A Preliminary Study on the Curriculum Overlap and Gap between LIS Education and Intelligence Education.

This paper addresses the curriculum overlap and gap between LIS education and intelligence education by analyzi ng the content of the websites of the intelligence education programs and courses in 27 representative intelligence education universities in the United States, and the intelligence-related programs and courses in the 56 LIS programs in the United States and Canada. The curriculum overlap lies in computer skills for information collection management, geographic information systems, data mining, knowledge discovery, competitive intelligence and information security, whereas the major curriculum gap lies in most intelligence analysis domain areas (such as military intelligence, political intelligence, science and technology intelligence) and many intelligence tradecraft areas (such as structured analytic techniques, intelligence theory and methods, intelligence policy and organization, intelligence operations, counterintelligence, intelligence writing and briefing). By filling some curriculum gaps based on the overlap, LIS education can extend to open source intelligence analysis in some domain areas.Keywords: LIS curriculum, LIS education, intelligence education, information analysis, content analysis of websitesIntroductionAs direct responses to the September 11, 2001, tragedy, we have seen a large demand for intelligence analysts (CNNMoney, 2009; Reid, 2009) and the rapid increase of intelligence studies education programs across the United States (Spracher, 2009). Meanwhile, many LIS schools have been redefining themselves in the changing, complex, knowledge-based environment and have reviewed and modified their curricula to keep abreast with the changing demands of the job market (Jin & Bouthillier, 2012). Several LIS educators have advocated intelligence analysis (including competitive intelligence analysis) as an alternative path for information professionals (Dillon & Doty, 2012; Edna, 2009; Hohhof & Chitwood, 2000; Shelfer & Goodrum, 2000), and there are LIS schools (such as the Information School at University of Texas at Austin) that have started intelligence analysis programs (Dillon & Doty, 2012). A prerequisite for LIS education to be able to extend to intelligence education is the curriculum overlap between the two fields.The motivation of this study is to provide curriculum support to the idea of extending LIS education to intelligence education. It does not try to answer the practical questions of why LIS education should extend to intelligence education and whether or not the production of current United States intelligence education programs serve the job market with sufficient graduates. There is sporadic, qualitative evidence supporting the idea. For example, Reid (2009a) addressed a "critical shortage of intelligence analysts" in many of the 16 U.S. intelligence community agencies (p. 40). Intelligence analysts, who are involved in identifying, evaluating, and analyzing information for decision makers in the intelligence community, were identified by CNNMoney. com as among the ten best jobs in America in 2009 (CNNMoney, 2009; Reid, 2009). The author found some intelligence analysis job announcements related to LIS (see Appendix A for the gist of such an example job announcement posted in March 2011). The example position has two categories of duties: (1) information collection, cataloging, and storage; and (2) information analysis for decision making or recommendation. A typical Master of Library and Information Science (MLIS) program prepares students for the first category of the duties, but not the second. However, the author has not found quantitative data to answer the two practical questions. Answering those questions require a separate study.The research question of this study is: what curriculum overlap and gap are there between intelligence education and LIS education? Following a literature review addressing the connection between intelligence analysis and LIS with a focus on the relationship between LIS education and intelligence education, the paper addresses the methodology of the study, followed by data analysis and findings, and the conclusion and limitations. …