Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Date of this Version
2021
Abstract
The present study examined the roles school libraries play in meeting the educational information needs of secondary school students in Nigeria. The research design was a descriptive survey. To realize the four specific purposes of the study, 200 secondary school students were sampled from four secondary schools in Nsukka local government area of Enugu State, Nigeria. Their opinions were sampled using a researcher-developed questionnaire. First, it was found that students' educational information needs were mostly academic and related to future career development. The findings further suggest that the role of school libraries as major sources of educational information for secondary stand out especially on the provision of academic information and career-related information since the student consult the library regular in search of such information. However certain barriers such as poor technology integration in school library services limit the potentials of the school library in meeting the educational information needs of the students. These barriers make students lose faith in the capability of the school library to influence their learning experience positively. To correct this impression it was suggested among others that employment of qualified teacher-librarians; extending library opening hours and above all, provision of networked computers in the school libraries could go a long way in improving service quality and the capability of the school libraries to meet the educational information needs of students.