Role of the National Institute of Library and Information Sciences to Empower Teacher Librarians in Sri Lanka

Abstract

The National Institute of Library and Information Sciences (NILIS), an Institute affiliated with the University of Colombo, in Sri Lanka, was established in 1999, with the main objective of training Sri Lankan school librarians and other library staff, under the World Bank project. Accordingly, in 2002, NILIS commenced Certificate, Diploma, and Post-graduate courses for teacher librarians. Concurrently the Ministry of Education selected and trained 4000 teacher librarians with the assistance of NILIS. The training consisted of short term and long term programs commencing at the certificate level and leading to the post graduate level . Teacher librarians were mainly trained to manage school libraries; while being empowered to teach the subjects in which they specialized in the university, or Information literacy, in order to give them the same status as the other teachers. To date NILIS has trained around 2000 teacher librarians under the different categories. In this study, the number of training sessions conducted, number of teachers trained, and the outcome of the programs are elaborated and discussed. Finally, the performance of the teacher librarians after the completion of the masters in teacher librarianship course conducted by NILIS is critically discussed, using the data collected by the interview method with the random sampling technique. The results show that most of the teacher librarians trained at NILIS are performing school library organization activities at a more satisfactory level than prior to receiving their training. Nevertheless, the teaching of information literacy by the teacher librarians to the school children is not being fulfilled at a satisfactory level. Most of the teacher librarians who have obtained higher professional qualifications at NILIS are unsatisfied due to problems with regard to their promotional schemes. Since 2005, NILIS and other relevant bodies have been striving to resolve the problems of the teacher librarians, but so far their efforts have not been successful.