Exploring the professional qualification of Teacher Librarians in Akuressa educational zone.

Abstract

Teacher librarians are the in charge of school librarians under the administration of principals. In Sri Lanka, a person who is in charge of the school library referred to as a teacher librarian. To manage a school library, teacher librarians must have specific knowledge, skills and training related with Library and Information Science. Hence, the objective of this study is to identify the current situation of Library and Information Science related professional qualifications of teacher librarians in government schools in Akuressa educational zone. Akuressa educational zone in Matara district was selected as the study area. A sample of fifty teacher librarians was drawn randomly from Akuressa educational zone. Primary data of this study was collected using questionnaires post through regular mail with self-stamped envelopes. The response rate for the questionnaire was 72%. A significant number (88.9%) of respondents do not have any professional qualification in the Library and Information Science (LIS). Only four (11.1%) respondents have professional qualifications in LIS. Library-related duties such as, Classification, Cataloguing, Shelving and Circulation cannot perform well without proper knowledge and training. School administrations’ lack of knowledge in library management and lack of formally established teacher librarian service are the main reasons behind failed libraries in government schools of Sri Lanka. Thus, the government of Sri Lanka and Ministry of Education have to play a vital role behind establishing rules and regulations to recruit qualified individual as teacher librarians to overcome failures in school libraries.