By: The Capella Editorial Team
Reading Time: 10 minutes
With an increasing number of jobs in the United States requiring digital skills, the need for digital literacy has never been greater. Your future depends on how confidently you can learn, work and communicate in a digital world.
For working adults pursuing degrees online, these skills are the bridge between academic success and career impact. Being digitally literate means knowing how to evaluate information, protect personal data and use technology to collaborate effectively. It helps you complete coursework efficiently and prepares you to use digital tools in your profession with confidence.
But which skills should you prioritize to thrive throughout your academic journey?
This guide breaks down the digital literacy skills that matter for students and educators. You’ll see real-world examples of how they apply in school, a self-assessment checklist to measure your strengths and strategies to sharpen your skills, so you can move forward in your studies and your career with clarity and confidence.
Digital literacy refers to your level of proficiency in using digital tools and technologies to find, evaluate and create information. It encompasses practical skills like using digital devices, conducting online research and understanding online safety.
In an educational context, digital literacy involves using technology to locate information and evaluate its credibility, collaborate effectively with others and practice safe online behavior.
These skills are so integral to academic and professional success that they’re considered a 21st-century skill – abilities necessary to succeed in today’s digitally connected world. They equip students with the competencies they need to navigate digital platforms and support their learning throughout their educational journey and beyond.
Digital literacy skills are also essential to career readiness. Modern workplaces don’t expect employees to be computer experts, but they do expect them to have basic proficiency with tools like Microsoft Office.
Digital literacy skills are valuable across all professional settings. For example, let’s say you want to pursue a career in health care administration. You’ll need digital competencies to manage electronic medical records and coordinate staff schedules to ensure quality care.
Likewise, if you want to work in finance or sales, you’ll need to be proficient with software like Microsoft Excel to create visuals and reports for stakeholders. If you can’t adequately perform these tasks, you may not be as effective in your role as someone who can.
Knowing how to work with technology is a necessary skill for any professional. Yet, there’s a glaring gap between the skills employers need and those of the workforce. Employers expect you to be digitally literate regardless of the field you want to enter. As a student, developing the technical skills employers value may help make you a more appealing candidate.
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Digital literacy includes many overlapping abilities that shape how students learn and communicate in digital environments. Educators sometimes describe these as the 7 Cs of digital literacy, a framework that emphasizes creativity, communication and critical thinking.
We've distilled these broader ideas into a few essential areas that form a foundation of academic success: technical skills, information literacy, media literacy, digital communication and digital safety.
Technical skills aren’t about performing basic tasks like searching on Google or creating a TikTok account.
Rather, they include the ability to:
Mastering these basic technical skills can help with your academic and professional journey.
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As a student, you’ll need to conduct research for academic projects and papers. But your teachers will expect you to use credible, reliable sources rather than unverified websites.
Information literacy encompasses the ability to locate and evaluate the credibility of information from digital sources.
Students should know how to use academic databases, such as PubMed Central, to find research papers for writing reports. Knowing how to use Boolean search operators (AND, OR, NOT) is a must to narrow their search results.
Once students find an article they can use to strengthen and lend credibility to their writing, they also need to know how to cite it correctly, which is something you learn as part of your studies (different fields and academic journals use different citation styles). An example is the American Psychological Association (APA) Style, commonly used to reference academic papers.
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Media literacy is the ability to understand and critically evaluate the messages you encounter through media like news articles, videos, social posts, podcasts and advertisements. But media literacy goes beyond checking facts to examining how and why a message was created, who created it and whose perspectives it represents.
Being media literate means recognizing bias, identifying persuasive techniques and distinguishing between credible journalism and opinion or sponsored content.
It also involves understanding how algorithms and platforms shape what you see online, so you can avoid echo chambers (where you only see information that reflects your views) and broaden your perspective. Politically active users may tend to follow and connect with like-minded individuals. However, these selective connections may reinforce existing beliefs and create information bubbles.
Developing strong media literacy skills empowers students to be thoughtful consumers and responsible sharers of digital content.
Strong digital communication skills allow you to express ideas clearly, respectfully and effectively through digital tools. In education, they allow students to collaborate, share feedback and build strong connections in online environments that mirror today’s workplaces.
Core digital communication skills include:
Developing these skills helps students engage confidently in online courses while preparing them for careers where clear, digital-first communication is essential.
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Some people find sharing personal moments on social media second nature. However, sharing too much information can expose users to identity theft and online scams.
As Andrei Mochola, head of consumer business at Kaspersky Lab points out, the internet makes it simple to share information, but doing so can come at a cost. Once you share sensitive details online, you lose control over where that information goes and how it might be used.
Digital safety is all about protecting your personal data and staying safe online. An example is recognizing phishing attempts and avoiding falling victim to scams. Students with digital safety skills can safely navigate the digital world while preserving their privacy.
Educational environments provide students with opportunities to develop their digital literacy abilities, which may serve as a foundation for future skills.
Here are examples of digital literacy skills that can support your educational journey.
Even as a single user amongst billions, you have an ethical obligation to be responsible and safe online. That means understanding how your actions online impact others. This is the underlying principle behind digital citizenship – behaving responsibly online and making contributions that support learning communities.
As a student, that means:
One way you can be a responsible digital citizen is to identify and report misinformation when you see it to keep it from spreading.
Developing this awareness can prepare you to participate responsibly in online forums and class discussions. It also equips you with the skills to navigate digital platforms and maintain your reputation.
Students must learn to interpret and present information clearly. They may use tools like Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets and Tableau to turn raw data into dynamic visuals.
For example, real classroom scenarios might include business students charting sales data to identify trends, nursing students tracking patient outcomes over time and education students mapping learning progress for classrooms.
Presenting project results using charts and other visuals instead of long text helps improve comprehension and engagement. These skills strengthen analytical thinking and communication – both of which are key for pursuing career opportunities.
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Safeguarding digital identity is a must to stay safe online.
Attackers are increasingly sending phishing emails to students, especially around exams or registration periods. These are often used to steal login credentials. Scammers may also offer students “jobs” that promise good pay but are actually schemes to trick users into divulging sensitive information.
To protect their personal data and privacy online, students can:
AI tools can help with idea generation, provide “tutoring-style” support and summarize research reports.
However, despite their capabilities, AI tools have inherent risks. Perhaps the biggest is the tendency to “hallucinate” or present incorrect information as fact. Some research even suggests that popular AI models exhibit political bias.
AI can help streamline study tasks and brain essay structures. However, they must be fact-checked and used within academic integrity guidelines. Knowing when to rely on AI – and when not to – is part of becoming digitally literate.
Now that you understand the value of digital literacy skills in education and beyond, you can easily assess your skill level with a simple checklist to identify areas for improvement.
I know how to…
I know how to…
I know how to…
I know how to…
I know how to…
Rate your proficiency in these areas by counting how many boxes you’ve checked in each section:
Now you have a better understanding of your digital literacy. This will help you identify areas for improvement and develop a plan to sharpen your skills.
As a student, building digital literacy helps you gain confidence in how you learn, collaborate and communicate in today’s digital world. These abilities support your academic success and prepare you in your career.
With flexible online learning formats from Capella University, you can strengthen these skills for use in practical, real-world working environments. FlexPath lets you study at your own pace and set your own deadlines, while GuidedPath provides a more structured format with weekly milestones.
You can also work with your academic coach to identify courses within your program that help build and apply digital literacy skills across different disciplines.
Build your digital literacy and take the next step toward your goals. Explore online degrees from Capella University and prepare for your future with confidence.
The seven Cs of digital literacy include: Creating, Communicating, Connecting, Critiquing, Collecting, Changing and Curating. Developing these skills in these areas will help students thrive in academic and professional environments.
The first step to improve your digital literacy is to perform a self-guided assessment. This will enable you to identify technical gaps in your skillset. Practice using various digital tools, engage in learning through online courses and stay updated on emerging trends.
Nearly all modern professional roles require digital literacy abilities. This includes skills like computer literacy, data entry and proficiency with software like Microsoft Office.
Capella University is not affiliated with these products, and reference to them is for informational purposes only.
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