EFFECTS OF LIBRARY ON THE ACADEMIC PERFORMANCES OF STUDENTS IN TERTIARY INSTITUTIONS

EFFECTS OF LIBRARY ON THE ACADEMIC PERFORMANCES OF STUDENTS IN TERTIARY INSTITUTIONS

A CASE STUDY OF KOGI STATE POLYTECHNIC LOKOJA, KOGI STATE

ABSTRACT

This research work takes a critical look and thorough investigation on the effect of library on the academic performances of students of Kogi State Polytechnic Lokoja. The project work makes use of a case study method and used the interview and personal observation as its main instrument for data collections. At the end of data gathering process and analysis it was revealed and concluded that the lack of fund to update the library stock, qualified staff, absence of library period on the student time table, lackadaisical attitude of students toward the use of library are some of the factors militating against the effective use of the library. On the basis of this findings, suggestion and recommendations were made to the effect that there should be a source of fund to purchase up-to-date materials in the library holding also, that qualify staff and provision of library period on the school time- table should be ensured.

CHAPTER ONE

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

• INTRODUCTION

The National policy on Education (1998) recognized tertiary education as one whose goal is to impact knowledge, promote and encourage scholarship services on students. This goal can only be achieved through teaching, research, generation and dissemination of knowledge in order to achieve this goal the policy enjoins school proprietors to provide functional libraries in all their educational institutions in accordance with the established standards. They shall also provide for training of librarians and library assistance for this service.

As rightly observed by Anafulu (1996), the important role of the library as a partner in the business of higher education is universally accepted and respected.

In tertiary institutions, the centrality of the library’s role and functions are recognized around heads of library who are by law, principal officers. The library main functions are to support learning teaching and to aid research process in the institution. This is done by selecting, acquiring, processing organizing and ensuring the availability of appropriate materials in all formats.

    The purpose for which these materials are build up is to provide services that will satisfy the needs of readers.

    In business, people often talk abut customer services whilst libraries will prefer the use of the word, reader’s services. Customer services and reader services connotation are synonymous in many respect except that, customer services implies profit making whereas, reader services are social responsibilities that should be performed by libraries without having profits as the main objective.

It has been argued that library provides social services that do not generate profits; therefore there is no need to justify effective services as and business ventures. Although, libraries are not established for the purpose   of making profits, reader’s satisfaction should be the ultimate goal. It should be remembered that readers especially students in an academic libraries, payed library fees and other forms of levies before services are rendered to them. It is then proper for the students to have good returns for their money.

These has prompted Harrison and Beecham (1985) to remark that; every member of the organization will have needs that the library could and should satisfy the ambition of the user, librarian must by this to identify the needs in good time, to have the service available at an appropriate point and to encourage the users to approach library.

There is no doubt that library has a significant role to play in our educational development given the singular reason, every educational sector emphasis it’s importance and has therefore do all what is humanly possible to provide learning materials in the library.

    A library is a house that store varieties of knowledge materials that is solely designed for group or individual reading. Supplementary, library play a greater role in our educational development. Books in assorted forms are gathered and brought in a place for individual to benefit.

An academic library is one located within the school (parent organization) such as polytechnic, university, colleges of education.

    An academic library has an essential element for the development of literacy, teaching, leaning, cultural and assimilation which are core imperative in every academic settings.

    The above factors hereby called for the Rangananthans (1963) five laws of library science, which states:-

• Books are for use
• Every reader and his book
• Every book is for reader
• Don’t waste the time of the reader
• The library is a growing organism.

1.1  HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF KOGI STATE POLYTECHNIC        LIBRARY

            The birth of Kogi State Polytechnic in January, 1993 was predicted on the outcome of a technical committee’s report set up by the then Government of Kogi State to examine the desirability as well as the feasibility of establishing a state-owned polytechnic and formulate the philosophy and objective of the institution.

          The objective of the polytechnic among other is to provide post-secondary and academic and practical training in management service and technology whose distinctive attribute would be creativity and self reliance and to accelerate the general socio-economic development of Kogi State.

STUDENT AND STAFF

           The Polytechnic which took of in January, 1993 with a scanty student population of 840 and staff strength of 70 has witnessed a steady growth in both student and staff. Presently, the polytechnic has a total population of about 6,000 students pursuing various courses at it’s ,Lokoja Campus in full-time, while at Osara Campus, the total student population is about 2,500.

          Apart from the full-time courses, the polytechnic has part-time courses at the main Campus Lokoja and Itakpe/Osara Campus. The course that are being run at these centres are essentially in administration and management. The student population pursuing pat-time courses is about 2,500 at present. 

          The polytechnic initially took off with four school namely:

1. School of Engineering metallurgy at Osara Campus, this was a campus of Kwara state Polytechnic which fell within the territory of Kogi State at its creation and invariably become the nucleus house of Kogi State Polytechnic.
2. School of management studies: This comprises three (3) departments initially namely: Financial studies, Business studies, Secretarial studies and the accreditation of more courses in 2009 fixed in the Department of Library and Information Science Temporarily.
3. School of applied Science with single departments Mathematics & Statistics but now with additional department of science and labouratory technology and computer science.
4. School of environmental Technology: This comprise the departments listed below:

• Architectural Technology
• Building Technology
• Survey and Geo-informatics
• Urban and Regional Planning
• School of Engineering
• School of Art and Design
• School of Preliminary studies
• School of general & Remedial studies  

KOGI STATE POLYTECHNIC LIBRARY COMPLEX

          The Kogi State Polytechnic Library was established right from the inception of the polytechnic in January 1993, the library complex is located within the polytechnic and is situated close to the school of arts and industrial design (AID). The library consists of various units and each units is headed by a professional librarian. These units are Administrative, Technical services and readers services.

 EXPLANATION TO THE UNITS AND THEIR FUNCTIONS

1. ADMINISTRATIVE UNITS: This units is charged with the responsibilities to perform both administrative and secretarial functions. Such activities are as follows:

• Day to day library management
• Keeping records of library staff and preparing reports relating to library
• The unit communicates relevant information within and outside the library.
• Ensuring that all facilities in the library are properly managed.
• Planning, organization and coordinating the activities of library personnel’s.

2. CIRCULATION UNIT: This is a unit in which the circulation librarian is saddled with the responsibility of supervising all library materials and equipment. Principally, this section carried out functions as circulation of library materials, registration, charging and discharging of materials to users.
3. TECHNICAL SERVICES UNIT: The technical service unit of the library comprises of collection development, cataloging and classification division. The collection development takes charge of selection, aid acquisition of library materials, while the cataloging and classification division takes charge of the organization of acquired materials in terms of books, journals, monograph etc.

  Kogi State Polytechnic Library catalogue materials using Anglo American Cataloging Rules (AACR2) while Library of Congress Classification Scheme is used for Classification.

4. READERS SERVICE UNIT: The readers service unit is the area where all the activities carried out in the library becomes glaring. This unit is made up of different divisions namely: Circulation, Reserve, Reference and serial sections.
5. RESERVE UNIT: The materials in reserve section are usually not allowed to be carried out by users except on the permission of the library officers, catalogue are given to users to confirm whether the material needed are in reserve section and in these process, user can request for such.
6. REFERENCE UNIT: The materials available in this section ranges from encyclopedia, Dictionaries, Year books, Handbooks, Projects written by past students of the polytechnic and other reference materials, these collections are organized accordingly for easy accessibility.
7. INTERNET SERVICES: The students and staff of the Polytechnic access the internet in the library for electronic resource without any payment. This service is made available to enable them browse and download any material relevant to their various academic need.
8. SERIAL SECTION: This section house collections ranging from newspapers, periodicals, magazines and journals. Users have access to journals from various disciplines from this section of the library.

1.2     STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

          It is very obvious that libraries are always established along sides their parent institution as an indispensable and integral part of educational system.

          It is clear that the educational goals of any academic settings could hardly be attained without a solid and functional library.

          Inspite of the above factors, however examination in recent time have been producing very bad results with students have several carry over in courses sat for, it is of a fact that, students wallow in object of failure owing to their inability to use the school library. The question then will be how well are the students prepared for those examinations? In what ways does the school help in the sound preparation for the examination? How well are school library stocks towards the preparation? It is of this poor performance that this study investigates the “Effects of Library on the academic performances of students of Kogi State Polytechnic Lokoja.

1.3     RESEARCH QUESTION

          This study is aimed at providing solutions to the following research questions. Which are as follows:-

1. What types of materials does the Polytechnic library holds?
2. How current and relevant are these subject based materials?
3. How does the library ensures active use of those materials by the student?
4. How can the library services be improved to enhance the academic performance of the students?

1.4     ASSUMPTIONS

          The following assumptions were made about this study namely:-

• Library use has positive impact on the academic performances of student.
• Students and lecturers knows the essence of library resources in the educational process.

1.5     OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

          This study is aimed at achieving the following objectives:-

• To know the kinds/types of materials that are being held by the library presently.
• To know the relationship between the use of the library on the academic performance of students.
• To know how library ensures active use of this materials by students and staff.
• To know how current and relevant are these subject based materials.
• To make valuable suggestions that can contribute immensely to the improvement of library services to the students and staffs of the polytechnic.

1.6     SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

          The research topic is aimed at revealing the essence of library use on the academic performances of students in Kogi State Polytechnic and every other interested readers. Also, it will immensely assist to reveal the relationship between students who regularly use library in preparation for examination and those who do not patronize library at all.

          This research work will also help to unveil the deficiency of library especially in the specific areas of relevant collections and services to the students and lecturers.

          The outcome of this project could also serve as eye opener to the students to know the effect of the library in their academic pursuits.

          Finally, the findings also could assist both the school management and wider spectrum of the educational planners in both present and future generation a comprehensive planning exercises especially as it relates to the relevance and importance of the library in the life of the institution, the students and their lecturers.

1.7     SCOPE OF THE STUDY

          This research work intends to cover the Kogi State Polytechnic Library users only. It is meant to examine the effect of library on the academic performances of students in the institution.

          This study would have covered more ground than Kogi State Polytechnic even covered out sketch of this institution but, because of financial constraints, time limitation, facilities and convenience. It is thereby limited to cover Kogi State Polytechnic.

1.8     OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF TERMS

1. Academic Library: Any library attached to a post-secondary or tertiary institution or libraries attached to universities, Polytechnics, Colleges of educations, colleges of agriculture etc.
2. Library: A library is a social institution charge with the responsibilities of selection, acquisition, organization, interpretation, conservation, retrieval and dissemination of information by trained or professional librarians and para-professionals. Library is a store or ware house of knowledge. It serves as link between knowledge and users for social, economical, political and cultural development.
3. Library Use: Library use is the act of making use of the materials in the library holding such as textbooks, encyclopedia, journals, dictionaries, periodicals, magazines, newspapers etc. for the achievement of quality education and also for research purposes.
4. Audio Visual Materials: Are multimedia formats that are hosed in the library such as compact disk read only memory (CD-ROM), video tapes, slides, microfilms, audio tapes and microfiche etc. used for the dissemination of stored information electronically to library patrons.
5. Encyclopedia: Encyclopedia are reference material or book given information on many topics.
6. AACR2: This is an acronyms of Anglo American cataloging rules used as basic rules and guidance to catalogue library materials.
7. Academic Performance: This referred to the extents to which students have been able to succeed in the school works as indicated by their results.
8. DDC: This stands for Dewey Decimal classification, this contains manual, schedules and relative index used to classify library materials.
9. Librarian: A body professionally trained in library and information science to perform the function of managing human and library resources.

L.C.C.: This stands for Library of Congress Classification, it is a scheme used to classify library materials.

REFERENCES

Akinbode, K.O. (2002): Readers services in academic library Ibadan-Evi-Coleman Publication.

Anafalu (1996): The Impact roles of the Library users’ Satisfaction in Academic Libraries: Issues and Strategies for Intervention Vol.2.

Dike, V.W. (2006) users Satisfaction in academic Libraries: Issues and Strategies for Intervention. Global Review of Library and Information Science.

Kogi State Polytechnic Student comprehensive Hand Book Rev. Edition, 2010.

Mbashir, A.L. et’al (2010): General Library studies I & II Lokoja; JHL Nig. Ltd.

O’Connor, Brigid (1998): Libraries and the Development of Information Society in Nigeria. A Paper Presented at  the Nigeria Library Association (NLA) Conference, Abuja.

Ragananthan (1963): Five Laws of Library Science, A. Guide to Librarians London: PMS Printing Press.