In-Service Teachers’ Knowledge of Significant Global Events/Issues: Implications for Teacher Preparation Programs in Developing Countries

In this era of globalisation, it is imperative that teachers are adequately prepared to function effectively in a challenging global environment. The challenges of globalisation demands teachers who are competent, effective, and dynamic in their orientation. This paper presents a report of a study that examines the existing knowledge of in-service teachers in the University of Botswana, of some significant global issues/events. Five hundred in-service teachers were randomly selected from across 100-400 levels of study and across the three main teaching specializations: arts/humanities, sciences and social sciences. An instrument tagged ‘’Knowledge of Significant Global Events/Issues Test’’ with a reliability coefficient of 0.92 was used for data collection. Three research questions were addressed and data collected was analysed using mean scores, t-test, and analysis of variance (ANOVA). The results indicates a generally poor knowledge of the global issues examined among the teachers, with a majority of them scoring below average (64.2% below 50).Also, course of study and level of study were found to significantly influence the in-service teachers’ knowledge of the global issues in question, while gender has no significant effect on the knowledge scores. The implications of the findings for teacher preparation programmes in Botswana and other developing countries were discussed with a major recommendation on curricular review to accommodate emerging issues in globalisation

The factors determining knowledge sharing intention among information professionals in Nigeria

Rationale of Study - Several studies have considered the factors determining the knowledge sharing intention among employees. However, studies focusing on information professionals and factors determining their knowledge sharing intention through a path model are either limited or been ignored. Methodology - In this study, the researcher developed and tested a path model that explains the factors that determine the intention of information professionals in Nigeria to share knowledge with their colleagues through a survey design. Findings - The results revealed that a correlation exists between the overall knowledge sharing intention score and the other knowledge sharing intention factors. The results demonstrate that citizenship behaviour had the highest correlation with knowledge sharing intention (r = 0.852). This is followed by creativity and innovation (r=0.704), and interaction frequency (r = 0.558). The results of the regression of knowledge sharing intention on the ten related factors show an adjusted R-square value of 0.661, and an F-ratio of 105.37; the latter of which is significant at 0.05 level (0.000 < 0.05). These indicate that the ten independent variables jointly (as indicated by the R-square value) explained 76.5% of the variations in the knowledge sharing intention by the information professionals. Implications - The research findings have a big bearing on policy formulation and decision making in information and knowledgeorganisations, the public and private information sector players, professional associations and information and knowledge training institutions. Originality - This research has a great value in the sense that it is one of the pioneer studies on information sharing in the context of information research in Nigeria

Application of social media for innovative library services in South-Western Nigerian University libraries

The study investigated the application of social media used for innovative library services by university library staff in South-Western Nigeria. A survey method was adopted with copies of questionnaire distributed to 354 library staff selected from the entire 36 university libraries located in South Western Nigeria. An in-depth interview was also conducted for heads of units in each of the libraries. The findings of the study reveal that social media application to library services is now prominent among university library staff in South-Western Nigeria. Facebook, Twitter, Blog, YouTube, LinkedIn, Delicious, MySpace and Flickr are the social media being used by the library staff. Facebook was found to be the most used site. In addition, the study affirms that selected libraries are using social media majorly to communicate with their users, provide reference services, disseminate information as well as news on library services

INFLUENCE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SKILLS ON LIBRARY PATRONAGE BY UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS IN SOUTH-WEST, NIGERIA

This study investigated the influence of information technology skills on library patronage by undergraduate students in South-west Nigerian universities. A descriptive research design of the ex-post facto was adopted using a sample size of 1527 selected out of the total population of 239,048 undergraduate students in the universities. Questionnaire was used to collect data. The results of the study revealed that the majority of undergraduate students patronised the library between two to three times a day. The finding of the study also revealed that information technology skills had influence on library patronage by undergraduate students in the universities (r = 0.59, N = 1333, p \u3c 0.05). The study concluded that information technology skills influenced library patronage of undergraduate students in the universities. The study, therefore, recommended that students should enhance their information technology skills to enhance their library patronag

Empirical investigation on impact of Koha on library services in selected academic libraries in Nigeria

This study examined the impact of Koha on library services in some selected universities in Nigeria. A total of 50 library staff was purposively selected from five universities belonging to south-western and north-central regions of the country. A self-designed questionnaire was administered to both professional and para-professional staff of the libraries. Collected data was analyzed using descriptive statistical method. The results of the analysis of the data showed that Koha has favorably impacted their libraries. Some difficulties encountered in implementing Koha were inadequate infrastructure and financial constraints

Self-Efficacy and Use of Electronic Information as Predictors of Academic Performance

Abstract Students’ ability to find and retrieve information effectively is a transferable skill useful for their future life as well as enabling the positive and successful use of the electronic resources while at school. It is a known fact in this digital era that any student at the higher level who intends to better achieve and go further in academics should have the ability to explore the digital environment. Students are increasingly expected to use electronic information resources while at the university. Research was undertaken to determine the level of influence of self-efficacy and the use of electronic information resources on students’ academic performance. This study examined self-efficacy and the use of electronic information as predictors of academic performance. Its participants were comprised of 700 students (undergraduate and postgraduate) randomly drawn from seven departments in the faculty of education, University of Ibadan, Nigeria. Data on the study was collected through the Morgan-Jinks (1999) academic self-efficacy scale and the use of the electronic information scale (UEIS) with r = 0.75. Three research questions were raised to guide the study. The results indicate that self-efficacy and the use of electronic information jointly predict and contribute to academic performance; that respondents with high self-efficacy make better use of electronic information and have better academic performance; that a correlation exists among self-efficacy, use of electronic information and academic performance; and that the use of electronic information influenced respondents\u27 performance in General Education subjects more than other subjects. Finally, the results reveal that the Internet is the electronic information source students access for information most often. Implications of these results and recommendations are discussed

Cataloguing and classification in the era of artificial intelligence: Benefits, and challenges from the perspective of cataloguing librarians in Oyo State, Nigeria

Goal: This study has examined cataloguing and classification in the era of artificial intelligence, benefits, and challenges from the perspective of cataloguing librarians in Oyo state, Nigeria. Methodology: The study adopted a purely qualitative method using interviews for data collection. The target population was the cataloguing and classification librarians in academic libraries in Southwest Nigeria. The sample comprised 21 cataloguing and classification librarians working in the cataloguing and classification section of 10 university libraries in Southwest Nigeria. Four research questions were developed and answered. Findings/Results: The findings revealed that cataloguing librarians are aware of the application of artificial intelligence for cataloguing and classification. Artificial intelligence enhances automatic cataloguing and classification using optical character recognition, assists in undertaking stressful work that humans may struggle to do; completes tasks faster than a human being and enables libraries to provide accurate cataloguing and classification services with fewer errors; saving time and money, assisting libraries to create metadata for digital resources and allowing cataloguing to increase the speed of metadata generation. The challenges associated with the application of AI to cataloguing and classification practices from the perspective of cataloguing and classification librarians are funding, irregular power supply and inadequate skilled personnel to handle AI. Currently, there is no strategic plan in place for the implementation of AI for cataloguing and classification in academic libraries in Nigeria. Originality and Values: Based on the findings, the study recommends that a strategic plan should be initiated in all academic libraries in Nigeria to allow the real-life practice of using AI for cataloguing and classification

Assessment of information seeking behaviour of physically challenged students in selected Nigerian tertiary institutions

This study examined the information seeking behaviour of the physically challenged students in selected Nigeria tertiary institutions. The study made effort to determine the predominant sources of information, accessibility to information materials and information services and the problems faced by the physically challenged students while seeking and using information/library resources and services. The study adopted survey design and data was collected using a questionnaire administered to two thousand respondents selected from three Nigeria tertiary institutions - the University of Ilorin, University of Ibadan and Federal college of education (special) Oyo. The findings of the study show that the majority of the respondents seek educational information, while their source of information is online. The major information material they consult was lecture note/handout, while the services rendered to them in the library are reference, abstracting and indexing services. Textbook is the only information material access by the respondents while the major challenges the physically challenged encountered are inadequate time to carry out information search and inability to locate information from the targeted sources. The physically challenged are encouraged to develop good time management. This will enable them to have enough time to search for their needed information. The library in each participated school should make sure they embark on regular shelve reading so as to help the physically challenged locate information through their target locations

Facilitating the move to competency based staffing in academic and research libraries in the globalised era

Libraries are evolving rapidly from physical spaces providing on-site services and resources to providers of electronic resources and virtual services. Globalization has enable librarians moving into dramatically different roles as new services are implemented. This implies that the move to competency based staffing in both academic and research libraries are germane. It has become more important than ever to have flexible and motivated librarians who possess the skills, attitudes, and traits that enable them to meet multiple informational needs of global age information users and adapt as those needs change. Encouraging those librarians to continue growing as professionals over their careers is equally important. Competency-based hiring and evaluation can enable information organizations including academic and research libraries to: “recruit employees who can meet the organization’s current needs and who are willing to fulfill the required job duties; evaluate employees based on their current activities as well as their professional development efforts; and set benchmarks for employees’ continued professional development and learning that are beneficial to the organization. The fact that competency-based recruitment of personnel is essential in this age, culminated into the discussion in this paper. Therefore, the paper discussed competency as relate to the recruitment of librarians, what are involved in using competencies in the selection of library personnel, the process, and the creative approach/approaches to recruitment of personnel into libraries. The paper recommends based on the discussion that an empirical investigation version of this discussion should be considered. This could be focused on examining the intriguing question of how users in academic and research libraries in this global era cope with the absence of an endorsed competent librarian.Keywords: Library personnel, Hiring, Recruitment, Globalisation, Competency Based Staffin

Assessment of Nigerian University Library Web Sites/Web Pages

Academic libraries, the world over, have designed and developed Web sites to advertise their resources and services to the outside world. In line with this, many universities in Nigeria have provided their library with a Web site while more are developing Web sites for their library to meet the new information superhighway’s challenges. However, in-depth studies on the assessment of these Web sites have not been undertaken and the studies have been especially neglected or ignored by the Nigeria researcher. The available existing study only focused on the rating of the Web sites on the basis of the number of hits. In view of this, there is a necessity to research the aspects of in-depth assessment of selected academic library Web sites in Nigeria, especially in view of the accelerating rate of university establishment in the country. This study is an attempt to fill this currently identified gap. Hence, the study assessed the university library Web sites in selected university libraries in Nigeria. The study uses content analysis as the research design. A total of 30 Nigerian university library Web sites were selected from the three categories to represent 110 universities in Nigeria using a purposely stratified sampling technique with a checklist as the research instrument. The criteria for the checklist were drawn on an assessment of library Web sites for Web 2.0 tools, access to electronic materials, and links to the National University Commission (NUC) virtual library. Four research questions were developed and answered and the result revealed low level of the integration of Web 2.0 in most of the universities’ Web sites. The study concluded that the use of the current web development technologies for deploying mainstream web information services is not widespread as web information services are yet to take off widely in academic libraries as regards to web 2.0, electronic resources and links to NUC virtual library. The majority of university libraries are found to be working in the conventional library settings and the diffusion rate of web information services is relatively low. Based on the conclusions, the study recommends that Web 2.0 tools should be used as part of the accreditation criterion for university libraries and that the NUC should embark on a national university virtual campaign. Additionally, librarians need to adapt to the revolutionary changes in technology that lead to changes in scholarly communication. Further studies can be conducted as to the choice of libraries in integrating Web 2.0 tools