is just one of 173 assistant professors awarded this type of seed grant from Kansas NSF EPSCoR. While these projects are designed to initiate novel research relevant to Kansans, they can be transformative for junior faculty members.

“[It] is the best thing that's happened in my career…” says Hovious, who is a librarian educator at Emporia State University.

Hovious explains more about the project in the interview below with University of Kansas Senior Makenna Dawson. Their conversation has been edited for clarity and brevity. 

Learn more about her research by watching a short video and reading her published findings.

Q. How did your career path lead you to apply for a First Award?

A. I was a librarian for many years. Then I got a PhD to become a librarian educator. Seeing the call for proposals for the First Award, I felt compelled to do something about data literacy. This emerging important area in librarianship primarily focuses now on academic librarians educating researchers at research institutions. But data literacy itself is just a fundamental skill that ties into health literacy and financial literacy and all these other areas. We can't make decisions without understanding the data.

Q. How has the First Award impacted you?

A. Being part of this project was the best thing that's happened in my career. It gave me a much broader perspective. The library science world is very small, and often our research doesn't cross over disciplines. It’s given me a chance to work alongside people from different disciplines and learn methodologies, like community-engage research—an important methodology for our field, but it's not being used widely by researchers in library science yet. So, I guess serendipity is the best way to describe it.

Q. Why does your research project focus on libraries?

A. The initial study was to look at public libraries in Kansas, which are mostly small and rural, serving less than 1500 people with essentially volunteers or very low paid staff. I noticed that KU Associate Professor Elaina Sutley, who studies critical infrastructure, was interested in studying libraries. My research showed that, well, libraries are critical infrastructure. After a disaster, FEMA often designates the public library as the information hub to get resources, access Wi-Fi or whatever. But nobody's ever connected the dots that libraries are critical infrastructure.

Q. How can libraries support data literacy?

A. The reality is, they can't because there are too many other social issues that need to be addressed.

Number one is that adult literacy levels are so low nationally and in some counties in Kansas, up to 60 or 70% of the population are functionally illiterate. That means that they read below the fourth-grade level. To make decisions about finances and health you need to read above that level.

This is in line with statistics you might have seen on financial illiteracy. More than half of adults are financially illiterate. And then the data piece goes into that as well, because adult literacy is not just reading, it's also numeracy, so also understanding mathematical concepts. And I found that libraries really can't do that. They're so busy just trying to do the everyday things for the community, that they don't have the ability or time.

Q. Does data literacy only come from childhood education, or is there lack of resources for adults? 

A. Well, there's an adult literacy crisis in this country. Mostly adult literacy is relegated to Adult Learning Centers, which you'll see in some communities. Sometimes they're tied to the community college. But the problem is that you can't just help somebody learn to read. You have to identify why they're not reading, right? I don't know really how you would solve data literacy. It's a problem because children's literacy, whether it's reading or data or numeracy, is very much tied to parents' literacy.

Q. So is your research about bringing to light the fact that public libraries are critical infrastructure?

A. Libraries have been in the line of fire the last few years with book challenges and censorship issues, We really need to change the conversation to talk about the critical role of libraries in communities. It’s so critical that, if they're gone, it can impact resilience.

The library staff just know everybody and what's happening to them. It's part of the social infrastructure. If someone stops coming to the library, you can call for a wellness check. It's also a safe place for kids to go after school.

Libraries are often seen as places you go to get a good book, right, but they're really educational institutions, and one of their missions is literacy and lifelong learning.

Q. What else have you gained and hope to achieve?

A. This research has allowed me to make connections with people and institutions across the U.S. through conferences. I also learned that to make progress for data literacy or anything else, people need leadership skills. So, we're focusing on developing training for community leadership, working with the Kansas Leadership Center, the community toolbox, and Web Junction.

Librarians want to solve all the problems, but they don't have the resources to do that. A good example of that is in San Francisco, where they were dealing with homeless populations that the city was not addressing. Cities often just kind of move the problem around. They don't solve it. So, the library is like, well, we're going to solve this. They bring in social workers, and it helps, because it's helping to connect homeless folks with resources. And they trust the library more than they trust the police.

Q. So, when the librarians are given more resources to use, are they better able to support the community?

A. I feel like librarians need to run the country.