William B. Badke, MDiv, MTh, MLS

Associate Librarian for Information Literacy
I am the Associate Librarian at TWU for Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and information literacy. As a leader within the worldwide information literacy movement, I have taught research courses to numerous students and written extensively in the information literacy field. It is my conviction that enabling students to become skilled researchers is crucial to their education and to their roles in the marketplaces of life.

Bill lives in the most fabulous part of the BC Lower Mainland, the city of Mission, with his wife Rosemary. He has two grown sons and attends North Valley Baptist Church. For over four decades he has served with TWU, and more recently Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, offering reference service, doing collection development and teaching credit-based research courses. It is his conviction that university students need to be able to understand and grapple with today’s highly complex and often polarized information world, especially if they want to meet the challenges of representing Christ in the world. TWU offers an enriching environment to pursue those goals.

  • MDiv (Northwest Baptist Seminary)
  • MTh (Northwest Baptist Seminary)
  • MLS (University of British Columbia)
  • BA (University of British Columbia)

Expertise

A leader in the developing discipline of information literacy, including extensive publication and the teaching of credit courses in research for over forty years.

Selected Research:

  • "Reading to Write: Using Disciplinary Expertise and Source Reading with the ACRL Framework to Enhance the Conceptual Depth of Writing Students." In Information Literacy and Writing Studies, vol. 2, Upper-Level and Graduate Courses. (Purdue Information Literacy Handbooks). Ed. Grace Veach, 135-146. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2019.
  • "Framing Information Literacy within the Disciplines of Theological Education." In Information Literacy and Theological Librarianship: Theory and Praxis. Ed. Bobby L. Smiley, 59-82. Chicago: Atla Press, 2019.
  • Teaching Research Processes: The Faculty Role in the Development of Skilled Student Researchers, 2nd ed. En Route Books and Media, 2021.
  • Badke, William, Kreiter, Elizabeth, & Zhang, Qinqin. "A Faculty Workshop on Developing Students as Discipline-Situated Researchers." Communications in Information Literacy 18, no. 2 (2024): 198–217. https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/42834
  • "Information Literacy and Ethics - State of the Art and Paths to the Future. In Information Literacy Handbook. Ed, Karen Kaufmann and Clarence Maybee, 222-232. Facet, 2026 [William Badke served as Ethics Section editor.]
  • "Disciplinary Information Practices." In Information Literacy Handbook. Ed, Karen Kaufmann and Clarence Maybee, 285-288.

Awards & Honours

  • 2016 - Book Chapter: "Expertise and Authority in an Age of Crowdsourcing," in Not Just Where to Click: Teaching Students How to Think about Information. Ed. Troy Swanson; Heather Jagman. Chicago: Association of College and Research Libraries, 2015 (http://williambadke.com/BadkeExpertiseAuthority... included in the volume that won the Irene F. Rockman Instruction Publication of the Year award for 2016. http://www.ala.org/news/press-releases/2016/02/...
  • 2016 - Article: Farrell, Robert and Badke, William. "Situating Information Literacy in the Disciplines: A Practical and Systematic Approach for Librarians." Reference Services Review 43, no.2 (2015): 319-340, voted one of the top 20 articles in library instruction for 2015 by the Library Instruction Round Table of the American Library Association.
  • 2011 - Named one of the sixteen National Forum on Information Literacy's "Champions for Information Literacy," https://web.archive.org/web/20170114055034/http...
  • 2006 - Article: "Can't Get No Respect: Helping Faculty to Understand the Educational Power of Information Literacy." The Reference Librarian 43, no. 89/90 (2005): 63-80, voted one of the top 20 articles in library instruction for 2005 by the Library Instruction Round Table of the American Library Association ("LIRT's Top Twenty," Library Instruction Round Table News 28, no.4 (June 2006): 5-8.).

Recent Publications

  • "Information Anarchy versus Traditional Scholarship." Computers in Libraries (Online Searcher section) 45, no. 5 (June, 2025): 39-40.
  • "Method and the Wildly Creative Researcher." Computers in Libraries (Online Searcher section) 45, no. 7 (September, 2025): 39-40.
  • "The Biggest Blind Spot in Higher Education Today." Computers in Libraries (Online Searcher section) 45, no. 8 (October, 2025): 39-40.
  • "Using Information Literacy to Transform Thinking." Computers in Libraries (Online Searcher section) 45, no. 9 (November, 2025): 39-40.
  • "Those Challenging Research Questions." Computers in Libraries (Online Searcher section) 46, no. 1 (January/February. 2026): 39-40.
  • "The Robotic Researcher " Computers in Libraries (Online Searcher section) 46, no. 3 (May/June, 2026): 39-40.

Affiliations & Memberships

  • American Library Association
  • American Theological Library Association
  • Association of College and Research Libraries
  • Canadian Association of Professional Academic Librarians

  • RES 502 OL (Research Strategies)
  • UNIV 110 IS (Scholarly Inquiry and Research Methods)