APPLICATION OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN THE MANAGEMENT OF NIGERIAN ACADEMIC LIBRARIES

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) have greatly affected the society. Almost every sector of the society has been influenced by ICT. In contemporary society, there is hardly anything that can be done without the aid of the ICTs. The situation is such that knowledge of it has been considered as very essential to meet up with the demands of the 21st century economic, educational, and social spheres. Mairaj and El-Hadi (2012, p.218) corroborate: “During the last fifty years, the world has witnessed important changes; in particular, information and communication technology (ICT) has brought a revolution in every sphere of life.” In the views of Usha, (2012) ICTs are the most sophisticated and expensive computer-based technologies. It is the sophisticated nature of the ICTs that makes it useful in different spheres of life. Sulaiman (2010) opines that recent trends in the existing field of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) have led to new and simpler ways of doing things such as information sharing, economic activities, journalism practice, politicking, library services, among others. Chukwu and Agwu (2012) corroborate that the increasing use of technology in all aspects of human lives makes effective use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) an indispensable skill for life. The composition of ICTs makes them very essential for executing different tasks. ICTs include both hardware devices and the software that allow the hardware devices to carry out or to be used for their intended functions. Nwanwene (2010) describes ICTs as a generic name used to refer to a number of communication hardware adopted in ensuring instantaneous dissemination of information and social values across the globe. It is equally a set of communication technology that shares that digitization made possible and is widely being made available for personal use as communication device. Dominick (2002) notes that the essential features of the ICTs lie in their interconnectedness, their accessibility to individual users as senders and/or receivers, their interactivity, their multiplicity of use and open ended character and their ubiquity and delocatedness. One of the areas where ICTs have been found useful is library services. Twenty-first century libraries can hardly render effective services without the use of ICTs. This is largely because the needs of library users have also been altered as a result of their knowledge and skills of ICTs. The rapid expansion of the Internet and the availability of an ever growing array of information technology tools have created a paradigm shift in the field of librarianship (Kari, 2017). The emergence of ICT has affected the role and services of the libraries. As Etim (2014) cited in Kari (2017) avers that the rapid pace of development in the field of Information Technology and the emergence of networked information services have prompted a comprehensive review of the library and information science profession. There is a clear paradigm shift from manual ways of carrying out information services powered by analogue data to electronic ways of accessing and retrieving information powered by electronic gadgets. ICT in the view of Abubakar (2011) cited in Kari (2017) is being introduced and included into all aspects of library services while e-library and e-resources are becoming the order of the day in library and information practice. Arising from the changes in library services occasioned by the ICTs, library workers have to also change their mode of operations. Janakiraman, Ormsby and Subramanian (2016) aver that library professionals need distinct information tools (Information Communication Technologies) for daily activities as well as for research and academic purposes. According to the trio, research and academic libraries have greatly improved with the expeditious changes in information communication technology because the emergence of modern library advances in ICT has opened up new ways of accumulating, regulating and disseminating scientific and technical information. The afore-going changes in library services engineered by the ICTs have raised interest among scholars to provide empirical data on the uses and applications of ICT skills in library Information services (LIS) with a view to modernizing the libraries. There is also the interest on how ICT tools can be applied to provide, innovative services to the users. In Polytechnics, just like in other institutions of learning, libraries are faced with the challenge of applying and using ICTs tools in rendering services to its users in line with the demand of the moment. Polytechnic libraries are set up with the aim of providing information resources to students, members of staff of the polytechnic community and other intended users. In addition to information materials, personal assistance is offered to library users to ensure optimal use of the library (Onuoha & Subair, 2013). This study, thus examined the use and application of ICTs in polytechnics in Nasarawa State.