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Abstract
Scholars who use primary resources in teaching and research have documented the rewards of integrating archival collections into undergraduate- and graduate-level courses. There is a gap in the literature, however, regarding how these invaluable resources can effectively be integrated into geographic information systems (GIS) courses as a means for increasing students' information and data literacy skills. This study seeks to address this gap by expanding empirical research on how librarians and instructors can collaborate on course projects to better embed information and data literacy techniques. In particular, this article will focus on a final course project designed by a special collections librarian and a GIS librarian, who was the instructor of record, for an undergraduate- and graduate-level introductory GIS course. We emphasize librarian collaboration in the project design process and highlight the skillsets students learned by completing this assignment, including but not limited to: primary source research, database creation, geocoding, historical and spatial data interpretation, and geographic information literacy. Our goal is to promote this type of collaboration to increase students' information literacy abilities and to reap the benefits of hands-on, primary resource driven projects that integrate geospatial technologies.