INFLUENCE OF SCHOOL LIBRARY SERVICE ON STUDENTS ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE IN WAEC

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

The past 62 years have seen a dramatic change in the status of the library both at the tertiary and secondary school levels. Since the early 1950s, almost 30,000 new secondary school libraries have been established in Africa, and thousands of federally funded development programs and collection expansion projects have enhanced existing libraries in public elementary and secondary schools in Nigeria. At the same time, school libraries have evolved from having a primary focus on books, housed in a store-like environment or room to providing the rich array of resources and services with computers as may be found in most academic libraries and information centers of today. These school libraries through the provision of information-rich resources and services have been considered paramount in the development of education and academic performance of its pupils and students who in daily basis, patronizes the services of the library.

School libraries are set-up in the primary and secondary school to cater for teaching and learning interest of their popular students. They are derived from the impact of the school library; some of those libraries are to provide background information materials which would supplement the impact of school library which is to organized and preserved for use of all teaching materials relevance to the school curriculum. The people in the primary and secondary school where school library is organized and operated can borrow or consult books and other information materials of the library when needs arise. School library enables students to acquire with books and other information materials so as to bounding the idea and stimulated their devices for knowledge of the school library Additionally, Ginika (2017) assets that the facilities, materials, equipments and staff of the library are organized in such a way that they support learning within the educational goals of the academic institution.

Furthermore, these educational goals are geared towards ensuring that students achieve mastery of educational objectives. Thus, the achievement and mastery of the educational objectives is what leads to educational development and academic enhancement. Nonetheless, ‘educational development’, for the purpose of this paper can be considered as any innovative action taken with the intention of either enhancing the teaching of a particular subject or enhancing the students’ learning of the subject. This is to say that educational development acts on both the teaching and learning processes. Consequently, preliminary observations and literature have shown that most Nigerian secondary school students cannot secure admission into institutions of higher learning of their choice due to poor academic performance in the placement examination. This poor performance which negatively affects the educational development of the students may be attributed to poor learning environment especially absence or inadequate library services in these secondary schools. Here, academic performance is seen as one of the determinants of educational development.

Academic performance translates into the ability of the student to accomplish his or her tasks and studies. However, this accomplishment is measured with grades and is certainly the most well-known indicator of academic performance. Consequently, academic performance is the ability to study and remember facts and being able to communicate one’s knowledge verbally or written on paper. Library services in the words of Nnadozie (2007); Igwe and Onah (2013) may be classified into technical and readers’ services. Library services involve the totality of assistance provided by the library for its users. These services, to a large extent determine the well-being of the library user, educationally, emotionally and otherwise. The library service could be direct or indirect as well as personal or group. Consequently, based on the great importance attributed to library services,

1.2 Statement of the Problem

The prevalence of poor academic performance seems to have increased over the last two decades been estimated at close to 11.3% in a general school population. In Nigeria, the estimation of the intensity of under-performance is clear as many inhibitory factors may be involved, as it is observed that the level of academic under-achievement is influenced by the presence of other academic inhibitory factors. This is because being successful in academics could be consequent on being regular and doing assignments on time. For instance, the latest results of the West African Examination Council2) showed that only 62, 295 of the 310, 077 candidates (20.04 percent) passed with credit in five subjects including English/mathematics. 3) There is further revealed that, a total of 529,425 candidates, representing 31.28 percent, obtained credits in five subjects and above, including English Language and Mathematics. It is noted that when compared to the 2011, 2012 and 2013 May/June WASSCE results, there was marginal decline in the performance of candidates as 30.70 percent was recorded in 2011, 38.81 percent in 2012 and 36.57 percent in 2013, researchers are of the opinion that many factors influence the academic performance of students which include, the home environment and the school environment, under the school environment is the school library which is the main focus of this research, therefore the main aim of this research is too investigate the influence of school library on the academic performance of students in WAEC.